Bakamla's Public Relations Officer, Major Yuhanes, informed that the rescue came from a public information received by his agency.
"AD, the family of one of the victims, a crew member assigned to a foreign vessel, had suspicions and submitted a report to Bakamla's Public Relations Division," Yuhanes explained.
When AD was contacted by the victim (CW), he reported several irregularities regarding his assignment on the vessel, which is known to be owned by a South Korean company (YMI).
Yuhanes mentioned that one of the suspicions arose when the workers were ordered to load and unload cargo at sea on another vessel. The act was detected and stopped by the South Korean Navy, which firmly warned against any recurrence.
Aware of the unlawful action, Yuhanes said that all Indonesian crew members refused and demanded to be repatriated to Indonesia.
Furthermore, Bakamla responded seriously to the report and immediately reported it to the related authorities, he added.
The Head of Bakamla, Vice Admiral Irvansyah, then ordered the Bakamla Cooperation Directorate to follow up on the matter.
"In a short time, we established coordination with the Korea Coast Guard to rescue the eight Indonesian crew members," Yuhanes remarked.
He informed that the activity involved close cooperation and assistance from the Protocol and Consular Office of the Indonesian Embassy in Seoul, the Defense Attaché of the Indonesian Embassy in Seoul, and the Director General of Protection at the Ministry of Migrant Workers Protection (KP2MI).
All eight Indonesian crew members are now safe and have been repatriated to Indonesia.
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Translator: Agatha Olivia, Resinta Sulistiyandari
Editor: M Razi Rahman
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