In recent years, the Rohingya have increasingly fled Bangladesh’s overcrowded refugee camps, where gang violence and hunger have surged. Others are escaping Myanmar, where a bloody conflict between the ruling military junta and ethnic rebel groups has escalated. Muslim-majority Malaysia and Indonesia are seen by many Rohingya as relatively safe, have become their preferred destinations. People smugglers often charge from several hundred dollars to over $1,000 USD for each passenger boarding a wooden boat to cross the Bay of Bengal and Andaman Sea.
The results of this dangerous voyage have been catastrophic. In 2023, 4,500 Rohingya, two-thirds of them women and children have fled Myanmar and Bangladesh by boat, the UNHCR reported. Of those, 569 died or went missing while crossing the Bay of Bengal and Andaman Sea, the highest annual death toll since 2014.
On March 21, 2024, a wooden boat with 142 Rohingya refugees on board capsized off the coast of West Aceh. But only 75 survived, while at least another 67 passengers, including at least 28 children, had been killed when the boat capsized, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Some bodies of women and children were found at sea, lifeless. Among the survivors was a 12-year-old girl, who was identified only by the initial N, said several crew members had beaten and sexually abused her before the captain became enraged and deliberately capsized the boat.
Between November 2023 and February 2025, over 3,000 Rohingya refugees reached Indonesia by sea. Yet, as their numbers grow, their arrival has increasingly been met with rejection from local communities. Their journeys underscore the peril faced by displaced communities in search of safety. For many, Aceh is not a final destination but a fragile refuge marked by uncertainty, rejection, and hope.
This project documents those perilous crossings and the fragile lives temporarily rebuilt on Aceh’s shores, where survival coexists with waiting and the longing for a place to belong.
Parts of this story have appeared in AP News and one of the photos won the Andrei Stenin Press Photo Contest 2025.
