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Individuals from the mostly Muslim Myanmar minority keep on to make perilous journeys across the sea in lookup of security.
Some 569 Rohingya individuals died or went missing at sea past yr – the most considering that 2014 – as they embarked on harmful boat journeys to Southeast Asia, in accordance to the United Nations refugee agency.
The UN Substantial Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) explained practically 4,500 Rohingya individuals took boats throughout the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal in 2023, fleeing crowded refugee camps in Bangladesh or persecution in their indigenous Myanmar.
“Estimates demonstrate just one Rohingya was documented to have died or long gone missing for every single eight folks attempting the journey in 2023,” UNHCR spokesperson Matthew Saltmarsh mentioned in a statement. “This would make the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal a single of the deadliest stretches of drinking water in the environment.”
Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya are living in crowded refugee camps in Bangladesh soon after a brutal crackdown by the Myanmar military services in 2017 that is the issue of a genocide circumstance at the Global Court of Justice (ICJ).
People who continue to be in Myanmar, where by the armed service seized electrical power in a coup virtually three years ago, are predominantly confined to camps in their native Rakhine State with stringent curbs on their motion and daily life.
A lot more than 1,500 Rohingya landed on the northern idea of Indonesia’s Sumatra island on scarcely seaworthy picket boats in November and December past 12 months, a period of time when waters are normally calmer.
But though folks there have formerly welcomed the refugees, this time villagers and the military services pushed boats back again out to sea and told their passengers they could not come ashore regardless of the dreadful ailments on board.
In 1 incident, some 200 people today ended up feared to have drowned following their boat sank in the Andaman Sea. Other individuals remained at sea for days more time as they sought a spot to land.
In December, a mob of college students stormed a local community hall in Banda Aceh exactly where dozens of Rohingya experienced been given shelter, demanding that the team be deported.
The UNHCR urged governments to consider actions to keep away from a repeat of such tragedies.
“Saving life and rescuing people in distress at sea is a humanitarian critical and a longstanding obligation less than intercontinental maritime law,” the statement said, incorporating that the UNHCR was performing to acquire a “comprehensive regional response” to the boat journeys.
Numerous of the Rohingya who flee Bangladesh and Myanmar hope to make it to Malaysia, a majority-Muslim nation that is currently household to almost 108,000 Rohingya refugees.
Like Indonesia, Malaysia is not a signatory to the UN Convention on Refugees, and those who are living in the nation are viewed as undocumented migrants at hazard of harassment, detention or deportation.
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