Craig Skehan, Kelly Burke and AAP – Indonesia accused Australia of a failure in diplomacy over boat people yesterday, attacking Canberra's "unacceptable" practice of going public before raising problems with Jakarta.

The Foreign Minister, Hassan Wirayuda, criticised Australia's handling of the Tampa crisis, when the Howard Government refused to allow boat people rescued by the Tampa to land.

Amid tense relations with Jakarta, the Prime Minister, John Howard, yesterday declared he wanted Indonesia to reject assertions by its navy that it would give food and other help to boat people trying to reach Australia.

Mr Wirayuda said Australia had insisted the Tampa problem was one for Indonesia and Norway to solve, but had failed to tell Indonesia that first. He said he had told his Australian counterpart, Alexander Downer, there was a cultural communication problem. "There is a certain tendency in Australia to communicate through public diplomacy rather than quiet [diplomacy]," Mr Wirayuda told SBS. "This is certainly in many ways unacceptable. To go public and accuse the other side [of] doing something wrong ... it's not our habit."

Mr Howard had failed to get the Indonesian president, Megawati Sukarnoputri, on the phone over Tampa, and was unable to arrange a one-on-one meeting with her at the APEC leaders' meeting in Shanghai. "It's a matter of cultural tendency here in Indonesia that when you want to enter someone's house, you cannot shout in front of it and ask to enter the house," Mr Wirayuda said.

Mr Howard said it would be disappointing if the Indonesian navy's attitude to helping boat people en route to Australia represented a "universal" Indonesian position. On Tuesday, the Indonesian navy's chief of staff, Admiral Indroko Sastrowirjono, said: "We can only let them continue heading to their destination because it is their right." He said Indonesia was obliged to help them under international maritime law. The navy reiterated this point yesterday.