T

he Indonesian Seafarers’ Association (KPI) called on the government to close the country’s waterways to foreign boat people.

The association also urged the government to deport thousands of illegal foreigners causing social problems in their resettlement areas in Southeast Maluku and Papua.

KPI Chairman Hanafi Rustandi said the resettlement of ex-crewmen of fishing ships had not only reduced opportunities for locals but had contributed to the spreading of HIV/AIDS and illegal drug trafficking in the two provinces and was a result of the government’s lax policy in handling illegal immigrants.

“Seafarers in the two provinces have repeatedly voiced their objection to the resettlement of the former crew members of foreign fishing vessels but we have been disappointed by the government’s lax policy which seems to give protection to illegal immigrants,” he said in a press conference here on Wednesday.

He stated that many Thai and Myanmarese seafarers infected by the HIV virus had married local women and transmitted the fatal disease to their wives and children.

KPI in cooperation with the ILO and UNHCR has established special clinics to provide free counseling and medical aid for people with HIV/AIDS in Tual, Southeast Maluku, and in Merauke, Papua, due to the increasing number of HIV cases in the two provinces.

So far, 51 seafarers from Thailand and Myanmar have been detained by the immigration office in Ambon in their attempt to seek resettlement in the province but their deportation has been suspended for financial reasons.

Hanafi, also chairman of the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) Asia-Pacific Region, said the government should set up an unoccupied island as a special area to intercept illegal immigrants as it did in Galang, Riau Islands, in the past so that they could be handled better and deported easily.

“More and more illegal immigrants from the conflict-ridden Mideast region such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan will come to Indonesia unless immigration policy is tightened and the illegal boatpeople are deported,” he said.

Hanafi said Indonesia had been a haven for Mideast boatpeople seeking asylum because the majority population was Muslim and because it was also a safe transit point for those heading to Australia and New Zealand seeking refuge.

He also called on the government to take harsh measures against transnational syndicates believed to have been behind the inflow of illegal immigrants, including the group of Mideast immigrants whose logging ship recently capsized on Pangandaran waters in West Java on their way to Australia.