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UN Calls for Access to Burmese Boat People
Press Release: Terry Evans
22 January 2009
UN Calls for Access to Burmese Boat People
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has made a formal request to the Thai Government for access to 126 Burmese asylum seekers after claims that the Thai military allegedly forced the migrants' boats back into the sea and left them to die.
The UN refugee agency believes a group of 80 boat people are being held on Koh Sai Daing island off the Thai coast in the Andaman Sea. Another 46 intercepted on a boat last Friday remain unaccounted for. The UNHCR has asked the Thai government for access to the boat people from Burma to see if they are in need of international protection.
The migrants are mostly Rohingya Muslims originally from the Rakhine State of western Burma. Over the past 20 years more than 200,000 have fled Burma to escape persecution by the brutal military junta.
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