COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh: UN chief Antonio Guterres exhorted Myanmar's leaders to end the "nightmare" faced by Rohingya refugees fleeing an army campaign, after at least 63 people were presumed dead when a boat carrying Rohingya families capsized off Bangladesh.
Guterres has urged Burma's authorities to immediately end military operations that have sent over 500,000 Rohingya Muslims fleeing to Bangladesh, calling the crisis “the world's fastest developing refugee emergency and a humanitarian and human rights nightmare.
The Rohingya have been fleeing a vicious Myanmar military crackdown on Rohingya rebels that has gutted villages across northern Rakhine state.
Scores have drowned while trying to cross waters separating the two countries, while those who survive face new dangers as they cram into squalid refugee settlements where food and clean water are in short supply.
The billowing humanitarian crisis prompted the UN Security Council to hold its first meeting on Myanmar in eight years, though the member countries failed to arrive at a joint resolution.
The US slammed the army for trying "to cleanse the country of an ethnic minority" — while Beijing and Moscow offered support to Myanmar authorities who have vehemently rebuffed allegations that ethnic cleansing is underway.
UN demand
Speaking to the 15-member council, Guterres urged Myanmar to halt military operations and open humanitarian access to the conflict-wracked western region.
"The situation has spiralled into the world's fastest developing refugee emergency, a humanitarian and human rights nightmare," he said, while calling for those displaced from the conflict to be allowed to return home.
The UN migration agency said Friday that more than 60 people are either confirmed dead or missing and presumed dead following the shipwreck of a boat carrying Rohingya Muslims who were fleeing from violence in Myanmar to Bangladesh.
Spokesman Joel Millman of the International Organization for Migration told reporters in Geneva that 23 deaths have been confirmed after eight more bodies were found overnight following an initial count of 15.
Based on interviews that IOM has conducted with survivors, Millman said, "We believe 40 are missing and presumed drowned" on the vessel, which was thought to have been carrying about 80 people.
The agency says more than 500,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since Aug. 25, the start of a military crackdown triggered by a coordinated militant assault on 30 police posts and an army base in northern Rakhine state, where many Rohingya live.
IOM's Missing Migrants Project said 46 bodies had been retrieved over a three-day period starting Aug. 30 after several boats carrying people trying to reach Bangladesh capsized in the Naf River. It said the incident this week was believed to be the first deadly one in the Bay of Bengal since the exodus of Rohingya began.
The "very tragic" accident involved a vessel that had been at sea for two days with no food on board and amid choppy seas, Millman said. The Bangladeshi captain hadn't initially charged the passengers any fee for the transport and had been trying to avoid sea patrols or checkpoints, he said.
'Systematic violence'
The UN chief noted that the "systemic violence" could cause unrest to spill south to the central part of Myanmar's Rakhine state, threatening 250,000 Muslims with displacement.
Some of the strongest criticism came from US envoy Nikki Haley, who accused Myanmar authorities of waging a "brutal, sustained campaign to cleanse the country of an ethnic minority".
"It should shame senior Burmese leaders who have sacrificed so much for an open, democratic Burma," she added, in what appeared to be a rebuke to the country's civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose reputation as a human rights champion has been battered by the crisis.
Burma is an alternative name for Myanmar.
Backed by Russia, China
But Myanmar received strong backing from Russia and China, a close ally and key trade partner.
"The international community must be aware of the difficulties faced by the Burmese government, be patient and provide its assistance," Chinese envoy Wu Haitao said.
"We must be very careful when we talk about ethnic cleansing and genocide," added Russian ambassador Vassily Nebenzia, taking the Myanmar government line as he blamed Rohingya militants for "burning villages".
Fires have razed hundreds of communities in northern Rakhine over the past month, in what rights groups say is an army-led effort to drive out the stateless minority that has faced decades of persecution.
Myanmar, a mainly Buddhist country, has denied the allegation and defended its operations as a proportionate crackdown on the Rohingya militants whose deadly raids on police posts on August 25 sparked the military backlash.
Authorities have restricted access to the epicentre of the violence but agreed this week to allow a UN visit to the conflict zone.
The trip has been postponed to October 2 due to bad weather, state media reported Friday.
Boat tragedy
The drowning tragedy is the latest in a series of deadly accidents as desperate refugees surge into Bangladesh, where they are penned into ramshackle tent cities amid dire shortages of nearly all forms of aid.
Witnesses and survivors said the vessel that overturned Thursday was just metres from the coast in rough waters, after it was lashed by torrential rain and high winds.
There are fears the death toll could rise sharply with the International Organization for Migration saying about 100 people, mainly children, were believed aboard the downed vessel.
The bodies of 16 people - mostly children - were found Thursday and brought to a local school, said coastguard commander Nasir Uddin.
Two more bodies of young boys were retrieved Friday morning, he added, while another woman was washed ashore in a separate location.
"They drowned before our eyes. Minutes later, the waves washed the bodies to the beach," said Mohammad Sohel, a local shopkeeper.
One distraught survivor told AFP that his wife and one of their children had been killed when the ship sank.
"The boat hit something underground as it came close to the beach. Then it overturned," said Nurus Salam, who had set off for Bangladesh from a coastal village in Myanmar late Wednesday with his family.
