SYDNEY — Myanmarese and Bangladeshi residents and some supporters chanted “Rescue the Rohingyas, let them land, let them stay!” and “Stop the turnbacks!” outside Town Hall here May 22. The Refugee Action Coalition called the 200-strong demonstration in response to the desperate conditions of asylum-seekers from Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Boatloads have been prevented from landing in Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia by being turned or towed back out to sea. On May 20 the governments of Malaysia and Indonesia agreed to temporarily take some refugees. But as many as 2,500 are still adrift on old trawlers, according to the U.N. and the International Organization for Migration.

In mid-May Australian Prime Minister Anthony Abbott applauded those governments for turning away boats, as Canberra has for the past two years. “I don’t apologize in any way for the action that Australia has taken to preserve safety at sea by turning boats around,” he said.

There are more than 1 million Rohingyas, a Muslim ethnic group, in majority-Buddhist Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. “The Myanmar government denies Rohingyas citizenship or passports,” Sirnjul Mustafa, 21, told the Militant at the protest. They are blocked from owning land, accessing basic services and traveling. Hundreds have been killed in recent assaults led by Buddhist monks.

About 150,000 Rohingyas are held in concentration camps in their home state of Rakhine, while another 200,000 live in squalid camps across the border in Bangladesh.

Indonesian fishermen from Aceh province have brought ashore hundreds of asylum-seekers. “How can we not help destitute people like this? It would be a big sin,” fisherman Muchtar Ali told the Australian newspaper.