More than 150 Bangladeshis are returning home from Myanmar

More than 150 Bangladeshis are returning home on Wednesday (April 24) after their imprisonment in Myanmar. Today at noon they will return to the country via BIWUT Jet Ghat in Cox’s Bazar city. No one in charge could confirm exactly how many Bangladeshi nationals are coming.

However, an unconfirmed source says that approximately 173 people will be handed over to the Bangladesh government. For this, a Myanmar delegation is on the sea route with these Bangladeshi citizens.

Departing Bangladeshi nationals left the port of Sittwe in Rakhine state aboard Myanmar’s naval vessel Chin Duin. The ship is coming to Cox’s Bazar to pick up members of the Myanmar Defense Force who were forced to cross the border to Bangladesh due to the conflict in Rakhine State.

It is expected that the Myanmar ship will reach Bangladesh’s sea border around 11 am on Wednesday and then the Bangladeshi nationals will be handed over to the relevant authorities.

Out of 173 deserters, 129 are from Cox’s Bazar, 30 from Bandarban, 7 from Rangamati and 1 each from Khagrachari, Noakhali, Narayanganj, Chittagong, Rajbari, Narsingdi and Nilphamari districts.

As soon as the Bangladesh Embassy in Yangon received the information about the ship’s visit to Bangladesh, it raised the matter with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Home Affairs of Bangladesh and the concerned authorities of Myanmar. In a plan to repatriate the maximum number of Bangladeshi nationals quickly and easily, the embassy undertook the initiative to bring 144 ‘verified Bangladeshi nationals who have completed their terms of imprisonment or have been pardoned’ from various prisons in Myanmar to Sittwe Prison. Besides, another 29 verified Bangladeshi nationals, who are still incarcerated or under trial, have also raised the issue of releasing them to the host country, on the basis of which they are also sent to the country through amnesty.

On February 15, BGB handed over 330 people, including members of Myanmar’s Border Guard Force, who took refuge in Bangladesh in the face of attacks by the insurgent group Arakan Army, to the country’s Border Guard Police (BGP). Due to the conflict in the country, many members of Myanmar’s security forces have taken refuge in Bangladesh. Now the process of sending them back is going on.