Boat with nearly 200 Rohingya lands in Indonesia

Rohingya refugees taken in by the army after their boat arrived at a beach in the province of Aceh, in the far west of Indonesia, at the end of the day on December 26.

AP - Rahmat Mirza

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

Nearly 200 Rohingyas, a persecuted Muslim minority in Burma, landed in Indonesia on Monday, December 26.

According to Indonesian authorities, this is the fourth such landing since November.

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In total, “ 

 ,” the local police spokesperson said in a statement.

The wooden boat arrived at the end of the day on a beach in the province of Aceh, in the far west of Indonesia.

Fleeing persecution and war in Burma and the unsanitary and overcrowded camps of

, hundreds of Rohingya try each year at the risk of their lives to reach Malaysia or Indonesia.

Six-fold increase in crossings

The High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is sounding the alarm.

In one year, the number of refugees attempting the perilous crossing of the Andaman Sea has increased sixfold.

This year, 119 people, mostly Rohingya from Burma, have drowned or gone missing and more than 1,900 have made the crossing.

In a month and a half, Indonesia alone has taken in more than 470 Rohingya refugees.

The last rescue before that involved a group of 57 men, exhausted and dehydrated, whose wooden boat had been drifting for several weeks.

They were able to land in the north of the province of Aceh.

►Also listen: Rohingyas: "There is a desire to work more for this ethnic and religious diversity"

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• Indonesia

• Rohingya

• Bangladeshi

• Burma