Around 280 starving Rohingya stranded on a cramped boat in the Bay of Bengal for weeks have been spotted by the Bangladesh Navy and are being taken to a controversial flood-prone island, officials said on Thursday.
The boat, one of two trawlers trying to reach Malaysia, was discovered after the navy increased patrols following reports of hundreds of Rohingya adrift at sea.
Authorities say they are likely to have come from Myanmar’s Rakhine state rather than camps in southeastern Bangladesh where nearly one million refugees live, as they did not have identity cards issued by the UN refugee agency UNHCR.
“It is a very tiny boat compared to its 280 passengers. They are starving. The navy has given them food, water and first aid,” a navy official told AFP.
