Indonesia is yet to launch an aerial search for scores of missing asylum seekers amid conflicting reports surrounding a boat that sank while heading for Australia.
It's believed that at least 14 asylum seekers have been rescued by fishermen off the coast of West Java, but there are fears for almost 60 others who remain missing.
A team from Indonesia's national search and rescue agency Basarnas was this morning still scrambling to gather information about the incident.
The team had spoken to one of the survivors, an Afghan named Habibullah Hashimi, but said he was unable to provide accurate details about the boat's last known location.
Mr Hashimi, who was plucked from the water by fishermen off the coast of Sukabumi in West Java, has said that at least five of those who had been aboard the boat had drowned.
The 29-year-old said there were 72 people aboard the vessel. He said there had been 72 people aboard the vessel. All were ethnic Hazaras from Afghanistan.
At least five asylum-seekers had died, Mr Hashimi said.
"The ship just broke," he told news agency AAP. "We saw about five people dead. They were in the water."
"The sea kept moving us around," he said.
Mr Hashimi, who was recuperating in Bogor yesterday, said the boat sank at about 8am on Wednesday.
The development came after a spokeswoman from the Australian Maritime Safety Authority initially reported a boat may have sunk in the Sunda Strait about midnight on Thursday (3am AEST yesterday).
The Weekend Australian understands a spate of mobile phone calls were recorded late Thursday night from people saying they were in a boat that was sinking.
However, the Indonesian authorities have been unable to establish a position for the calls.
But the leader of the Basarnas investigation team, Rohmali, said today that details remained vague, adding that to launch an aerial search without more information would amount to a “suicide mission''.
“We need solid information to start deploying helicopters and boats. The area between Lampung (in Sumatra) and Sukabumi is huge while helicopters and boats have limited capacity of searching,'' he said.
The boat reportedly sank in the Sunda Strait - the patch of water between Java and Sumatra and which connects the Java Sea to the Indian Ocean.
In August last year, Basarnas was criticised over its response to the sinking of an asylum seeker vessel in the same area.
More than 100 asylum seekers drowned on that occasion and it was later revealed that an aerial search was not launched until six hours after the first distress call.
There is also confusion over the timing of the latest incident, with initial reports suggesting the boat sank about midnight local time on Thursday (3am AEST yesterday).
An Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) spokeswoman said that information about a vessel that may have sunk in the Sunda Strait had been forwarded to Indonesian search and rescue authorities yesterday morning.
Mr Hashimi claims, however, that he was on a boat that sank on Wednesday.
The conflicting information raises the possibility of a second missing boat.
The last known large-scale loss of life in an Indonesian asylum boat sinking was last August, also in the Sunda Strait. Fifty-four Hazaras were saved but an estimated 100 people were lost. Basarnas was criticised then for its slowness to initiate a search.
More than 200 asylum-seekers drowned in three sinkings last year.
With the easing of monsoon conditions since early March, people-smuggling traffic is running at an even higher pitch than the same time last year, which was a record year.
A spokesman for the Department of Immigration said last night a boat was intercepted off Christmas Island yesterday.
Saturday 13 April 2013
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/five-drown-as-asylum-boat-sinks/story-e6frg6n6-1226619716376
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/five-drown-as-asylum-boat-sinks/story-e6frg6nf-1226619461072
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