Australia Bound Afghan, Iraqi Refugees Caught in Southern Sumatra
Thursday, 11 March, 2010 | 11:27 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta: Port authorities in Lampung Province, Sumatra, informed a catch of 21 refugees from Afghanistan and Iraq while trying to cross over the Sunda Strait to Java, in a stepped up security following terror operation in Aceh in the northen tip of the island.

Head of South Lampung Resort Police Senior Commissioner Muslim Siregar said all immigrants were caught in an Antar Lintas Sumatra bus during a joint security checks involving police anti-terror unit Detachment 88 at Bakauheni Port on Tuesday and Wednesday this week.

“We handed them to the Provincial police for further investigation by the immigration office,” Muslim said.headded that the cehcks was a routineprocedure with an increased personnel after the security operations in Aceh which peaked at the shootings of three terror suspects in Jakarta on Tuesday (9/3).

And Iraqi refugee told reporters in fluent malay that his group joined the afghan group in Malaysia and took wooden fishing boat to enter North Sumatra saying “Our destination is Australia.”

The refugees carried no identifications.

Indonesian authorities have caught hundreds of refugees from south asian countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan, some even came from Iraq, which said they were fleeing the anti-terrorwar led by the United States in the middle east and South Asia since 2001. Some refugees held refugee card issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, but Australia, who sent about 1,500 personnel to Afghnaistan rejected the arrivals saying the refugees were Indonesia’s problem.

NUROCHMAN ARRAZIE