UN warns that 2 boats adrift in the Andaman Sea with 400 Rohingya aboard desperately need rescue

By GRANT PECK
Associated Press

BANGKOK (AP) — The U.N. refugee agency has raised the alarm for an estimated 400 Rohingya Muslims believed to be aboard two boats reported to be out of supplies and adrift in the Andaman Sea. The agency is worried that all those aboard could die without efforts to rescue them. The captain of one of the boats told The Associated Press he had 180 to 190 people on board and that the engine was damaged. There is a seasonal exodus of Rohingyas, usually coming from overcrowded refugee camps in Bangladesh. About 740,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Buddhist-majority Myanmar to Bangladesh since 2017 after a brutal counterinsurgency campaign.