Police arrest mastermind behind refugee death boat

JAKARTA - Indonesian police have arrested an Egyptian suspected of organising a refugee boat for illegal migrants which sank last month killing more than 350 people.

National police spokesman Saleh Saaf said yesterday that Abu Quassey, whom Australian authorities have accused of being responsible for much of the illegal people trafficking from the Middle East to Australia, was arrested in West Java on Monday with a colleague.

"Abu Quassey was arrested with his right-hand man Johan. We are still searching for four other members of Quassey's gang," Saaf said.

He said a special police team set up to hunt the smugglers had tracked the gang from Sumatra to West Java.



"We are trying to crack down on the gang from the top to the bottom. We are coordinating with Australian police on this."

Australia has long urged Jakarta to crack down on human smugglers, but Indonesia had been reluctant until last month's incident in which an overcrowded boat bound for Christmas Island sank off Java, killing more than 350 people.

The vast Indonesian archipelago is the staging post for many illegal migrants - mainly from the Middle East, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka - who try to reach Australia on leaky fishing boats organised by smugglers who get rich out of the trade.

Last month, two Indonesian police officers were arrested for protecting people smugglers.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard hinted yesterday that terrorists could sneak into Australia among boatloads of asylum seekers.

In an interview with Brisbane's Courier Mail newspaper, Howard argued that his Government's new policy of refusing entry to asylum seekers coming to Australia by boat was justified in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States.

"You don't know who's coming and you don't know whether they do have terrorist links or not," Howard told the newspaper.

Seeking a third term at elections on Saturday, Howard has staked out counter-terrorism and border security as central issues in the campaign.

Meanwhile, Christmas Island residents have alleged that unidentified Royal Australian Navy officers told them asylum seekers had not thrown their children overboard during a confrontation with HMAS Adelaide last month, a newspaper reported yesterday.

The Australian quoted two anonymous residents, who said different officers separately told them the refugees were in the water because their ship had already started to sink. One man was told by two officers: "Whatever you hear - the asylum seekers did not throw their children overboard."



At the time, it was reported that children were thrown overboard after a boat carrying 187 asylum seekers was herded away from Australian waters by HMAS Adelaide.

Defence Minister Peter Reith claimed that the Navy had video footage of the asylum seekers throwing children overboard, but has refused to release the images. Yesterday Labor leader Kim Beazley called on him to do so.

- AGENCIES