Search on for missing asylum-seekers

AN asylum-seeker boat has reached Australia for the first time in almost four years, the government said yesterday, with many of those on board the Vietnamese vessel fleeing into a crocodile-infested mangrove rainforest after running aground near the coast.

Passengers from the rickety vessel disappeared into the dense forest near the Daintree River, north of popular tourist city Cairns, in the tropical far north of Queensland state on Sunday. They will have to avoid crocodiles, venomous snakes and giant cassowaries — one of the world’s deadliest and most aggressive birds — that all call the ancient Daintree rainforest home.

Queensland Police Minister Mark Ryan told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that 15 passengers had been found so far. The ABC added that two others, including the boat’s captain, were still missing. The Brisbane Courier Mail reported that up to 20 were unaccounted for. It said those detained were well dressed and in good health.

State Emergency Service area controller Peter Rinaudo said earlier his crews were searching through the mangroves and near the mouth of the river, reportedly with dogs. “It’ll be a hard slog, it’s still quite warm in there and it’ll be tough conditions for the guys,” he said.

Home affairs minister Peter Dutton said the partially sunk vessel had come from Vietnam and was the first boat of asylum-seekers to reach the country since 2014. Dutton did not confirm how many passengers were on board or their nationalities.

Under Canberra’s tough immigration policy, asylum-seekers who try to reach Australia by boat are either turned back or sent to remote Pacific camps where conditions have been widely criticized. They are blocked from resettling in Australia. The United Nations and human rights advocates say the policy violates the 1951 Refugee Convention of which Australia is a signatory.