Landmine Blast: Rohingya man killed, 2 injured
A Rohingya refugee was killed and two others were injured in a suspected landmine explosion on the Myanmar side of the border along Bandarban on Thursday night, Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) has said.
A group of refugees spotted the body and the two injured men lying near pillar number 39 along the Ghumdhum area under Bandarban’s Naikhongchhari upazila, said BGB Battalion-34 Commander Lt Col Ali Haider Azad Ahmed.
“The group was on its way back to Kutupalong camp from Myanmar,” he said.
The deceased was identified as Abdul Hamid, 32, while the injured are Mahmudul Haque, 26, and Habibur Rahman, 25, the BGB commander said, adding that all of them are from Kutupalong Rohingya camp in Cox’s Bazar.
According to residents of Ghumdhum, three of them are drug peddlers.
Mahmudul was taken to Chattogram Medical College Hospital with critical wounds while Habibur was taken to a medical centre inside the Kutupalong camp.
“We suspect that they fell victim to a landmine explosion inside Myanmar as the injured bore signs of being a victim of landmine explosions,” said Lt Col Ali Haider.
Five Rohingya refugees died in four incidents of landmine blasts in the same area over the last six months, Commander Ali told this paper.
A BGB official, wishing not to be named, said, “Myanmar security forces regularly bury mines along Ghumdum area that Rohingya refugees regularly use to commute.”
Myanmar troops have been accused of waging an ethnic cleansing campaign against the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority, with some 740,000 fleeing to Bangladesh since August 2017.
At the height of the mass exodus when tens of thousands of Rohingyas poured into Bangladesh every day, several were killed or seriously hurt in suspected landmine explosions along the border.
Anti-personnel mines were banned under a global treaty in 1997.
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