“Although that one person was on parole, he should not have been near an airport, the embassy told us.”
Little is known about the three Australians or their motives for flying to South Papua. The case has now caught the attention of immigration headquarters in Jakarta, which was sending investigators on Friday, Sianturi said.
He said the plane had first departed from Cairns, then picked up two Australian passengers in a town he believed was spelled “Con”.
Flight records show that at 6am on November 17, a twin-engine Piper left Cairns for Coen, a small Queensland community 400 kilometres to the north.
The same plane then left Coen at 8.45am and landed in Merauke about 2 ½ hours later.
Records show the Piper was registered to a company in Queensland, which told this masthead on Thursday night it had sold the plane several months ago.
Sianturi said the four detained people remained in Merauke.
In 2008, five Australians were detained for nine months after arriving in Merauke for the relatively minor offence of not having visas or special clearance for the sensitive region. They came to be known as the Merauke Five.
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