By Max Constant
BANGKOK
The day after it left a ship of emaciated Bangladeshi and Rohingya at sea, Thailand has neither confirmed nor unconfirmed its strategy on migrant boats in its waters, saying it would temporarily welcome some, but not all.
Deputy-government spokesman Colonel Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Friday that his prime minister's position was “if the migrants wanted to make landfall, Thailand was willing to provide them with humanitarian assistance,” according to The Bangkok Post.
But it came with a caveat: the migrants have to comply with legal procedures - implying that all who arrive in Thailand via smuggling networks would be considered illegal migrants.
The statement appeared to contradict that of government adviser Panitan Wattanayagorn, who also told the Post that only “small boats carrying 10-15 migrants could be accepted at the discretion of the officials at the scene.”
Large vessels carrying hundreds of migrants will not be allowed to make landfall, he stated.
On Thursday, the Thai navy intercepted a fishing boat carrying 400 migrants, mostly Muslim Rohingya from western Myanmar, provided them with food and water, fixed the boat's engine and turned them back to the sea.
The boat was packed with exhausted and starving men, women and children, after what they said was a two-month journey on the Andaman.
They told reporters who approached the boat that the smugglers controlling the vessel had left six days ago, after sabotaging the engine and robbing them.
Kaewkamnerd stated that those on board had told navy officers that they did not want to land in Thailand, but in Malaysia.
Inter-governmental agency the International Organization for Migration has estimated that 8,000 migrants being smuggled from either western Myanmar or Bangladesh are currently on boats in the Andaman Sea and Malacca Straits.
The boats have been attempting to beach in Malaysia or Indonesia, after Thailand - their usual destination - launched a crackdown on human smuggling at the beginning of the month
But in the past few days, both Malaysia and Indonesia have started to stop vessels from landing.
The deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch has accused Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia of playing games with the boat and putting the lives of those on board at risk.
Phil Robertson urged the countries’ navies to “stop playing a three-way game of human ping pong,” as the world would judge how they treated “these most vulnerable men, women and children.”
Malaysia’s deputy home minister Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar has said the government will turn back boats and deport migrants who land ashore, while earlier this week Indonesia’s navy towed out to sea a ship carrying 400 migrants after supplying them with fuel, food and water.
It has since claimed that it did not tow the boat from its waters, saying the passengers had asked to be left to continue onwards to Malaysia.
Thailand’s junta chief-cum-Prime Minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha announced Tuesday that the country will host talks on the migrant crisis May 29 with senior officials from “15 affected countries” – primarily Myanmar, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia.
