US President Donald Trump has vowed to honour the deal with Australia for the US to resettle refugees from Nauru and Manus Island during a phone conversation with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Sunday morning, Fairfax Media understands.
Mr Trump told Mr Turnbull during the 25-minute call that his administration would continue to honour the arrangement, which the Prime Minister struck with the Obama administration but which came into question because of Mr Trump's hardline statements on accepting refugees.
It is not yet clear how many of the roughly 2000 asylum-seekers held on Nauru and Manus Island will be resettled in the US.
Under the agreement with the Obama administration, US officials were to scrutinise applicants from February and only after that were the precise terms of the deal to be finalised.
News that Mr Trump won't overturn his predecessor's arrangement with Australia puts to rest months of concern about the future of the deal that could finally resolve the plight of many of the refugees on Nauru and Manus Island.
An executive order released over the weekend by Mr Trump includes a four-month pause on all refugee arrivals, a three-month ban on entry by citizens from seven countries of terrorism concern including Iran, Iraq and Syria, and an indefinite halt on all refugees from Syria.
The new US President has also ordered officials to prioritise refugees who are fleeing persecution as members of religious minorities in their home countries, which would most obviously apply to Christians and other non-Muslims in the Middle East and South Asia.
That order, however, also stated that senior US officials can "admit individuals to the United States as refugees on a case-by-case basis" including to "enable the United States to conform its conduct to a pre-existing international agreement".
It was expected that details of the deal between Australia and the US would not be nailed down until the second half of the year in any case.
It is unlikely that the US will take all confirmed refugees from Australia's offshore detention system. Many of those on Manus Island are single men, on whom the US is regarded as likely to look less favourably. Many are Iranian.
In their first conversation since the businessman was sworn in as US President, Mr Turnbull and Mr Trump also discussed the war against the so-called Islamic State and agreed to work together on global security including in the Asia-Pacific region. They also talked about their shared interest in stopping irregular migration of people seeking asylum.
Mr Turnbull's office is yet to comment on the 25-minute long conversation between the two leaders. A two paragraph statement from the White House said both leaders "emphasised the enduring strength and closeness of the US-Australia relationship that is critical for peace, stability and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region and globally".
Education Minister Simon Birmingham told reporters he did not know the details of the conversation between Mr Turnbull and Mr Trump but said the two countries had "long been close allies and have worked co-operatively on a range of agreements and I'm very confident, the government's very confident, we will continue to work co-operatively on agreements in the future".