INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Dozens of Rohingya refugees have been rescued from the Indian Ocean off the coast of Indonesia after spending the night balanced on the hull
of their overturned boat.Seventy-five people were pulled from the stricken vessel, which was spotted on Thursday by an Indonesian search and
rescue ship.Survivors said the boat had capsized on Wednesday
rubber dinghy to the rescue boat.There were contradictory reports about whether anyone had died, with survivors saying many who had been
onboard when their boat left Bangladesh were still unaccounted for, but authorities said everyone had been rescued.Samira, 17, who was among
the refugees from the Kutupalong camp in Bangladesh, who had been travelling to Malaysia, said there had been 146 people onboard, raising
the prospect that 71 could be missing at sea.She said the boat began foundering three days previously and capsized on Wednesday, adding that
her nephew was among those unaccounted for
overloading it and causing it also to capsize
an official search and rescue team set off from Banda Aceh city on Wednesday evening
They reached the area of the accident early the next morning and initially could not find the capsized boat.View image in fullscreenRohingya
refugees waiting for food in a Bangladesh camp
Many families are trying to flee the overcrowded camps for neighbouring countries
Photograph: Dar Yasin/APWhen they came upon it at midday, they found the refugees on its hull
They rescued 42 men, 18 women and nine children and took some to a temporary shelter in the Aceh Besar district and others to a local
hospital.Amiruddin, a tribal fishing community leader in Aceh Barat district, said those rescued indicated that the boat was sailing east
when it started leaking and strong currents pushed it toward the west of Aceh.About 740,000 Rohingya had earlier fled to Bangladesh to
escape a brutal counterinsurgency campaign by security forces in their homeland of Myanmar.However, thousands have since been trying to flee
prompted it to call on the international community for help
Some Rohingya arriving in Aceh face hostility from fellow Muslims.Indonesia, like Thailand and Malaysia, is not a signatory to the 1951 UN
However, these countries have so far provided temporary shelter to refugees in distress.Last year, nearly 4,500 Rohingya, two-thirds of them
women and children, fled Myanmar and the refugee camps of neighbouring Bangladesh by boat, the UN refugee agency reported
Of those, 569 died or went missing while crossing the Bay of Bengal and Andaman Sea, the highest death toll since 2014.Returning safely to
No country has offered the Rohingya any large-scale resettlement opportunities.
This article first appeared/also appeared in theguardian.com
