AUSTRALIA RELATIONS WITH INDONESIA HAVE GONE SO LOW FOLLOWING AUSTRALIA TURNED BACK A BOATLOAD OF ASYLUM SEEKERS BOTH ON 19TH DECEMBER 2013 AND 7TH JANUARY 2014 WITHOUT FIRST NOTIFYING THE GOVT OF INDONESIA BANGKOK, 15 January 2014 (IRIN) - Levels of cooperation on people smuggling between Indonesia and Australia have sunk to a new low following claims by Jakarta that the Australian Navy turned back a boatload of asylum seekers on 19 December 2013, and another on 7 January, without first notifying them, officials say. Our position is very clear. We do not agree with the ‘turn back boats’ policy,” Dewi Wahab, the Indonesian Foreign Ministrys director for East Asia and the Pacific, told IRIN. This could be interpreted as infringing on our sovereignty.” Her comments follow allegations in early January that two boats carrying approximately 100 asylum seekers from the Middle East and North Africa were discovered in Australian waters near Darwin and towed back to Indonesia. “The Australian government sees the violation of its borders by the activities of criminal people smugglers as a matter of national sovereignty,” Scott Morrison, the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, countered from Canberra, the Australian capital. Indonesia and Australia are co-chairs of the Bali process (a regional 50-member mechanism established in 2002 to combat people-smuggling), but the Australian governments stringent new policies, such as the Regional Deterrence Framework puts regional relations - and the lives of asylum seekers - at risk, say Indonesian officials and refugee rights advocates.
Posted on: Sat, 18 Jan 2014 02:27:07 +0000
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