Anti-migrant protests planned in Rakhine

MAUNGDAW (MYANMAR): Buddhist hardliners in Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state are planning a day of protests against moves to help desperate migrants found adrift on boats in the Bay of Bengal, organisers said on Sunday.

Rakhine, one of Myanmar’s poorest states, is a tinderbox of tension between its Buddhist majority and a heavily persecuted Rohinghya Muslim minority, many of whom live in displacement camps after deadly unrest erupted there in 2012.

Fragile equilibrium

A regional migrant crisis is upending a fragile equilibrium that has since settled on the state. Tens of thousands of Rohingya have fled Myanmar in recent years, alongside Bangladeshi economic migrants, mainly headed for Malaysia and Indonesia.

The exodus was largely ignored until a crackdown on the people-smuggling trade in Thailand last month caused chaos as gangmasters abandoned their human cargos on land and sea.

Trapped at sea

Some 4,500 Rohingya and Bangladeshi migrants have since washed ashore in the region while the UN estimates around 2,000 others are still trapped at sea. After years of turning a blind eye to the exodus, Myanmar’s navy in the last fortnight discovered two boats with more than 900 migrants who were brought to Rakhine.