Several overcrowded boats carrying more than 100 Rohingya Muslims trying to escape an approaching cyclone capsized off the coast of western Myanmar, and only 42 were known to have survived, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
Eight bodies have been found so far, and more than 50 other people who were aboard are feared dead, said James Munn, an official with the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The Rohingya, a long-suffering minority, had been living in camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine state after fleeing sectarian violence last year. They crowded into as many as five boats that left Pauktaw township late on Monday, said Munn. Reports indicated that one of the boats was towing the others and hit a rock, causing all to capsize overnight.
The accident came amid a wider evacuation ahead of Cyclone Mahasen, which the UN says could swamp makeshift housing camps sheltering tens of thousands of Rohingya.
Myanmar State television reported on Monday that 5,158 people were relocated from low-lying camps in Rakhine State to safer shelters. But far more people are considered vulnerable.
Around 140,000 people — mostly Rohingya — are living in flimsy tents and makeshift shelters in the region after two outbreaks of Buddhist-Muslim violence there last year, according to the UN humanitarian affairs office.