Australian authorities began searching the ocean off Australia's north coast on Wednesday for a boat reported missing with more than 40 asylum seekers from the Indonesian province of Papua.

Australia's immigration department said air patrols over the Torres Strait, which separates Australia from the island of New Guinea, have been put on alert for the boat, along with aboriginal communities on remote Cape York Peninsula.

Australia's West Papua Association, which backs independence activists in the remote eastern Indonesian province, said the group of 40 people included activists and four children.

The association's Louise Byrne said the group fled the troubled province after reports of a new crackdown by Indonesian authorities. Independence activists have waged a campaign for more than 30 years to break away from Jakarta.

Byrne said she had been told the group left the port of Merauke last Friday to head for Australia -- a journey which should take about 16 hours.

"We've been spending a rather frantic weekend looking for them because it's not that far across the Torres Strait," Byrne told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

Media reports said unrest has worsened in the past week after 12 separatists were arrested over a 2002 ambush on a bus carrying local and foreign workers to the giant Freeport gold and copper mine. Human rights groups have accused the Indonesian military of murder, rape and destruction in Papua province.

(Chinadaily.com via agencies January 18, 2006)