Immigration Minister Scott Morrison insists the transfer of refugees to Cambodia will be "strictly voluntary".
Mr Morrison travels to Phnom Penh on Friday to sign an agreement that will allow an uncapped number of refugees processed on Nauru to be resettled in the South-East Asian kingdom.
"There will be no surprise. The arrangement is strictly voluntary," he told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.
"Anyone who chooses to go to Cambodia will have chosen themselves to go to Cambodia"
The agreement has been criticised by aid and human rights groups.
Former Family Court chief justice Alastair Nicholson, speaking on behalf of eight groups, described it as "inappropriate, immoral and likely illegal".
The Greens fear young female refugees will be forced into prostitution.
"(Mr Morrison) says it's their choice as to whether they have to go sell themselves on the streets in Cambodia," Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.
But the minister says the resettled refugees will get support designed to make them self-reliant as quickly as possible.
Details of the agreement will be made public after it has been signed by both nations.
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