The body of an asylum seeker who died of a suspected stomach infection in Indonesia will be returned to Sri Lanka this week, a Foreign Ministry official said on Sunday.
The man, identified by Indonesian authorities as Jacob Samuel Christian, 29, died last Wednesday in hospital.
His body will be sent to Sri Lanka after “discussions with the Sri Lankan government,” ministry spokesman Teuku Faizasyah said. “He died of his illness. We’re preparing to send his body to Sri Lanka some time this week.”
Christian was one of about 250 ethnic Tamils headed for Australia who have refused to leave their boat in the port town of Merak after they were intercepted off Indonesia in October.
They staged a brief hunger strike and threatened to torch their boat to draw attention to their plight.
Teuku said the migrants had prevented Indonesian authorities from boarding the boat to carry out medical inspections.
“Part of the reason we couldn’t provide early medical assistance [for Christian] is because they refused to allow us to get on board,” he said.
“They must understand that they entered our waters, our territory, unauthorized, and people-smuggling groups were involved. We have the right to enforce our national law and process them first,” Teuku said.
“We ask for their cooperation so we can know their situation,” he said.
The stand-off has fuelled an intense debate in Australia, where it has added to the pressure on Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to stem the flow of migrants passing through Indonesia, amid a sharp increase in arrivals this year.
The migrants say they face persecution at home, where a civil war between ethnic Tamil separatists and the majority Sinhalese ended earlier this year.
Indonesia, which sprawls across 17,000 islands, has been a key staging point for people smugglers taking migrants on the perilous sea journey to Australia.
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