Authorities Detain Rohingya In Pathein
By Network Media Group
Friday, July 29, 2022
A Burmese naval vessel has intercepted a boat carrying 48 Rohingya who were at sea off the western town of Shwe Thaung Yan in the Irrawaddy Region.
A source close to the government for the town in Pathein Township told NMG that 22 men and 26 women were on the vessel, which was boarded by naval officers at midnight on 23 July.
“They were detained at Shwe Thaung Yan Police Station. Police are interrogating them,” says person who knows some of the police officers at the station.
“They’re Rohingya Muslims and were born in Burma. They’re so impoverished in Rakhine State that they’re trying to migrate somewhere to find work,” an anonymous member of the Muslim Youth Social Team told NMG.
The Rohingya, the majority of whom are denied citizenship in Burma, often try to flee by land via Shwe Thaung Yan, Chaung Tha and Ngayok Kawng or by sea to Malaysia and Indonesia.
On 9 July, the armed forces arrested 51 Rohingyas and 104 in May, both times travelling from Gwa in Rakhine State to Yay Kyi in Irrawaddy Region.
Before Burma Army (BA) clearance campaigns from 2016 to 2017 forced over 740,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh and the 2015 crisis, there were about living in 1.4m in Burma.
A UN fact-finding mission found BA’s 2017 campaign in Rakhine State included “genocidal acts.”
