Seven bodies, including five women and a girl, were pulled from the sea by Malaysian authorities on Sunday. Thirteen people were pulled out alive. Several hundred more were still missing after a boat carrying Rohingya fleeing Myanmar capsized near the Thai-Malaysian maritime border, and Thai authorities said on Monday they had recovered four more bodies, two of them children. That puts the confirmed toll at at least 11.
The vessel went down off Thailand’s Ko Tarutao island, just north of Malaysia’s Langkawi Island. It was carrying about 70 people and belonged to a larger group of about 300 Rohingya who left Myanmar’s Rakhine state three days earlier on several vessels. Officials believe the group set off from the town of Buthidaung.
Three boats, two still unaccounted for
“As they neared the border, they were instructed to transfer onto three smaller boats, each carrying around 100 people,” Kedah state police chief Adzli Abu Shah told local media. Passengers were moved to avoid detection as they approached the Malaysian coast. One boat, thought to have sunk in Thai waters on Thursday, is the one that capsized. The other two, with roughly 230 people between them, have not been found.
Search teams are working across an area near Langkawi covering 583 sq km (225 sq miles). The operation was suspended after the Sunday recoveries and was due to resume on Monday. Images released by the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) showed one survivor under a sheet and another on a stretcher while crews scoured the water. Adzli said police had asked the MMEA and the Marine Police to look for the missing boats.
The survivors include three Myanmar nationals, two Rohingya refugees and a Bangladeshi man. Romli Mustafa, the regional MMEA chief, said more victims might still be found.
The route and the traffickers
Romli blamed organised crime. “Cross-border syndicates are now increasingly active in exploiting migrants by making them victims of human trafficking using high-risk sea routes,” he said. Reports suggest traffickers charge up to $3,500 per person for the trip.
Al Jazeera’s Rob McBride, reporting from Kuala Lumpur, described a well-used path down the coast of Thailand toward Malaysia, where migrants hope to build a new life and often have relatives already waiting. “According to the authorities, the situation in Myanmar, with the increased instability and also the ongoing civil war, is forcing people to take ever more desperate maritime journeys to try and start a new life,” he said.
The UN refugee agency, UNHCR, says around 5,200 Rohingya have set out on dangerous sea journeys since the start of the year, and nearly 600 are reported missing or dead. In December 2021, more than 20 people drowned in several capsizings off the Malaysian coast.
Why they leave
Rakhine state has endured years of conflict, hunger and ethnic violence aimed mostly at the Rohingya, a largely Muslim minority that Myanmar denies citizenship. Around 1.3 million Rohingya live as refugees in crowded camps in neighbouring Bangladesh after a brutal 2017 military crackdown. Myanmar has been in civil war since the military overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in 2021.
Malaysia has accepted Rohingya on humanitarian grounds in the past but tries to limit numbers. About 117,670 are registered with UNHCR there, more than half the country’s refugee population. In January, Malaysian authorities turned away two boats carrying nearly 300 people believed to be Rohingya.
Sources
- Boat sinks off Malaysian coast leaving 7 dead and hundreds missing
- Eleven dead, hundreds missing after refugee boat sinks off Malaysian coast
- Hundreds feared dead after migrant boat capsizes off Malaysia
