BANGKOK: Thailand has deported dozens of Rohingya boat people back to Myanmar,
an official said on Thursday, despite a UN appeal to accept members of the
Muslim minority fleeing sectarian bloodshed.
The 73 Rohingya, including 15
women, were sent back across the border on Wednesday after landing on the
southern island of Phuket, said Ditthaporn Sasasmit, a spokesman for the
kingdom's Internal Security Operation Command.
"The waves were high and it
might have been dangerous to go further, so Thailand allowed them to come into
the country and detained them as illegal immigrants," he said.
"Phuket immigration police
sent them back overland via Ranong, where there is a border checkpoint."
The UN refugee agency has called
on Myanmar's neighbours to open their borders to people fleeing a wave of
communal violence in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine.
Clashes between Rohingya and
ethnic Rakhine people have left at least 180 dead in Rakhine since June, and
displaced more than 110,000 others, mostly Rohingya.
Myanmar views the roughly 800,000
Rohingya in Rakhine as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants and denies them
citizenship.
Although the tensions have eased
since a new outbreak of killings in October, concerns have grown about the fate
of asylum-seekers setting sail in overcrowded boats.
In a statement, New York-based
Human Rights Watch urged Thailand to "scrap its inhumane policy of
summarily deporting Rohingya, who have been brutally persecuted in Burma
(Myanmar), and honour their right to seek asylum".
The group said some deported Rohingya
were falling into the hands of people smugglers waiting for them at the
Thai-Myanmar border to demand large sums of money to transport them to
Malaysia.
"Those unable to pay the
smuggling fees are forced into labour to pay off the fees, condemning them to
situations amounting to human trafficking," it said.
Rohingya have for years trickled
abroad to neighbouring Bangladesh and, increasingly, to Malaysia. They
sometimes land in Thailand, which has been criticised in the past for pushing
Rohingya back out to sea.
About 500 Myanmar boat people
swam to shore in Malaysia at the weekend after a 15-day sea journey, according
to police there. Another died after being hit by a boat propeller when he
jumped into the sea.
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