Hundreds of asylum seekers on Manus Island are staging a mass hunger strike to protest their treatment at the centre in Papua New Guinea.

An ABC report estimates up to 300 asylum seekers are protesting, while Guardian Australia says 500 people have joined the hunger strike.

• This is Bashir, the face of child detention
• How long can humans survive without food?

Australia’s Immigration Department confirmed the protest but said it was passive and asylum seekers were not refusing food.

Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said asylum seekers were fearful of being resettled in Papua New Guinea, which is a cornerstone of the Coalition government’s asylum seeker policy.

“I think that this has just heightened the fears that they’re extremely vulnerable to the locals. The memory of the killing of Reza Barati is very fresh in their minds,” Mr Rintoul told the ABC.

“For the vast majority of them, they’ve now been on Manus for close to 18 months.

“For most of them there is still no refugee determination and no end in sight to the indefinite detention for what is perhaps the worst hell-hole that Australia has created.”

Hundreds of asylum seekers on Manus Island are on a hunger strike. They fear being resettled in PNG. Please RT. pic.twitter.com/TEAF9AE5CF

— Shane Bazzi (@shanebazzi) January 13, 2015