102 boatpeople rescued off Indonesia, hundreds more at sea

Hundreds of boatpeople were rescued by local fishermen off Indonesia's Aceh province early Wednesday, as Myanmar said it was "ready to provide humanitarian assistance" in its most conciliatory comments yet.

Khairul Nova, a search and rescue official, said that 374 migrants, believed to be from Myanmar, had so far been rescued.

At 2 am (1900 GMT Tuesday) fishermen saved 102 boatpeople "from the sea of the Malacca Strait, including 30 children and 26 women".

He added later that in the morning another 272 people were brought to shore.

Those rescued were taken to Simpang Tiga village, in East Aceh district, he said.

Teuku Nyak Idrus, from an Aceh fishermen's organisation, told AFP the migrants had been found aboard a wooden boat off the coast.

"Their condition is very weak," he told AFP. "Many are sick, they told me that some of their friends died from starvation."

He said local people were providing food and water, and medics were treating the sick.

The rescue came as the foreign ministers of Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia were meeting near Kuala Lumpur to discuss Southeast Asia's migrant boat crisis.

Some 1,500 Muslim Rohingya from Myanmar, fleeing persecution, and Bangladeshis, seeking to escape grinding poverty, have already arrived in Aceh in recent days after being abandoned by people smugglers.

A foreign ministry statement in state media said Myanmar "shares concerns" of the international community and is "ready to provide humanitarian assistance to anyone who suffered in the sea."

Myanmar's treatment of the impoverished and marginalised Muslim Rohingya community is widely seen as one of the root causes of the surge in migrants making the perilous journey across the Bay of Bengal.

Nearly 3,000 Rohingya from Myanmar and Bangladeshi migrants have made it ashore in Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia in recent days after being abandoned by smugglers in open waters.

Thousands more victims are believed to be stranded at sea with scant food or water.