Will Anyone Help the Rohingya?
The Inquiry
BBC
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 8 June 2015
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Shocking images have brought the Rohingya to the world’s attention - boatloads of people drifting aimlessly on the Indian ocean, sustained by bottles of water thrown to them by visiting journalists. The Rohingya are Muslims from western Myanmar – or Burma – who live a life of poverty and exclusion. The government refuses even to recognise their ethnicity. Hoping for better lives in Malaysia, they turned to people smugglers and leaky boats. Will anyone help the Rohingya, one of the most marginalised communities in the world? And, why has even the most famous living Burmese, the icon of democracy and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, refused to speak up on their behalf?
(Photo: Myanmar, South East Asia migrant. Credit: Ye Aung Thu/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC World Service, this is James Fletcher with The Inquiry. |
| 0:07.0 | This week, will anyone help the Rohingya? |
| 0:15.0 | One month ago, a rusting turquoise fishing vessel was drifting aimlessly in the waters off the coast of southern Thailand. |
| 0:22.0 | Its engine had been disabled and desperate faces peered |
| 0:26.0 | from the deck. |
| 0:27.0 | Well, this is incredible. We've heard about this boat for the last five or six days. They've |
| 0:31.5 | been cast adrift. They've told people on the phone |
| 0:34.8 | that had no food and water and they're in just terrible shape at the moment. |
| 0:38.6 | They're begging for help. On board were around 350 people, mostly Rohingya Muslims fleeing persecution in Myanmar, |
| 0:48.0 | formerly known as Burma. |
| 0:50.0 | Ten people were reported to have died on their lengthy voyage. |
| 0:54.0 | They've had absolutely no help, no supplies for close to a week. |
| 0:58.2 | There are plenty of women and children on board. |
| 1:00.6 | These are people who may have been at sea for close to three months. |
| 1:04.0 | And they're begging for help. |
| 1:07.0 | And we think there are many more boats like this out in the sea at the moment. |
| 1:11.0 | Up to 8,000 people were stranded at sea, denied safe harbour by |
| 1:16.3 | neighboring countries cracking down on the people trafficking trade. Shocking images of the refugees |
| 1:22.4 | brought the plight of the Rohingya to the world's attention, |
| 1:25.0 | and eventually Indonesia and Malaysia agreed to take some of them temporarily. |
| 1:30.0 | But, while the immediate crisis may have eased, the plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar remains |
| 1:36.7 | unresolved, long ignored by the region and the world. |
... |
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