The beep of an incoming text message breaks the silence in the hold of a shabby wooden boat carrying 255 Sri Lankan immigrants, moored off Merak Port on the northwestern tip of Java.
As the message is read, a mixture of anger and hope casts a spell over the immigrants, hoping for a miracle that will allow them continue their two-month journey to Australia.
The message was sent by a member of a people-smuggling ring trying to get the immigrants through Indonesia to the promised land Down Under.
Immigrant spokesman Alex says the smuggler sent the message to assure the immigrants they will soon be released and be allowed to continue on their journey.
"*The smuggler* said they're working out something so that we can be released," says Alex, but clams up when asked just how the smuggler will help them.
While also declining to say what nationality the smuggler is, Alex says the boat people are being assisted by an organized group operating in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
The group's recruitment agents are never short of a supply of people clamoring to leave their impoverished or restive countries.
Middle-class Alex says people like himself pay US$15,000 to make the crossing to Australia, or $45,000 to get to Canada.
They fly to Malaysia or Singapore first, before taking a boat that smuggles them through the labyrinth of Indonesian islands to get to Australia, Alex adds.
Malaysia is also a favorite transit point for immigrants from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, because the country waives visas for citizens of other Islamic countries.
From Malaysia, the immigrants usually take a bus or a van to ports to cross into Indonesian territory on board fishing boats.
In many cases, Malaysian smugglers hand them over in the middle of the sea to their Indonesian counterparts, says immigration office spokesman Maroloan J. Baringbing.
International smuggling rings have used Indonesia as a final stopover due to its close proximity to Australia and weak monitoring of its 17,000 islands.
With an area roughly the size of western Europe, Indonesia only has 130 immigration checkpoints and 79 border posts to control the flow of people. The situation is exacerbated by the poor surveillance on the part of the underfunded Navy.
Favorite points of entry for immigrants coming in via Malaysia or Singapore include Riau Islands, North Sumatra, Aceh, East Kalimantan, Jambi and Lampung provinces.
Once there, the immigrants travel by bus or boat to Jakarta to apply for refugee status from the UNHCR representative office, says Riau Islands Police spokesman Sr. Adj. Comr. Anggaria Lopis.
"Some of them are even willing to take the risk of sailing straight to Australia in a wooden boat," he adds.
Anggaria says the immigrants pay local fishermen around $3,000 to take them from Malaysia to Riau Islands, and another $500 to Jakarta.
In some cases, the immigrants also try to slip into Australia via islands in eastern Indonesia. The transit points include Bau-Bau and Makassar in Southeast Sulawesi, and Jayapura in Papua.
Makassar Immigration Office head Triono says the immigrants, mostly from Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, usually stop in Makassar to stock up on supplies.
"It's when they come ashore that we arrest them," he says.
Sixty-two illegal immigrants are currently in detention in the Makassar, says Triono.
"Most of them come by fishing boat from Kalimantan and Java; some have sailed all the way from Riau Islands," he says.
However, not all immigrants risk their lives on the perilous crossing.
A safer way to get to Australia is to come to Jakarta, legally or illegally, and then seek refugee status from the UNHCR to be allowed to freely travel around the country to seek a way into Australia, Triono says.
The refugees sometimes take boats from the southern Java coast.
Indonesian authorities have recently laid bare these smuggling networks and arrested several suspects.
Among them is Abraham "Captain Bram" Lauhenapessy, the alleged mastermind behind the attempted smuggling of the 255 Sri Lankans to Australia, says Merak naval commander Col. Iriawan.
Abraham is also believed to be involved in attempted smuggling of 78 Sri Lankans on board the Ocean Lady. The immigrants are now being held at the Tanjung Pinang detention center in Riau Islands.
In May, authorities arrested Ali Cobra and Suparman Tong for allegedly helping 18 Afghan immigrants escape from an immigration detention center in East Nusa Tenggara.
Additional reporting by Fadli in Batam Apriadi Gunawan in Medan and Andi Hajramurti in Makassar
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