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A boat of 56 Rohingya men, women and children from Myanmar’s central Rakhine state has arrived in Malaysian waters four days after it came ashore on the Thai island of Koh Lanta.
The group had taken shelter near the popular tourist island after a storm overnight on March 31. They were brought ashore and given food, water and supplies by community groups on the island before being shepherded on by Thai authorities once the boat had been patched up.
Thailand’s official policy is to push refugee boats onward.
Photos posted online depicted a rickety wooden vessel with limited space below deck. A source who encountered the group on a civilian boat on the Andaman Sea said they did not have GPS and appeared to be navigating with a compass. They had run out of food and water.
All they had been able to communicate due to the language barrier was that they were Rohingya.
Malaysia has stepped up maritime patrols in anticipation of the boat’s arrival. Late on Monday, the group was found exhausted near an island off Langkawi.
They have been taken into custody by police and navy and are being transferred to Belantik for processing at the immigration detention center, according to MAPIM, the Malaysian Consultative Council for Islamic Organization. Community groups are mobilizing funding to support the refugees.
It is not yet known precisely when the group left Rakhine state. Aid groups are on standby amid concerns there may be other planned departures.
Malaysia already plays host to over 100,000 Rohingya, the vast majority of whom are undocumented by refugee agencies. They often struggle to access basic public services.
Boat departures from Rakhine state and Bangladesh had tapered off in recent years, following a regional crackdown on trafficking rings. Thailand dismantled major operations that were taking people from the coast and overland to Malaysia.
Almost 100,000 fled on boats between 2014 and 2015, and it is estimated at least 1,000 died during treacherous journeys on rickety boats. The smuggling route for Rohingya refugees, as well as Bangladeshi economic migrants, had become a lucrative trade.
Extortion was rife, with many held in jungle camps until their relatives paid to have their family members released. It is unknown how many died in these places, from which tales of shocking brutality at the hands of traffickers emerged.
Many entered into complex debt arrangements with brokers. In Malaysia, stories abound of young women having been brought over and sold into marriage.
Previously, the business model involved people being ferried out to large carriers, where they were made to wait until the vessel was jam-packed.
While the international spotlight has shone on the mass human exodus from northern Rakhine state to Bangladesh, conditions that prevail inside other parts of Rakhine remain dire. The Muslim population is subject to movement restrictions, and in many areas tensions remain on-high with their Buddhist neighbors.
Over 100,000 remain in squalid internment camps, where their access to healthcare, education and work opportunities is severely curtailed. Travel outside of Rakhine is made near-impossible due to the Rohingya population’s lack of official documentation and the movement restrictions they face.
Short of paying extortionate sums for forged documents and bribes for safe passage, many feel they are left with few options but to take the perilous journey by sea. Myanmar authorities recently detained several groups who fled Rakhine overland by vehicle, possibly putting a stop to that minor route.
This all comes as Myanmar and Bangladesh have reached a tentative agreement on repatriation of refugees. However, analysts and rights groups agree this appears to be wildly premature.
For the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), heading off another boat crisis has been a top priority. Calls for Myanmar to act in good faith and provide safe, dignified and voluntary returns have resounded from the bloc.
Whether the boat of Rohingya was a one-off, or the beginning of more dangerous last-ditch attempts to flee Rakhine and Bangladesh ahead of the relentless monsoon, is not yet clear.
Sources inside northern Rakhine state have indicated a concern that relatives in the surging camps of Cox’s Bazar plan to take to the sea in a bid to reach Malaysia before the monsoon closes in.
With certainties of landslides, water-borne disease, and outbreaks of illnesses such as cholera, conditions in the camps are set to deteriorate badly in the coming months. And as the arrivals of the 56 who have made safe passage to Malaysia attest, the level of desperation inside Rakhine itself also remains high.
Myanmar has long insisted that the problems plaguing Rakhine state are an internal matter. This runs contrary to the officially perpetuated narrative that the Rohingya are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.
In sight of the biblical exodus from northern Rakhine following the Myanmar military’s campaign of ethnic cleansing, and the massive boat exodus before it, it is clearly a regional issue that requires a collective regional response.
I am astonished to learned how Aung sang Suu Kyi, head of a budhist state resorting to inhuman treatment to Rohigya Muslims. It looks they’re no more followers of Lord Abuddha. They are animals of prehistoric age who were killing & eating their flesh
NO DOUBT BANGLADESHIS ARE MIGRATING
Bangladesh is smaller in size than the state of Iowa in United States, yet its population is over 150 million compared to Iowa’s 3 million. The population of Bangladesh is projected to be 242 million by 2050. The Rakhine state population is around 4 million. Bangladesh is one of the world’s most densely populated nations with 90% being Sunni Muslims. Even the government of Bangladesh report states that 50 million of Bangladeshis needs to migrate to other countries. On the orther hand the minority population (Hindus, Buddhists and Christians) have decreased from 40 % in 1950 to less than 10% to to ethnic cleansing by the muslims.
Now we will see how those countries, especially the muslim countries whic have been critical of Myanmar, deal with their fellow religious brudens.
Sadly, Suu Kyi seems to share the racist hatred for the Rohingya, enhanced up by a government Facebook campaign. China should use its economic influence to persuade the generals to implement a semi-autonomous federated region for the Rohingya. See my blogpost, ‘Halo goodbye, Suu – the Rohingya crisis’ (https://soothfairy.com/2018/01/29/halo-goodbye).
Here we go again! After so-called "Liberation of South Vietnam", over haft of millions of South Vietnam risked their lives went to south China sea, about haft of them did not make it to the freedom. Now we have the Rohingya Boat People Exodus, and will have more from Vietnam,
Laos, Cambodia, Myanma, etc. and others if Xi Jen-ping has his way. It looks like he would have the iron hands over the entire south China Sea if the west is cowardly to let it happens. But American has President Trump for that. Wake up America! Another front is the new "Sirk Road" over the "Dry Port", and the "Belt and Road Inititive" over "Wet Port" from Mr. Xi Jen-ping. I can see the Chineses are coming. If you look around the world from Red Sea at Djibouti going to the Miditerrian for Middle East oil and gas to the straight of Malacca, the most important water way to the whole world on maritime commerce, not to mention the work with Nicaragua to create the new canal above Panama Canal. Vietnam is the first victim of the Han to be assimilated in to China after four thousands of years their fore father could not. Cam Ranh bay is the stategict sub marine bay for Russia and China to occupy. But China already declared more the 90% sea, lands, and space are belonging to them. Who gave them the right to do so even the international sea conference in San Francisco made it into the law but Chinese thumbed the noses of the west. Perhaps President Obama kowtowed to Xi Jen-ping, and he got the Nobel Prize!!! Now China has the Parcell and Spattly islands from Vietnam, Parcell island in 1974, and Spattly island in 1982. They now are the stratigic military instalations with runways that could accommodate land-to- air missiles, heavy nuclear bombers, weather stations, sub marine bases on all of them, and yet Mr.Xi Jen-ping said he’s not militaring the south China Sea. They harassed other nations which crossed the south China Sea, but the US, and may be Europe like France, Brittan, Germany, etc. The whole world have to deal with I call "The Pirate of the South China Sea." Chineses are coming! Deal with it.