http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/01/13/moeldoko-s-boatpeople-clinker-recalcitrant-nescient-or...

" Diplomatic notes of notification would be sent to Jakarta just before a turn-back. A non-response, or a delayed one, was regarded by Canberra as consent.

As Howard’s former foreign minister, Alexander Downer, recently explained in The Advertiser, the boats would be “towed to the edge of Indonesia’s territorial waters under Operation Relex, 19 kilometers from the Indonesian coast”.

Hence, we can understand why Prime Minister Tony Abbott remained gleeful about the bilateral cooperation on boatpeople as “evidenced by the discussion that seemed to have taken place between Gen. Moeldoko and our own Gen. Hurley not long ago”.

There are also questions of legality binding Australia, which Moeldoko’s statement of “understanding” may have unintentionally waived.

The question is where Australia is intercepting these boats.

Under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, Australia can only stop boats within its territorial and contiguous zones (24 nautical miles from the Australian shore). It cannot board vessels outside this area without permission.

International obligations also forbid unseaworthy vessels to be cast to their fate.

So if these boats are being intercepted outside of Australian waters, how can Australian patrols then board them, determine their seaworthiness, and decide the refugee status of passengers?

Furthermore, as a signatory to UN conventions on refugees, Australia must adhere to the principle of non-refoulement, which entails avoiding sending people to countries that do not acknowledge legal refugee status, such as Indonesia.

Canberra has, unsurprisingly, again looked to its Big Brother, the United States, as an example in its turning away of boats from Cuba. But Washington is not a signatory of many maritime international norms that Canberra has ceded to.

As the diplomatic wrangle trudges along and the legal interpretations vary, Indonesia needs to settle its own tangled self with less nescience if it really wants to be taken seriously by Australia. "