Whose job is it to save those desperate enough to set out on the high seas? In southeast Asia, an estimated 4,000 men, women and children from Burma and Bangladesh drift in boats with dwindling supplies. On Wednesday authorities from Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia will meet, but they fear what they call a "pull factor" - that a rescue will encourage yet more to set sail. Do the same moral standards that apply in the Mediterranean apply here? And what does it say about our globalised world?