Indonesia 'in no rush' to process Sri Lankan asylum seekers
Updated
Two groups of Sri Lankans are still waiting for Indonesian authorities to process their claims for asylum. The first group of more than 260 asylum seekers were headed for Australia, when they were intercepted by the Indonesian navy off the Java coast earlier this month. Another group is waiting for similar answers onboard the Australian customs vessel the Oceanic Viking, anchored of the northern Riau Islands.
Presenter: Bo Hill
Speaker: Teuku Faizasyah, Indonesian foreign ministry spokesman
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FAIZASYAH: Well. this is not the first case that we are dealing with the so-called refugees, so what we need to do first based on our sovereignty and our policy, we will have to conduct verifications from our side first. Then once we have an indication, some of them might have refugee status condition to the refugee, then we will enforce the international organisations. But our policy is to deal with these issues through our mechanism system. We are not in a rush, so we are just simply wait until the appeal ready to follow the verification process.
HILL: I understand the governor of the Riau Islands has told the Australian vessel that they will not allow the Sri Lankans to disembark at Kijang Port. Have you spoken to the authorities there and do you understand the governor's concerns?
FAIZASYAH: Well, we are fully aware of the situation. You see that Indonesia today we must respect the opinion and the consideration of the local government. The central government coordinates our position with the local government, but we must for sure listen to what they have in mind, but in the process, we try to explain the reason why we suggest that the vessel move toward the Tanjung Pinang area. Now what we do is send a team there to liaise with the local government and I think we have full confidence in their capacity to handle this issue. In the process, I'm not sure when the two sides will reach some kind of conclusions, but the negotiation and the discussion is in process at the moment.
HILL: Did the discussions between the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd and your President Yudhoyono have any affect on the way that foreign affairs and immigration in Indonesia are handling these particular cases?
FAIZASYAH: Well indeed, the foreign ministry is now the vocal point to coordinate a reaction or response from many agencies and departments in Indonesia, so we are coordinating, we try to seek common ground among the differing opinion and position among these agencies. But we are working as one team really, so it's not an easy process, but we will treat these last two cases as a special case. It won't be happening in the future, but we try to deal with this and try to find a solution.
HILL: Well in your opinion, what is the ideal solution?
FAIZASYAH: Well, the solution is how to provide humanitarian assistance and to ensure that within the framework of regions, then we must in the future stop the flow of boat people from the conflict areas. So it's not really a matter of Indonesia and Australia, but this is the concerns of regional countries that is why we think that what we intend the Bali process, the process sponsored by Indonesia and Australia, to deal with the issue of people smuggling and trafficking of persons, ideally would be the best framework to deal with these issues of boat people coming to our regions.
