Malaysia has taken 269 Rohingya Muslims into custody after intercepting a boat off the country's north, authorities said late Monday.
The boat was found off Langkawi island early Monday, the National Task Force on border security said in a statement.
As a coast guard vessel approached it with the intention of pushing it back into international waters, 53 people jumped off and swam ashore, it said, adding that they were immediately detained by officers who were awaiting them.
Found on the boat were 216 other members of Myanmar's persecuted minority and the body of a dead woman. All 269 people were detained as "undocumented migrants," it said.
The people were offered food and clean water, and their boat, which was deliberately damaged, was allowed to be towed to Langkawi "on humanitarian grounds," the authorities said.
Since a military crackdown launched on Rohingya communities in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine in August 2017, more than 740,000 members of the minority have crossed the border and taken shelter in neighboring Bangladesh.
Many have then sought refuge in Malaysia, but after a boat carrying 202 Rohingya made it to Langkawi on April 5, Malaysian authorities tightened the border to stem the spread of the new coronavirus in the wake of the pandemic.
According to the task force, a total of 396 undocumented migrants, 108 boat handlers and 11 smugglers have been arrested between May 1 and June 7.
According to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, as of the end of February 2020, there were 101,010 registered Rohingya refugees and asylum seekers living in Malaysia.
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