More than 70 Rohingya citizens are missing after a boat capsized off the coast of Indonesia

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has said that more than 70 Rohingya are ‘dead or missing’ following a boat capsized off the coast of Indonesia’s Aceh province.

According to the news of the foreign news agency “Reuters”, UNHCR said in a joint statement with the International Organization for Migration that if the deaths are confirmed, it will be the biggest loss of life this year.

The alert was issued on Wednesday following Indonesian fishermen rescued six migrants, a fishing community in Aceh province said, following the rescuers were standing on the deck of a boat that sank in strong waves.

For years, Rohingya have been fleeing Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where they are treated as foreigners from South Asia, denied citizenship and mistreated.

According to UNHCR data, more than 2,300 Rohingya arrived in Indonesia last year, which is more than the total number of citizens who arrived in the last four years.

UNHCR said in January that at least 569 Rohingya were killed or missing while trying to flee Myanmar or Bangladesh in 2023, the highest number since 2014.

Babar Baloch, a spokesman for UNHCR Asia, told Reuters that 151 people were on board, of whom around 75 were rescued by local authorities, while the rest were feared dead or missing.

Faisal Rahman, UNHCR’s protection associate in Aceh, told Reuters that the surviving Rohingya were fine and were staying at a Red Cross building in western Aceh.

The immigration agency in Aceh did not respond to a request for comment on the matter.