Bangladesh stops more refugees taking risky trip to Malaysia

12 February 2019
Bangladesh stops more refugees taking risky trip to Malaysia
Rohingya refugees walk back to their tent during dusk at the Kutupalong refugee camp on November 18, 2018. Photo: Dibyangshu Sarkar/AFP



The 22 had paid traffickers up to $1,200 each to get a place on a small boat for the dangerous journey, a BGB officer said. The people smugglers fled before security forces arrived.


There were already 300,000 Rohingya already in Bangladesh, where they are largely confined to the overflowing camps.
"The traffickers took whatever they could from the refugees," Lieutenant Colonel Asadud Zaman Chowdhury, BGB chief for the town of Teknaf, told AFP.

He added that it was possible many of the young women would have ended up in "forced prostitution".




Bangladesh's refugee commissioner Mohammad Abul Kalam said "an internationally organised racket" was preying on desperation in the Rohingya camps.

"The refugees are lured by false promises. They simply don't have any idea how dangerous these sea journeys can be," he told AFP.

The UN refugee agency urged the Myanmar authorities to address the root causes of the crisis in Rakhine.

"Rohingya will continue to risk their lives on boats unless there are tangible solutions to their plight," UNHCR spokeswoman Caroline Gluck told AFP.
