Australia earns Indonesia's ire over Timor fisherman
Australia earns Indonesia's ire over Timor fisherman
SYDNEY (DPA): Indonesia complained to Australia on Friday over the treatment of a Timorese fishermen who survived at sea for nearly a month only to be jailed after a cyclone blew his crippled craft ashore in a remote part of the Northern Territory.
Australian authorities have refused an official request for 48-year-old David Luan to be moved from a cell in Berimah Prison to a ward at the Royal Darwin Hospital where he can be properly cared for after living on not much more than seaweed for almost a month.
Luan's outrigger drifted more than 1,000 kilometers after its outboard motor broke down.
Gale force winds whipped up by Cyclone Steve drove him ashore in the Coburg Peninsula where park rangers found him famished, dehydrated and disoriented.
The rangers described Luan's battle against the elements as a "remarkable story of survival" and classed him as seafarer in distress rather than an illegal immigrant.
But Luan was put in the slammer to await his repatriation to Indonesia and a reunion with his family in Namfalus, near Kupang, on the island of Timor.
"He is not a criminal. He is supposed to be treated properly," angry Indonesian Vice Consul Arif Soepalal told Australia's AAP.
Northern Territory Legal Aid director Richard Coates was even more critical of the attitude of the Australian authorities, saying it was outrageous that Luan should be jailed when he was guilty of no crime.
"We go to enormous efforts to save round-the-world yacht people and here's someone from our nearest neighbor who is washed up here...It's a bit of a shameful episode," Coates said.
He noted that two years ago English yachtsman Tony Bullimore was piped ashore in Perth after being saved at enormous expense by the Australian navy.
Three years ago, Frenchwoman Isabelle Autissier, another wealthy round-the-world sailor, was rescued from the sea at a cost of more than A$1 million (US$600,000).
Luan, in contrast, saved himself but was not feted when he arrived in Darwin. Instead, the impoverished but resourceful fisherman was thrown in jail to await what amounts to extradition.