(Reuters) -A boat carrying illegal immigrants heading for Australia sank off the coast ofeast Java in Indonesia and over 300 people were missing with many feared dead,a senior emergency official said.
Only 76people of 380 people on board had been rescued, said Sahrul Arifin, the head ofemergency and logistics at the East Java Disaster Mitigation Center.
He saidstrong waves wrecked the wooden boat about 90 km (56 miles) out to sea lateSaturday night. "Our search and rescue team have begun sweeping the wateraround where the accident took place but we are now sending body bags to thatarea," Arifin said.
He said thepassengers were mainly believed to be illegal migrants from countries includingIran and Afghanistan. Many boat people from the Middle East and Asia useIndonesia as a transit point en route to Australia.
Local TVshowed images of more than a dozen shocked-looking survivors huddled in aclinic in Trenggalek, a town on Java island's southern coast.
Manyeconomic migrants from the Middle East attempt to cross the Indian Ocean inboats in search of a better life in Australia.
Australia-basedrefugee advocate Jack Smit told Reuters first reports indicated the boat wasoverloaded. He suggested it might involve a new and inexperiencedpeople-smuggling operator trying to make money quickly, as the boat reportedlyleft from the same port in Java as another that sank recently.
"Itall points to new operators, and also the population of the boats ischanging," Smit, of Project SafeCom Inc, told Reuters. "It seems tome it's a new operator that took a risk that was too big."
Smit saidthere appeared to be an increasing number of Iranians taking to the boats andfewer Afghans than previously. He estimated that 2 to 5 percent of thousands ofasylum-seekers taking to boats in this way each year died en route, with manydeaths not reported.
Asylum-seekersoften pay thousands of dollars to board the boats, whose journeys are organizedby people-smuggling networks based in Indonesia using ramshackle vessels oftenpoorly equipped for the perilous journey to Australian waters. This sinking isthe latest of several such disasters in recent years.
(Reportingby Olivia Rondonuwu, Additional reporting by Chris McCall in Sydney; Editing byRaju Gopalakrishnan)
