Death and despair: Rescued Rohingyas describe high-seas terror

Sub-title: 

About 1,400 Rohingyas have been stranded at sea this year -- and at least 130 of those have died, according to IOM

Description: 

"A group of Rohingyas says they were beaten by traffickers and drank their own urine to stay alive on a perilous four-month journey at sea until their dramatic rescue near the Indonesian coast. The bedraggled survivors -- about 100 in all, mostly women and children --described a high-seas horror story that saw them reduced to throwing the dead overboard as their rickety craft drifted thousands of kilometres towards Malaysia. Two survivors claimed that people smugglers paid to transport them had beaten the Rohingyas who were later moved to a new boat and abandoned at sea. They were rescued by fishermen in Indonesia on Wednesday and pulled to shore by locals the next day, thousands of kilometres south of Bangladesh..."

Source/publisher: 

Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "Dhaka Tribune" (Bangladesh)

Date of Publication: 

2020-06-28

Date of entry: 

2020-06-29

Grouping: 

  • Individual Documents

Category: 

Countries: 

Myanmar, Bangladesh

Language: 

English

Resource Type: 

text

Text quality: 

    • Good