By Joshua Carroll with additional reporting by Michael Hernandez in Washington
YANGON/WASHINGTON
Myanmar's government announced Tuesday that it will return 200 migrants found last week on a boat off its shores to neighboring Bangladesh.
Myo Myint Than, the ambassador to Bangladesh, held talks with officials from the foreign affairs ministry to arrange the repatriation, the state-backed Global New Light of Myanmar reported.
Government officials, UN agencies and other aid groups "scrutinized some 208 boat people sheltered at relief camps in Ale Thankyaw village in Rakhine State," the report said.
Eight of those were "found to be Bengalis from Rakhine State," it added, using the term favored by the government for the Rohingya - a name it does not recognize.
Bangladeshi migrants and Myanmar's Muslim Rohingya are at the center of a crisis gripping Southeast Asia after human traffickers abandoned boats at sea when they were targeted in a crackdown by Thai authorities. reconnaissance
Malaysia and Indonesia subsequently repelled boats approaching their shores, leading to an international outcry. The countries have now said they will accept the migrants, but only temporarily.
Around 3,500 are estimated by the United Nations to be stranded at sea.
The U.S. has begun maritime reconnaissance flights in the Bay of Bengal and Adaman Sea in order “to locate and mark the positions of boats possibly carrying migrants”, State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke told reporters Tuesday.
Rathke said a U.S. Navy P-8 Poseidon airplane began conducting reconnaissance flights during the weekend with the support of the Malaysian government, and the U.S. stands ready to "conduct additional flights as necessary to help provide support to regional governments".
Myanmar's navy found the migrants Thursday and brought them to shore to be processed, following an announcement by the government that it would provide "humanitarian assistance to anyone" stranded at sea.
The announcement was in response to international pressure on Myanmar, which has denied responsibility for the exodus of migrants.
Rights groups have accused the government, which is staffed with former generals from the previous dictatorship, of forcing Rohingya to flee the country with a complex raft of oppressive laws. Meanwhile, Bangladeshis across the border are escaping extreme poverty.
Extremist Buddhist groups including the notorious monk-led 969 movement are planning a protest Wednesday against the Myanmar government's decision to shelter migrants.
Many in Myanmar besides the government reject the term Rohingya and say those who identify as such are in fact interlopers from Bangladesh.
