While Northern America, Europe and Western Asia are important regions of destination, the majority of the 23.6 million migrants from South-eastern Asia remain on the continent and roughly a third of them stay in the same sub-region. The rising demand for domestic and care work in Asia and beyond has led to more female migrants than male migrants from some countries in the sub-region: 61 per cent of migrants from Thailand are female and the share is well above 55 per cent in Malaysia and the Lao People's Democratic Republic.
All countries of the sub-region imposed temporary restrictions for international travel (IOM, 2021), which included, for example, the closure of border crossing points and enhanced border surveillance, the suspension of visas, the interruption of international flights, as well as extensive testing and quarantines. This was complemented by internal measures, such as Myanmar’s domestic flight ban, and the Philippines’ suspension of public transport and use of roadblocks and checkpoints (Philippine Department of Health, 2020).
Migrants in South-eastern Asia have suffered disproportionately from COVID-19, often due to inadequate and cramped living conditions. In Singapore, for example, as of mid-February 2021 more than 90 per cent of the total 59,800 cases were migrant workers housed in dormitories (Singapore Ministry of Health, 2021), a trend to which the government reacted with movement restrictions for foreign workers (Singapore Ministry of Health, 2021). Other countries imposed restrictions for their own workforce, for example, the Philippines banned overseas travel for Filipino nurses and medical workers for several months (Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, 2020).
While all migrants suffer from the health risks, insecurity, lockdowns, declining work conditions and economic downturn related to COVID-19, the consequences for asylum seekers and refugees are particularly dire. Due to the pandemic, asylum systems in several countries were scaled down and are currently only partially operational or not at all, as in the case of Cambodia. Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Timor-Leste and Viet Nam have refused asylum seekers access to their territories (UNHCR, 2021), which led to hundreds of Rohingya refugees being stuck on boats in the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea (UNHCR, 2020a).