Rohan Sullivan, Sydney – Australia's new leader proposed Tuesday to stop an influx of asylum seeker boats by making East Timor a hub for processing UN refugee claims for people fleeing

Sara Everingham, Kerri Ritchie and staff – East Timor's deputy prime minister says his country does not have the capacity to set up a regional processing centre for asylum seekers.

Stephen Fitzpatrick – Indonesia warned yesterday that Jakarta would not allow itself to become a refugee processing centre for Australia.

Jakarta – The handling of foreign refugees that enter Indonesia, which are often referred to as illegal immigrants, is still of concern.

On 14 June 2010, East Timor community figure Joao Quintao (57), a retired Indonesian military senior sergeant, said that the thousands of refugees from East Timor living in refugee sett

Australia's government says it's seeking more information about claims of poor conditions and ill treatment of asylum seekers – including the use of a stun gun – at Indonesia's Tanjung

Jakarta – Some asylum seekers in an Indonesian detention center are on a hunger strike, saying immigration officials use stun guns and threaten to kill them.

Kerri Ritchie – Sri Lankan asylum seekers who were removed from an Indonesian port earlier this week say they are now being kept in cramped conditions in a detention centre which is lik

Tom Allard, Merak – It was a desperate final plea, sad and futile.

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Jakarta – A six-month asylum-seeker deadlock in Indonesia has finally been broken, with more than 200 Tamils agreeing to be taken from their makeshift dockside camp

Indonesia says Australia's decision to stop processing asylum seekers from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka will be "positive" for the region's fight against trafficking.

Tom Allard, Jakarta – The six-month impasse between Indonesian authorities and a group of about 240 asylum seekers who refused to leave their boat in the port of Merak appears to be end

"The Merak refugees and the Indonesian Solution, not people smuggling, should be at the top of the agenda for discussions between the Australian government and Indonesian President Yudh

Tom Allard, Jakarta – Sanjeev "Alex" Kuhendrarajah, who gained fame as spokesman for 254 Sir Lankan asylum seekers who refused to leave their boat after being intercepted on their way t

Sri Lankan refugees inside an Indonesian detention centre have entered the second week of a hunger strike aimed at winning them a resettlement deal like that given to the Sri Lankans in

The notorious Indonesian people-smuggler behind the failed attempt to bring 254 Sri Lankan asylum-seekers into Australia last year is facing trial for breaching sailing laws.

Putri Prameshwari, Cipayung – The room is not big, but there's just enough room for Fariba to let her four children run around with dolls in their hands.

Tom Allard – The notorious Indonesian people smuggler Abraham Louhenapessy, better known as Captain Bram, is likely to receive only a fine for attempting to bring 254 Sri Lankans in an

Stephanie March for PM – Indonesian authorities are accusing two Australian refugee advocates of breaching their visa conditions by trying to make contact with a group of asylum seekers

Indonesia will send up to 500 police and militia members to force Sri Lankan asylum seekers off a boat in Merak, separating their spokesman "Alex" from the group.

Paul Maley – Four of the Tamil asylum-seekers rescued by the Oceanic Viking and offered a special deal by the Rudd government will be refused visas after ASIO determined them a threat t

Angus Hohenboken – Tamil asylum-seekers were "interrogated" by a Sri Lankan navy officer within the walls of an Indonesian immigration detention centre yesterday, a refugee advocate in

An Australian doctor says he has had to resort to giving medical advice over the phone to asylum seekers on a boat at an Indonesian port.

Paul Maley – Indonesia has rejected a proposal by Tony Abbott to tow seaworthy asylum boats back to Indonesia, saying Australia must deal with boats in its own waters.

Lindsay Murdoch and Yuko Narushima – Fears of a disease outbreak are causing tensions to rise among asylum seekers on a boat moored at the Indonesian port of Merak since October.

