About 140 Rohingya Muslims on wooden boat off Indonesia’s coast as residents refuse to let them land

Associated Press

LABUHAN HAJI, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian officials say about 140 weak and hungry Rohingya Muslims, mostly women and children, are on a wooden boat anchored about 1 mile off the coast of Indonesia’s northernmost province of Aceh, and local residents refused to allow them onto land. The blue-painted boat has been floating off the coast since Friday. Three Rohingya died during the trip from Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh to the waters off Labuhan Haji in South Aceh district, local police said Tuesday. Authorities have transferred 11 Rohingya to a government hospital since Sunday after their health worsened. About 1 million of the predominately Muslim Rohingya live in Bangladesh as refugees from Myanmar. They include about 740,000 who fled a brutal counterinsurgency campaign in 2017 by Myanmar’s security forces.