More than 500 people are feared dead after two boats carrying Rohingya refugees capsized in the Bay of Bengal, officials said Thursday, in one of the deadliest disasters involving Myanmar's persecuted Muslim minority.
According to preliminary information, the two boats left Myanmar’s western state of Rakhine in late June carrying mostly Rohingya passengers, including some who had traveled from refugee camps across the border in Bangladesh, according to a statement from the International Organization for Migration and the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
One boat, believed to have been carrying around 250 people, lost contact shortly after departure. A second boat, reportedly carrying 280 people, is believed to have sunk off Myanmar’s Ayeyarwady coast on July 8.
″While the incidents and casualty figures have yet to be officially confirmed, UNHCR and IOM are gravely concerned by the potentially devastating loss of life,” the agencies said.
Acting police Brig. Gen. Soe Lin Aung, the spokesperson for Myanmar’s Ministry of Home Affairs, declined to comment. Spokespeople for Myanmar’s president and the Ayeyarwady region’s government did not respond to requests for comment.
