By Joshua Carroll
YANGON, Myanmar
Bangladeshi diplomats in Myanmar have spoken out against claims that most of the thousands of migrants caught up in a boat crisis on Southeast Asia’s seas are from their country.
Myanmar’s government says that over 700 people found near its shores last week are mostly from Bangladesh and has described the country as “the root” of the migrant crisis.
A spokesperson for the neighboring country's embassy in Yangon, Myanmar’s main city, told Anadolu Agency Friday that “whether the 700 people are all Bangladeshi or not will only be known after due verification.”
“The consular team is yet to start the process,” he added.
Thousands of migrants from Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslim community and from Bangladesh were left stranded at sea after a crackdown by Thai authorities scared people smugglers into abandoning their boats last month.
The nationality of the migrants is especially contentious in Myanmar because the government denies that the Rohingya are a genuine ethnicity, and claims the group are in fact interlopers from its neighbor.
Partly because of that stance, Myanmar authorities have been keen to deflect blame for the crisis by suggesting most of the migrants are "Bengali."
The country's Ministry of Information said in a Facebook post May 29 that its navy had discovered 727 "Bengali" migrants -- including "74 women and 45 children" -- crammed on a fishing trawler. It added that the migrants would be towed to an island.
Reports have since said that the boat is now being sent to Bangladesh, though Bangladeshi authorities have said they will only accept people who are genuine citizens of their country.
On Thursday, Mohammad Sufiur Rahman, the Bangladeshi ambassador, contested those claims.
“We believe that to form a better understanding, we need to examine the entire spectrum of rescued people in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Myanmar together,” he said during a briefing at Myanmar’s foreign ministry.
He added that there was a need to “understand the root causes” of the crisis to form a “clear understanding as to where these people are coming and why they are coming."
The Rohingya are largely stateless and are described by the United Nations as one of the most persecuted groups in the world. Tens of thousands have fled Myanmar on crowded boats in recent years.
Many live under apartheid-like conditions in northwest Rakhine state, near Bangladesh’s border, following Buddhist led rioting that forced tens of thousands to flee their homes.
Since May 1 -- when people trafficking camps, later found to be the sites of graves, were discovered in Thailand -- Myanmar has refused to acknowledge that persecution of the Rohingya is the root cause of the boat exodus. Officials maintain that traffickers are to blame.
Myanmar complained of "finger pointing" at a regional summit in Thailand May 29 to discuss the crisis, and urged countries to work together rather than place blame.
Myanmar's delegates at the meeting also agreed to allow the UN's refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) access to migrants.
But so far aid agencies have been prevented from travelling to see the 727 people found by the navy. The navy also briefly detained and then turned away a team of journalists who attempted to reach the boat earlier this week.
On Sunday, Myanmar tried to deflect attention to Thailand by announcing that its eastern neighbor had refused the migrants permission to land before they were found abandoned off the Irrawaddy delta.
Thailand's Nation newspaper reported Myanmar's Eleven Media as saying that on arrival in Thailand, the migrants had said that they failed to meet their contact and tried to avoid the authorities, but were instead sent back to sea and told to return to Bangladesh.
Many of the migrants are attempting to travel to Malaysia on trafficking vessels, the smugglers using Thailand as a transit stop where they frequently imprisoned the migrants for ransom.
"Thailand put these people on boats and sent them out of Thai waters," the report quoted an unnamed naval officer as saying.
"It's been 10 days since they left Thailand, according to the migrants. The navy is now sending them to the Haigyi island naval port. After interrogating them, we will make detailed plans about what to do next," he added.
Thailand has since said it will help, but not harbor, the thousands of boat people --- Rohingya Muslims and Bangladeshis -- who remain at sea looking to land on Southeast Asian shores.
Malaysia and Indonesia, meanwhile, have said that they will take them in for one year, ascertain which are asylum seekers and which are economic migrants, and then the international community will find homes for them.
