More than 200 people, including 55 Pakistani citizens, were killed after a heavily overloaded boat packed with asylum-seekers sank off Indonesia en route to Australia a couple of days ago.
It has emerged now that 70 of the asylum seekers on board were from Quetta. While fifteen of the Pakistanis were rescued, 55 drowned.
Their relatives in Quetta have requested the federal government to help them in bringing back their dead bodies.
Australian government called the sinking “a terrible tragedy”, but came under pressure from campaign groups which said its tough approach to refugees was partly responsible for such disasters.
The fibreglass boat had a capacity of 100 but was overloaded with about 250 people when it sank on Saturday 40 nautical miles off eastern Java, in heavy rain and high waves, Indonesian officials said.
Thirty-three survivors were plucked from the shark-infested waters, officials said.