Myanmar News Articles: Rohingya boat migrants without food and water, beg for rescue

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Rohingya boat migrants without food and water, beg for rescue

LANGKAWI A ship carrying hundreds of Rohingya Muslims sent out a distress call asking to be rescued on Tuesday, saying they were abandoned by their captain without fuel and have been without food or water for three days.

Chris Lewa, director of the nonprofit Arakan Project, which has been monitoring the movement of Rohingya fleeing from Myanmar for over a decade, says she spoke by phone with one of the migrants on the Thai vessel. An estimated 350 people are on board.

"They are not sure exactly where they are, possibly near Langkawi," Lewa said, of the Malaysian resort island that has been the dropoff point in recent days for more than 1,000 Rohingya and Bangladeshis.

There has been a surge in migrants from impoverished Bangladesh and Myanmar to Malaysia and Indonesia following the clampdown in Thailand, usually the first destination in the region's people-smuggling network.

Many of the arrivals are Rohingya, a stateless minority from Myanmar described by the UN as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world. The crisis involving migrants deepened on Tuesday as Malaysia said it would turn away any more of the vessels unless they were sinking.

GALLERIES