2000 more rescued off Indonesia, Malaysia

Nearly 2,000 boat people from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been rescued or swum to shore in Malaysia and Indonesia, authorities said Monday.

It was warned that still more desperate migrants could be in peril at sea, according to reports by Reuters, AP and AFP.

The spate of arrivals comes as Thailand, a key stop on a Southeast Asian people-smuggling route, cracks down following the discovery of mass graves that has laid bare the extent of the thriving trade.

Thousands of impoverished Muslim Rohingya -- a minority unwanted by Myanmar's government -- and Bangladeshis brave a perilous sea and land trafficking route through Thailand and into Malaysia, Indonesia and beyond every year.

Malaysian police said people-smugglers had dumped at least 1,018 hungry migrants in shallow waters off the coast of the resort island of Langkawi since Sunday.

One boat was still stuck on a breakwater offshore but the others are believed to have fled to sea.

"We know that there are more boats out there that want to come in," Langkawi police chief Haritth Kam Abdullah said, citing police intelligence.

Indonesian authorities said they intercepted a boat off the coast of the northwestern province of Aceh early Monday with estimates of at last 400 people aboard, a day after 573 people described by one official as "sad, tired and distressed" came to shore in Aceh.

Police found a wooden boat late Sunday night trapped in the sand in shallow waters at a beach in Langkawi that was capable of holding 350 people, said island deputy police chief Jamil Ahmed. Around 865 men, 52 children and 101 women have been counted since then, he said at least two other boats have not been located yet.

Jamil said a Bangladeshi man told police that the boat handlers gave the passengers directions on where to go once they reached Malaysian shores, and escape in other boats. The migrant said they have not eaten for three days, Jamil said, adding that most of them were weak and thin.

There has been a huge increase in refugees from impoverished Bangladesh and Myanmar drifting on boats to Malaysia and Indonesia in recent days after Thailand, usually the initial destination in the region's people smuggling network, announced a crackdown on the trafficking.

When the four ships neared Indonesia's shores early Sunday, some passengers jumped into the water and swam, said Steve Hamilton, of the International Organisation for Migration in Jakarta, Indonesia's capital.

They have been taken to a sports stadium in Lhoksukon, the capital of North Aceh District, to be cared for and questioned, said Lt. Col. Achmadi, chief of police in the area.

Sick and weak after more than two months at sea, some were given medical attention.

An estimated 7,000 to 8,000 people are now being held in large and small ships in the Malacca Strait and nearby international waters, said Chris Lewa, director of the Arakan Project, which has monitored the movements of Rohingya for more than a decade.

Some are held even after family members pay for them to be released from the boats.

Mohammad Kasim, a Bangladeshi migrant on one of the boats, told Reuters that each passenger paid 4,400 ringgit ($1,200) for the journey to what they thought would be Malaysia. Three people died on the journey and were dumped in the sea, he said.

"We are hearing the passengers were left close to shore and were told that this is Malaysia and you got what you paid for. They came onshore and found out it wasn't Malaysia," said Mark Getchell, head of the International Organization for Migration in Indonesia.

An agency official estimated that around 300 people had died at sea in the first quarter of this year as a result of starvation, dehydration and abuse by boat crews.

Kasim, 44, said he had left the Bangladesh town of Bogra a month ago on a small boat with 30-40 other people in the hope of finding a job in Malaysia. An agency in Bogra helped arrange the trip.

After leaving Bogra, they arrived at a Thai beach where he said they stayed for 21 days before leaving on a larger ship with hundreds of passengers.

"I didn't know where I was but I was on the beach," Kasim said.

Rohingya packing into ships in the Bay of Bengal have been joined in growing numbers by Bangladeshis fleeing poverty and hoping to find a better life elsewhere.

Meanwhile, report from Bangkok add: Thai police have downplayed a probe into more than 50 officers transferred over suspected links to human trafficking networks, saying the transfers were "standard operating procedure" and that most of the officers were suspected only of negligence.