Desperate Rohingya Drown While Fleeing Remote Bangladesh Island
Voice of America
More than two dozen Rohingya are missing and feared drowned after their boat sank August 14 in the Bay of Bengal while they were fleeing a refugee settlement located on a remote Bangladeshi island.
The refugees, living on the island of Bhasan Char, have long said they do not want to live there, and the drowning incident underscores their desperation to flee the island. The Rohingya who drowned were apparently trying to sneak back to Cox’s Bazar where they had lived in the world’s largest refugee camp, before being relocated to Bhasan Char, police and other officials said. “We are devastated that reportedly many passengers, including women and children, have tragically drowned. The confirmed number [of the drowned] is not yet known,” Hannah Macdonald, a spokesperson for the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), told VOA in an emailed statement.A TV screen shows a file image of North Korea's rocket launch during a news program at a bus terminal in Seoul, South Korea, May 27, 2024. FILE - Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi speaks to reporters in Colombo, July 29, 2023. FILE - A TV screen shows a report of North Korea's spy satellite into orbit with its third launch attempt this year with an image of North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Nov. 22, 2023.
Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.