Bodies of three Bangladeshi migrants, who died of hypothermia on a boat while crossing the Mediterranean Sea to enter Italy illegally, have arrived home. According to a news report on Monday, the body of one 21-year-old Kamrul Hasan Bappy, of Shariatpur’s Naria upazila, reached the country on Sunday. With this, bodies of three of the seven Bangladeshi migrants arrived in the last three days.
Unfortunately, the seven Bangladeshis were found dead by Italian Coastguard while conducting a rescue operation some 18 miles off the coast of Lampione, an uninhabited island near Lampedusa, on January 25. The boat carried a total of 273 Bangladeshis, said the Bangladesh embassy in Italy. Earlier, bodies of Joy Talukder and Emran Howladar, both from Madaripur, were received by their families on Saturday and Friday. Kamrul started his journey from Bangladesh on November 11 last year and initially reached Dubai on a visit visa, and from there entered Libya. In Libya, both Bangladeshi and Libyan traffickers kept Kamrul hostage for about two months before the boat journey. Kamrul’s father had to pay Tk 7.30 lakh in total to traffickers in Bangladesh and Libya.
Every year thousands of migrants’ corpses return and thousand others return with reduced mental and physical health. Experts asked for health insurances for the migrants, while human trafficking is seemingly uninterrupted. A section of national and local politicians, bureaucrats, law enforcers and recruiters have set up illicit networks across the rural and hard to reach areas. We earlier asked for dismantling the networks, arrest the kingpins, however, who are responsible to protect people, stop human trafficking are directly and indirectly beneficiaries of the illegal income. International and local collaboration among different agencies are must to stop human trafficking, but awareness, job opportunities, effective social safety net and political commitment are imperative. Sons and daughters of this soil and demise of such potentials are disgraceful, and disrespect to our flag and national spirit.
Our government use inhumanly earned foreign exchange for corruption through mega projects and luxury foreign trips.
