Two Muslims die, 45 missing in boat capsize off Arakan coast

By Admin 08 Aug 2023

DMG Newsroom
8 August 2023, Sittwe
 
Two Muslim women died and 45 other Muslims were missing on Tuesday after their boat capsized in the sea near the village of Barsar in Arakan State’s Sittwe Township on Monday evening. Eight others were rescued.
 
Muslims from Buthidaung, Rathedaung and Maungdaw townships were heading to Malaysia, and their boat capsized near Barsar Village in Sittwe Township due to bad weather.
 
Forty-five people remained missing, Barsar village administrator U Soe Myint told DMG.
 
“According to survivors, there were 55 people on board. They were heading to Malaysia. Their boat capsized due to heavy waves,” U Soe Myint said.
 
The Muslims were being taken to Malaysia with a promise that they would pay 12 million kyats per person after they reached Malaysia.
 
Sittwe-based social organisation Shwe Yaung Metta took the bodies of the two Muslim women, while Sittwe police took the survivors to No. 1 Police Station.
 
Chairman of Shwe Yaung Metta Foundation U Min Htel Warr said: “We received a phone call yesterday around noon that there were two bodies at Barsar village. So, we took the bodies and sent them to the mortuary in Sittwe Hospital.”
 
DMG was unable to contact Sittwe Township Police Force on Tuesday evening to ask how police will handle the survivors.
 
The Muslims left by boat from Anaukpyin village in Rathedaung Township on Sunday evening, and the survivors were adrift with only water bottles after their boat capsized near Sittwe, according to Rakhine Daily, a mouthpiece of the Arakan State military council.
 
Despite the risk of jail terms on immigration charges, stateless Muslims who are barred from leaving Arakan State continue to leave the western Myanmar state to work in Thailand and Malaysia, driven by poverty and institutionalised discrimination.
 
A Muslim from Thakkelpyin village in Sittwe said: “We have to pay a lot of money to middlemen to apply for citizenship ID cards. Sometimes, we can’t get an ID card even if we give money. As we can’t apply for a citizenship ID, many attempt to leave the state illegally. Some are arrested at checkpoints, some die in boat capsizes, and some are on the way.”