Philippine President Gloria Arroyo expressed outrage yesterday at reports that a Filipina girl was sexually abused in a Malaysian detention centre for illegal immigrants and asked Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad to immediately act on the complaint.

Arroyo's concern over the reported abuse of the 13-year-old girl was expressed in a letter to Mahathir, the foreign department said in a statement.

The letter was delivered to Malaysian ambassador to Manila Taufik Noor, who was summoned to Foreign Secretary Blas Ople's office yesterday.

"I express my personal outrage and that of the Filipino people and which I am sure you will also condemn in the strongest terms," Arroyo said in the letter to Mahathir.

Ople also lodged a diplomatic protest with Kuala Lumpur on the reported incident, the foreign department said.

The incident "calls to question Malaysia's adherence to all United Nationsnternational conventions on human rights, especially the rights of women and children, and may question an act of aggression against civilisation itself," the protest note said.

The Philippine government "condemns in the strongest terms this outrage" and is calling on Kuala Lumpur to "conduct a swift and thorough investigation of the report, leading to the prosecution and trial of those found responsible," the note added.