Medan, North Sumatra – The Indonesian government must not deport Rohingya asylum-seekers stranded in Aceh Province, a Muslim organization said on Friday.
"The foreign affairs minister should not deport the predominantly Rohingya Muslim refugees and should not categorize them as 'economic migrants,'" said Djoko Wiyono, head of the Ukhuwah Jama'ah Muslimin, or Hizbullah.
Wiyono also urged the government to form an independent fact-finding team to investigate the factors that forced the Burmese Rohingya to flee their home country.
He called on the government and the Aceh provincial administration to give the refugees protection, clothing, food, medicine and other assistance, particularly to teenagers and elders.
Wiyono said Hizbullah had provided the Rohingyas and Bangladeshis with shelter at Kuala Idi, East Aceh district, and donated medicine, clothing and copies of the Koran.
The Muslim organization also condemned the Burmese military regime for persecuting the Rohingyas. Wiyono said that the Rohingyas had been intimidated, tortured, kidnapped, raped and even killed in Burma. Such ill-treatment was a crime against humanity, he said.
"Those actions are against human rights and have hurt the feelings of Muslims throughout the world," he said.
Hizbullah urged the international community to pressure the Burmese government to respect the rights of Rohingyas.
Wiyono said that the health condition of the Rohingya migrants in East Aceh had improved, and a number of Islamic boarding schools had expressed their willingness to accommodate them.
Over the last month, Aceh Province has received nearly 400 Rohingya refugees. Some 193 Rohingya boat people were stranded in Sabang, Aceh on Jan. 7, and another 198 Rohingyas reached the coast of East Aceh after 21 days at sea, some of them arriving in critical condition on Feb. 3. Twenty-two of the refugees in the second boat had reportedly died at sea.
Both Burma and Thailand have faced condemnation from many quarters, including Indonesia, over their alleged mistreatment of the Rohingyas. The Thai Navy was alleged to have towed as many as 1,000 Rohingyas out to sea in boats without engines and cast them adrift with little food or water. Rights groups say hundreds are still missing at sea.
On Wednesday, AFP reported that Burma's senior official in Hong Kong described the Rohingya ethnic group to be "ugly as ogres" in a letter sent to media and foreign officials. "In reality, Rohingyas are neither Myanmar people nor Myanmar's ethnic group," the country's consul general, Ye Myint Aung, wrote in the letter.