Indonesia faces new refugee crisis as Rohingya boat pushed back to sea

Al Jazeera  :
Indonesia is facing a renewed refugee crisis after the arrival of three boats in as many days with nearly 600 Rohingya people on board.

Two of the boats, the first with 146 passengers and the second with 194, were able to land on beaches in Pidie on Aceh’s east coast on Tuesday and Wednesday, with refugees including women and children pictured collapsed on the sand after reportedly spending a month at sea.

On Thursday, a third boat carrying some 249 people was met with resistance from locals in Bireuen who refused to allow it to land and pushed the vessel back out to sea.

When the boat tried to land a second time – a little further south at Muara Batu – and refugees staggered onto the beach, they were lined up and escorted back, according to witnesses on the ground. Fishermen at the beach handed some of the refugees packets of food and bottles of water, but the situation continued to escalate late into the evening.

In video footage sent to Al Jazeera by aid workers on the beach, hundreds of refugees then jumped off the boat and swam ashore, staging a sit-in on the sand.

Late in the evening, under the cover of darkness, more footage showed emaciated people, some who could barely walk, being dragged into the sea by residents and forcibly returned to their boat. Refugees on the beach, including children, prayed and cried as they begged to be allowed to remain in Aceh, which lies on the tip of Sumatra island and is Indonesia’s most western province.

The situation appeared more volatile than in previous years, with refugees and residents shouting at each other, and refugees clinging to each other in an effort to avoid being marched into the water.

The people of Aceh have previously welcomed refugees, who are taken to a temporary camp before they are usually moved to other parts of Indonesia, but tensions have been escalating in recent years as more and more Rohingya have arrived.