More than 160 people, mostly asylum-seekers, were feared drowned in violent storms off Australia's north-western coast yesterday.
A Japanese tanker reportedly picked up four people. Hopes of finding other survivors from the two small vessels which were carrying a total of 167 people appeared slim.
The asylum-seekers, thought to be from the Middle East, had paid smugglers to be taken from Indonesia across the Timor Sea to the remote island of Ashmore Reef, 370 miles north-west of Australia.
Australia's hard-line Immigration Minister, Mr Phillip Ruddock, described the deaths as "tragic" but said it should act as a deterrent to others seeking refuge in Australia.
"I think it's appropriate that people are aware of the very significant risks involved," he said. "If people are intent on getting into vulnerable vessels on very dangerous seas, then there are risks associated with it.
"We're dealing here with a group of people whose intention was to arrive without notice, clandestinely, on vessels that really don't have the sort of navigational devices and identification equipment that would enable a search-and-rescue operation to be mounted," said Mr Ruddock.
Conditions in the Timor Sea were "atrocious", Mr Ruddock said, following the 175-m.p.h. winds of Cyclone Sam which battered the north-west coast over the weekend. A search of Australian waters by the navy, customs service and federal police will resume today.
The route from Indonesia to Ashmore Reef is well-travelled by refugees, usually taking two to three days. Canberra has met with increasing international criticism over its treatment of asylum-seekers. Three UN reports have condemned Canberra's human rights record this year.
The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, was in Palermo, Italy, yesterday to sign the UN Convention against Organised Crime, including two protocols to prevent trafficking in persons. The focus of the latter, he said, was "correctly, to focus on criminalising the smugglers and traffickers".