Australian authorities said the international human smuggling operation is linked to the notorious Abraham Lauhenapessy, known as Captain Bram, who has spent the last decade smuggling Sri Lankans, particularly Tamils.
The illegal migrants reportedly paid up to US$45,000 for the Canadian option, which involved the cross-Pacific journey on the Ocean Lady that was intercepted and towed to Victoria last Sunday. The other vessel with 254 Tamils aboard is currently tied at a wharf in West Java, Indonesia. Australian and Indonesian authorities said that Lauhenapessy is on that boat, which was originally heading toward Australia.
Two other vessels carrying Sri Lankan Tamils were reportedly sending distress signals Monday morning. They are suspected to be in Indonesian and Malaysian territorial waters. One of the illegal migrants on the boat in Indonesia identified by Australian and Indonesian media as Alex said he knew of the journey to Canada on board the Ocean Lady. He said he was offered a place on the Ocean Lady, but chose the Australian venture because, at US$15,000, it was much cheaper than the Canadian option.
However, Alex now said some on his boat wished they had chosen the boat heading for Canada.
Last weekend, the Tamils on the boat in Indonesia threatened to cause an explosion if they were not immediately resettled in Australia or another country. "We can see some light. We hope we can receive the assurances about our future that will allow us to resolve the situation," said Alex, whose wife has just given birth to their third child in Sri Lanka. As well as the 254 Tamils, there is one Burmese man aboard the boat, which has only one toilet.
Those on board the Indonesian boat each paid human smugglers US$15,000. Parents even paid the full amount for newborn babies and young children. The recent investigation into the Sri Lankan ships is expected to focus on Lauhenapessy, the Indonesian-based people smuggling kingpin.
As the Ocean Lady was heading toward Canada, Lauhenapessy was sailing on a wooden boat toward Christmas Island in the South Pacific with 254 asylum seekers planning to get into Australia. The asylum seekers had reportedly paid him a total of US$4-million.
Lauhenapessy turned the boat around close to the island because he missed a rendezvous with a smaller boat that was to pick him up, said Alex, who is acting as spokesman for the Tamils on the vessel.
"It was in the night and we were sleeping and we didn't know what was happening," Alex told Australian media by phone from the boat tied up at a wharf in West Java. Lauhenapessy has reportedly brought more than 1,500 asylum seekers to Australia since he emerged as a pivotal organizer of Indonesia's people smuggling operations in 1999.
He turned the boat around and returned to Indonesia to avoid arrest as he could face up to 20 years in jail in Australia. News of his presence on the boat in Indonesia has prompted Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to fly to Jakarta to seek a solution with the Indonesian government to stem the influx of asylum seekers into Australian waters. Lauhenapessy, an Ambonese with strong links to a criminal network at Jakarta's main port, had been a top-priority target for Australian Federal Police for more than five years.
After eluding a number of elaborate "sting" operations by Australian and Indonesian police, including one in Cambodia in 2001, Lauhenapessy was eventually arrested in Jakarta in June 2007 following a long-term joint operation between the Australian Federal Police and Indonesian police. An Indonesian court sentenced Lauhenapessy to two years in jail and fined him the equivalent of about $3,000 US in December 2007 on charges of hiding, protecting, harbouring or providing a livelihood to people known to have entered Indonesia illegally.
The charges related to the arrival of 83 Sri Lankan asylum seekers in international waters off Australia in early 2007.
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