Bangladesh police have rescued 20 Rohingya
after busting a gang which ferried the refugees from Myanmar but
demanded thousands of dollars for the boat ride, an official said
Tuesday.
The Rapid Action Battalion raided a village near the border with
Myanmar late Monday to free the Rohingya Muslims who had been held there
for a day, said Major Ruhul Amin.
The RAB chief who led the operation at Sabrung near Cox’s Bazar told
AFP the 20 included seven women, five men and eight children.
“They were held there by a gang of boat owners and crew who demanded
20,000 taka ($250) per person for a two-hour boat ride from Myanmar,” he
said.
A boat ride between Maungdaw and Bangladesh’s main landing station at
Shah Porir Dwip would cost no more than five dollars normally.
Amin said they arrested three members of the gang for profiteering.
The UN estimates that 507,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine into
Bangladesh since late August after the latest eruption of violence in
the northern Myanmar state.
Many have arrived on rickety boats crossing the Naf river, which
marks the border between Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district and Rakhine.
Police said boat owners, crew and fishermen have charged exorbitant prices for the rides.
“It has become a common phenomenon” since the influx began, Amin said.
Authorities have deployed mobile courts to crack down on the
profiteering gangs and handed down sentences of up to six months’
jail on nearly 200 people.
“We have arrested 20 brokers and freed nearly 2,000 people in raids
in the coastal villages. In one raid we rescued about 1,000 Rohingya who
were held at six houses,” Amin said.
Rohingya who fled to Bangladesh said the boatmen extracted every last
penny from them for the ferry and threatened to throw them overboard if
they refused to surrender valuables including gold ornaments
Media reports have mentioned Rohingya being held by boatmen and
agents for hours in coastal villages until they made inflated payments
for the trip.
Rohingya living in established refugee camps in Bangladesh have also been accused of joining the profiteering.
Bangladesh rescues 20 Rohingya held by refugee racket gang
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on
October 03, 2017
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