Journalists and filmmakers Am and Steve Sandford have covered Southeast Asia as a couple for the last 30 years and have been intimately involved with the Rohingya in Myanmar since 2009, when members of the Muslim minority group began fleeing their homes.
That culminated in a mass exodus amid an alleged genocide of the Rohingya in 2017, when more than 700,000 fled into Bangladesh. The Rohingya’s plight has gone from bad to worse amid the civil war in Myanmar following the coup d’etat in early 2021.
The Sandfords have released a book – “Witness to Genocide, Chasing the Rohingya in Southeast Asia” – that details their experiences in gathering evidence. The well-written chronicle leaves readers with no doubt about the tragedies inflicted against a largely impoverished ethnic minority.
Evidence collected by leading rights groups and media outlets has led to charges of genocide against the Burmese army by the International Court of Justice, but the judicial process has been delayed, in part due to the chaos that followed the coup.
Am, a native Thai, and Steve, a photojournalist from Canada, spoke with Luke Hunt from The Diplomat about their eight-year odyssey, which began when a boat overloaded with Rohingya refugees washed ashore in southern Thailand in 2009.
The couple have worked for Al Jazeera, SBS Dateline, Unreported World, 60 Minutes Australia, and NPR in the United States. Together they have covered conflicts in Myanmar and southern Thailand, coups, and stories ranging from surrogate baby scandals to the Thai cave rescue in 2018.
Through their media outlet, AsiaReports, Am and Steve and are currently focussed longer-form documentaries and current affairs programs.