Dozen Die, Scores Missing as Rohingya Boat Capsizes

Rasa - At least 12 Rohingya refugees, mostly children, drowned when their boat capsized on the way to Bangladesh.

News ID: 432986

Date: 09 October 2017 - 22:50

RNA - Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) official Abdul Jalil told AFP news agency at least 12 bodies had been recovered after an all-night rescue operation, saying "they include 10 children, an elderly woman and a man", Al-Jazeera reported.

At least 13 Rohingya, including three women and two children, were rescued after scouring the estuary of the Naf river, Jalil said.

Area coastguard commander Alauddin Nayan said the boat sank in the mouth of the Naf river near Shah Porir Dwip, on the Southern tip of Bangladesh, with nearly 100 people on board.

"It capsized near Galachar (a coastal village in Bangladesh) with nearly 100 people," Nayan told AFP.

Earlier in September, 46 bodies were recovered after another ship went down in waters between Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Meanwhile, United Nations children’s agency (UNICEF) has voiced it worries over the catastrophic humanitarian situation of Rohingya Muslims, who are trying to escape the government crackdown in Myanmar.

UNICEF noted that some 150 thousand women and children are in dire need of humanitarian support.

Aid agencies also say they need more than $500 million to address the needs of the Rohingyas living in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar refugee camps.

Authorities in Myanmar, led by de facto leader Aug San Suu Kyi, have been tightly controlling access to Rakhine since August, when purported attacks by Rohingya fighters prompted a brutal military response that has forced over 515,000 Rohingya to flee for Bangladesh.

The crackdown, backed by radical Buddhist monks, has left scores of Rohingya villages torched and completely destroyed.

Myanmar’s government denies full citizenship to Rohingya Muslims, branding them illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Witnesses and rights groups have reported systematic attacks, including rape, murder and arson, at the hands of the army and Buddhist mobs against the Rohingya.

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