One of Indonesia's biggest-selling newspapers has depicted John Howard and Alexander Downer as a pair of sex-crazed dingoes, dragging media outrage over the Papua visa row down to a new low.

The front page of the Islamic-leaning Rakyat Merdeka (People's Freedom) newspaper was dominated by the cartoon of the two having sex under a palm tree on an otherwise barren island signposted "Papua".

Headlined "The adventure of two dingo" (sic), the drawing shows the Prime Minister as the dominant dog, shaking as he tells the Foreign Minister: "I want Papua!! Alex! Try to make it happen!" A small Australian flag hangs off the PM's wagging tail.

In the wake of Australia's decision to grant visas to 42 Papuan asylum-seekers, Indonesian nationalists accuse Canberra of secretly plotting Papua's breakaway from Jakarta's grasp, likening it to the 1999 independence crisis in East Timor.

The lurid caricature is the worst-taste example of a new Papua cartoon craze in the Indonesian media since the row flared last week. The media's response has perhaps been given added edge by still-simmering anger in Indonesia over the prophet Mohammed cartoon furore.

Another Jakarta paper depicted the hairy arm of a gorilla labelled as Australia shaking hands with a suit and cufflink-clad Indonesian arm.

The English-language Jakarta Post newspaper, read by most foreigners in Indonesia, showed a furious Indonesian eagle staring at the rear of a retreating kangaroo, with the bird's chicks in its pouch flying a Papuan independence flag. "Don't worry, it's just temporary," the kangaroo is saying.

The same image was adopted by protesters rallying outside Australia's Jakarta embassy this week when some painted obscenities on its walls.