FACTBOX: Australia's detention camps

CANBERRA, Australia -- At detention camps in Australia riots and breakouts are common and every incident is widely reported by the government and local media.

Here is a breakdown of the main points about the country’s controversial detention centers and a timeline of major violence at the camps.

-- Australia currently holds about 2,500 illegal immigrants, including up to 500 children, in nine camps of which six are permanent.

-- The government says Australia has 12,000 places per year for humanitarian refugees, a scheme it says is "more generous on a per capita basis than anywhere else bar Canada".

-- Australia is only one of eight countries that has a formal refugee resettlement program, the government says.

-- Over the years, detainees at the three biggest camps -- Port Hedland, Curtin and Woomera -- have staged peaceful breakouts and hunger strikes and unleashed bursts of violence to protest being held and denied rights afforded to those refugees who arrive legally.

-- The detention centers are run by a private operator -- Australasian Correctional Management (ACM), a unit of U.S. prison operator Wackenhut Corrections Corp. Critics of the camps protest at the outsourcing saying it is wrong for a private firm to seek profit from managing refugees.

-- The cost to the government and taxpayer amounts to $53 per aslyum-seeker per day.

-- Plans are afoot to allow for an increase in capacity for up to a further 3,000 illegal immigrants.

-- The Australian government has increased the penalty for escaping from a detention center to five years jail from two and increased the term for helping escapees or inciting violence to ten years.

Timeline of camp violence

June 8, 2000 -- 500 break out of Woomera.

June 9 -- 150 break out of Curtin.

November 29 -- Ten hospitalized after hunger strike at Woomera.

January 21, 2001 -- 180 riot at Port Hedland.

January 30 -- 300 riot at Curtin.

March 27 -- 14 escape from Villawood.

March 30 -- 60 riot at Port Hedland.

April 4 -- 200 riot at Curtin.

May 8 -- 100 riot at Port Hedland.

May 26 -- 170 police raid Port Hedland camp, arrest 22 detainees and seize a cache of homemade weapons.

June 2 -- 200 riot at Curtin.

July 19 -- 23 escape from Villawood.

July 23 -- 23 escape from Villawood.

July 26 -- South African man commits suicide at Villawood.

August 26 -- 39 detainees in hunger strike at Curtin. Five sew their lips together in protest.

August 13 -- Six-year-old Iranian boy removed from a center is placed in foster care after refusing to eat, drink or speak.

Reuters contributed to this report.