Paul Maley – Indonesia has put Kevin Rudd on notice that the special treatment offered to the 78 Tamils aboard the Oceanic Viking must be extended to the 255 Sri Lankans moored off the

Paul Maley and Lanai Vasek – Indonesia is considering using force to end the extended stand-off with the boat of more than 240 Tamil asylum-seekers moored at Merak after last week's dea

Around 40 people staged a lively protest outside the Australian embassy in Jakarta on Monday, 28 December.

Ari Sharp – The death of a Tamil man who had been aboard a boat moored at Merak in Indonesia has prompted renewed calls for Australia to help strike a deal to resettle the 246 people on

Indonesian authorities have been accused of assaulting a number of Sri Lankans who are aboard a boat in Indonesia's Merak port.

Adam Gartrell – One of almost 250 Sri Lankan asylum seekers who have spent the past 11 weeks refusing to leave their boat in Indonesia has died after allegedly being denied medical help

Australian citizens and community workers are deeply concerned for the welfare of 246 asylum seekers on board the boat at Merak's shores in Indonesia.

"The tragic death of a young Tamil man on board the refugee boat at Merak was completely avoidable," said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition.

Jakarta – Fifteen of the Sri Lankan asylum seekers who spent weeks refusing to get off the boat that rescued them near Indonesia have left the country, a foreign ministry official said

Tom Allard, Jakarta – Hundreds of asylum seekers have escaped Indonesian immigration detention centres and boarded boats to Australia this year amid widespread bribe-taking by guards an

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Jakarta – Jakarta hopes to bring historic people-smuggling legislation before parliament as soon as next year, with penalties of up to 10 years' jail for those conv

Indonesia says it expects the 78 Tamil asylum seekers who spent almost a month on Australia's Oceanic Viking to start being resettled as early as next week.

Harlyne Joku – "They're being sent to a concentration camp." This is how a West Papuan spokesman for the Merauke group living in Port Moresby, Nicholas Balagaize, described the repatria

Nurfika Osman – Despite the raft of killings, abductions and other violence carried out by unidentified groups in Papua, the nation's eyes remain elsewhere, an activist said on Thursday

Ten Sri Lankan women and children who came off the Oceanic Viking yesterday say they are locked up and unable to leave an Australian-funded detention centre in Indonesia.

Tom Allard in Jakarta and Ben Doherty in Tanjung Pinang – The Indonesian Government has reversed its policy to swiftly deport Sri Lankan asylum seekers refusing to get off a boat in Mer

Cunding Levi, Jakarta – Papua New Guinea repatriated on Thursday 141 Papuans on Thursday as part of the program to return about 700 Indonesian citizens in the Papua New Guinea territory

Tom Allard, Jakarta – Indonesia is planning to deport Sri Lankan asylum seekers at Merak, including "Alex", the English-speaking spokesman for the group that has spent more than a month

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Tanjung Pinang – Kevin Rudd might have been given another week to solve his Oceanic Viking public relations disaster, but that doesn't mean Indonesia is very happy

Jakarta – Indonesia extended by a week on Friday a deadline for an Australian customs ship loaded with 78 protesting Sri Lankan asylum seekers to leave its territory.

Tom Allard, Tanjung Pinang (Indonesia) – The Indonesian Government is deeply unhappy with the notion of an "Indonesian solution" to the asylum seekers trying to come to Australia, calli

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Tanjung Pinang, and Paul Maley – Senior Indonesian officials have rejected outright a claim by Kevin Rudd that women and children asylum-seekers aboard the Oceanic

Alvin Darlanika Soedarjo, Jakarta – Indonesia on Friday gave an Australian customs boat another week to end a standoff with 78 Sri Lankan asylum seekers who are refusing to disembark on

Roselyn Ellison – Seventy-six people from the West Papuan community in Manus province will move back to their homeland, as part of the nationwide repatriation of refugees from the Indon

Sophie Black – The 255 asylum seekers docked at the port in Merak in West Java are still refusing to leave their boat and be processed by Immigration Officials.