BIREUEN, Indonesia: Three boats filled with more than 500 Rohingya refugees landed in Indonesia´s westernmost province on Sunday, a UN agency said, in one of the biggest arrivals since Myanmar launched a military crackdown on the minority group in 2017.
The mostly Muslim Rohingya are heavily persecuted in Myanmar, and thousands risk their lives each year on long and expensive sea journeys, often in flimsy boats, to try to reach Malaysia or Indonesia.
United Nations refugee agency protection associate Faisal Rahman told AFP one boat had arrived in Aceh province´s Bireuen district with 256 people aboard, while at least 241 others arrived in Aceh´s Pidie region and a smaller boat carrying 36 arrived in East Aceh.
“They were found in several spots,” Rahman said on Sunday. Of the 256 aboard the Bireuen boat, 110 were women and 60 were children, he said.
It was the same boat that locals had pushed back out to sea on Thursday, leaving it stranded off the coast for several days, according to Rahman.
“It´s confirmed... because many people were identified by security officials during the landing,” he said. The latest arrivals mean more than 800 refugees have landed in Aceh province this week alone, after 196 arrived on Tuesday and 147 on Wednesday, according to local officials.
The boost for Harris came amid new turmoil for 78-year-old Trump, who cast into doubt whether he will debate the vice...
“It was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,”...
Starting this month, three autonomous on-demand delivery robots will begin their trial within the community
“They identify where our mobile groups are positioned, where the machine guns are that can destroy them," says...
Biden describes the pair as “two of the most notorious leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel”
Wang says Beijing is “ready to work with Russia to... firmly support each other, safeguard each other’s core...
