A spokesman for Indonesia's president has denied Susilo Banbang Yudhoyono had postponed a visit to Australia because of the diplomatic standoff with that country over Sri Lankan asylum seekers aboard an Australian ship off Indonesia's coast.
Following news that Susilo Banbang Yudhoyono had delayed his trip, Australia's opposition expressed concern it was because of the row over an Australian ship which is carrying 78 Sri Lankan asylum seekers.
The 78 Sri Lankan asylum seekers on board are ethnic Tamils, including women and children, who were found drifting in a wooden boat with a broken engine in international waters near Indonesia, where they were picked up by the Australian Customs Service ship.
Speaking in Jakarta, presidential spokesman Dino Patti Djalal said "after considering a number of circumstances relating to the domestic issues, the president decided that he would make the visit in February and that had been confirmed directly by president Yudhoyono to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd".
Twenty-two of 78 Sri Lankan asylum seekers disembarked from the ship on Friday, after spending over three weeks moored off Indonesia's coast.
Indonesian authorities said that the asylum seekers, who had been refusing to leave the Oceanic Viking, would be taken to temporary shelters, where they would undergo medical and administrative checks by officials from the Indonesian Immigration service.
Officials said that the asylum seekers would be held at the shelters for 4 weeks before being moved to Australia, after the Australian government reportedly agreed to resettle all the people within 3 weeks.
There was no information given on the other 56 people still onboard the Oceanic Viking, although it is thought they will also disembark the ship in the near future.
Disagreements between the Australian and Indonesian government over who had responsibility for the people led to the long delay in dealing with the issue.
"It's not an easy problem but it's completely manageable and it's unrealistic for us to cancel a visit just because of the boat issue," Djalal said.
The asylum seekers had then been taken to Bintan Island in Indonesia to be assessed under United Nations refugee rules at an immigration detention centre, but the local government would not allow the Sri Lankans to disembark, and the Indonesian government refused to physically move the Sri Lankans off the boat.
"We are willing to temporarily accommodate them in our detention centres until they can be relocated to a third country, whatever that third country may be, but we definitely don't want them to stay in Indonesia permanently," the presidential spokesman said.
The Sri Lankans are the latest in a flood of thousands of people from war-torn countries such as Afghanistan and Iraq seeking better futures in Australia, but arriving in Indonesia.
Indonesia is a staging point for human traffickers who have been known to charge US$15,000 per person for the treacherous journey, often made on boats unfit for the rough seas, to isolated Christmas Island, an Australian territory.
The cash-strapped Indonesian government has limited resources for dealing with the influx of new arrivals and relies heavily on assistance from the United Nations and International Organisation for Migration to feed and shelter them.
APTN