The 122 are believed to be from a flotilla of seven boats containing as many as 1,000 Rohingya who left Myanmar by sea and were heading for Malaysia. In heavy seas their engine failed and their boat was blown onto the Phang Nga coast.
The arrival of the Rohingyas’ boat in Thai waters was reported to police by a Phang Nga fishermen. By the time police arrived at the beach in front of Tai Muang Industrial and Community Education College, they had already beached and were jumping out of the boat.
The Rohingya are all men aged between 18 and 40 years old. After they were formally arrested on charges of illegal immigration, the police fed them, then took them to the police station and from there handed them over to the local Immigration Police.
Police were helped by Na Hayee-Ado, a Phang Nga local of Rohingya ancestry, who acted as interpreter. She explained that the 1,000 Rohingya had left Rakhine state in Myanmar on November 2 intending to go to Malaysia.
Through Ms Na they pleaded with the police not to send them back to Myanmar. They said they were sure that if they were sent back it would be to their deaths. It would be better to die in Thailand, they said.
The Rohingya are regarded by the Myanmar government as illegal immigrants into the country. Thousands have fled over the past couple of years, most aiming for asylum in Malaysia, after becoming targets of communal violence.
At the end of October the Myanmar government admitted that thousands of homes in villages and parts of towns inhabited by Rohingya were burned, along with boats, in the latest outburst of sectarian violence between the mainly Muslim Rohingya and the Buddhist majority.
Rangoon said it would send more police and troops to the area to keep the peace, but most Rohingya will undoubtedly see this as the precursor to government action against them.