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A boat carrying about 300 Rohingya Muslims that was stranded off the coast of Thailand for a week has been moved away by Thai officials, the BBC reports.

The BBC's Jonathan Head, who went to the boat on Thursday, says those on board contacted families to say armed uniformed men had boarded overnight.

They repaired the broken engine, gave them food and moved the boat south.

Thai officials said the migrants did not want to go to shore but wanted to continue to Malaysia.

Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have been turning away migrant boats.

The heavily packed boat was abandoned by people smugglers who also disabled the engine. The migrants, including women and babies, had told the BBC’s correspondent they had no food or water and that 10 people had died.

"We fixed the engine and the boat left last night after 03:00," provincial governor Dejrat Limsiri told AFP news agency.

"We gave them ready-to-eat meals. They are now out of Thailand territory... They will try to go to Indonesia as it seems they cannot get to Malaysia," he said.