Latest entry follows the arrival of another vessel in late June when Acehnese fishermen rescued more than 100 Rohingya refugees, including 79 women and children, after Indonesian authorities had initially threatened to push them back.

Rohingya migrants look on following their arrival by boat in Lhokseumawe, Aceh on September 7, 2020.
Rohingya migrants look on following their arrival by boat in Lhokseumawe, Aceh on September 7, 2020.
(AFP)
Almost
300 Rohingya refugees believed to have been at sea for six
months have landed in Indonesia’s Aceh province.
Acehnese police said early on Monday that a wooden boat carrying the Rohingya was
spotted by local fishermen several kilometres (miles) off the
coast of Lhokseumawe, before landing at Ujung Blang Beach just
after midnight
“There are 297 Rohingya according to the latest data, among
them 181 women and 14 children,” Iptu Irwansya, a local police
chief, told reporters.
Junaidi Yahya, head of the Red Cross in Lhokseumawe, said
the group was currently being held in a temporary location.
“We hope they can be moved to the evacuation centre today,
but their health, especially related to Covid-19, is our main
concern,” said Yahya.
Among the group was one sick 13-year-old who police said was
taken to hospital in an ambulance.
Images of the Rohingya arrivals show lines of women in masks
carrying their possessions in plastic bags, and men huddled on
the floor of a thatched roof shelter.
Monday’s arrival follows the arrival of another vessel in
late June when Acehnese fishermen rescued more than 100 Rohingya
refugees, including 79 women and children, after Indonesian
authorities had initially threatened to push them back.
READ MORE: Confined to tents, Rohingya hold silent protest on genocide anniversary

Fleeing persecution in Myanmar and refugee camps in
Bangladesh, the Rohingya have for years boarded boats in an
attempt to seek refuge in other Southeast Asian nations.
Chris Lewa, director of the Arakan Project, a non-profit
group focusing on the Rohingya crisis, said the passengers that
arrived in Aceh on Monday had set sail from southern Bangladesh
at the end of March or early April, bound for Malaysia.
But both Malaysian and Thai authorities pushed them back,
she said, as borders tightened due to coronavirus pandemic.
Smugglers split the passengers into several boats, some of
which managed to land in Malaysia and Indonesia in June, but
several hundred remained at sea until Sunday night.
The smugglers called their families to demand payments in
the weeks before they were taken to shore, she said.
“The smugglers seemed to not want to try to disembark them because not everyone had paid ... They were basically keeping them hostage on the boat,” she said.
READ MORE: Years after ‘textbook ethnic cleansing’, fate of Rohingya remains in limbo
Source: trtworld.com