Sagar Biswas :
Human trafficking to Malaysia still remained unabated while hundreds of low-income group people risk their lives everyday voyaging through the Bay of Bengal to get job in plantations, factories and construction sites.
These illegal migrants often take risky wooden boat or fishing trawler journey to go to Malaysia. As a result, dozens of people die every year when boats and trawlers carrying, mostly Bangladeshis and Rohingya Muslim refugees, keel over in the high seas.
In the latest incident, about 50 persons went missing when a fishing trawler carrying about 100 fortune-seekers to Malaysia sank in the Bay of Bengal some 2.5 kilometres offshore near Kutubdia Island in Cox’s Bazar district on Thursday.
There is widespread allegation that the voyagers met the tragic end of life after their boat was deliberately damaged, causing it
to go under water. Several persons, those rescued after the accident, claimed that the human traffickers deliberately damaged it when the passengers refused to board on other vessels.
Not only that, human traffickers sometimes kill the voyagers in the mid sea and wrap the voyage swallowing the promised money. Sources said the traffickers usually take Tk 1 lakh to Tk 2 lakh per head to transport the job seekers to Malaysia. In many cases, they fail to reach their destination due to strict surveillance of the law enforcement agencies.
When contacted, Superintendent of Police [SP] of Cox’s Bazar Shyamol Kumar Nath told The New Nation on Saturday, “Sometimes the traffickers damage their own vessels being chased by the coast guard and other law enforcing agencies.”
However, the Thursday’s incident of trawler capsize was different. The overloaded vessel sank when tried to flee away with full speed being chased by Bangladesh Coast Guard [BCG], said the SP.
The human traffickers have now changed their routes and started using the waterways of Chittagong Port to keep their transaction uninterrupted when the law enforcement agencies have increased vigilance on the Cox’s Bazar coast, intelligence sources said.
The brokers at first bring the passengers in Chittagong and keep them in hotels and other places. Later, they are forced to board on small boats and fishing trawlers at different ghats of Chittagong Port at dead of night. The Malaysia-bound passengers are kept in lower decks or store rooms. Finally they are shifted to large vessels waiting in the high seas to smuggle them to Malaysia, the sources added.
“So far we think, the traffickers have changed their route to avoid arrest. They are now using Karnafully channel. There are several ghats under Chittagong Port stretching from Sadarghat to no: 15 Jetty and Patenga. It is easy for the traffickers to board on the passengers in small boats in these ghats,” Captain Mahmud Hossain Zia, Director Operations, BCG, said last night.
However, member of the Board of Chittagong Port Authority [CPA] Commodore M Shahjahan said that it is not possible to know the inner portion of trawlers without conducting search. “The CPA has the technology to supervise the movement of ships. But the CPA has no technology to see the inside of trawlers and boats. It needs physical search in each and every trawler.”
More than 200 illegal migrants have been arrested by the BCG in the last couple of days. Security officials estimate that at least 25,000 Bangladeshi migrants attempt the journey to Malaysia illegally each year through the dangerous sea voyage.
“At present, the BCG along with Border Guard Bangladesh and police has intensified surveillance. To avoid the security trap, the human traffickers are now trying to run their business through Karnafully River and its adjacent waterways. Dozens of fishing trawlers use the Karnafully waterways every day. The traffickers take this opportunity and transport their human consignment loading on the fishing trawlers,” Captain Shahidul Islam, Commander East Zone of BCG said.
“The BCG has so far arrested 1,022 people while voyaging illegally to Malaysia conducting massive search on 180 kilometre waterways in the Bay of Bengal stretching from Mirsharai to Teknaf,” he said.
Sources said the human traffickers charge around $1,000 [£600] to take Bangladeshis to Malaysia by boat while it takes about 10 to 12 days to reach the destination.
The traffickers operate at least two fishing boats daily carrying 70 people each to Malaysia from Saint Martin’s Island. That means around 25,000 people migrate to Malaysia illegally every year, the sources added.
According to the UNHCR, hundreds of people, including Bangladeshi nationals and Rohingya people from western Myanmar, leave the Bay of Bengal on smugglers’ boats every year.
Besides, the UN estimates that nearly 50 to 150 Bangladeshis travel to Malaysia every week by paying traffickers operating the illegal sea routes while the illegal migration and sea accidents reach a peak each November to March.
In a major anti-trafficking drive, Bangladesh Navy Ship Durjoy rescued 614 people and 21 boatmen from Bay of Bengal, 135 nautical miles southwest from Saint Martin’s Island, when they were being sent to Malaysia illegally through the unnamed Myanmar-flag hoisted trawler on November 20, 2014.
In another deadly incident, nine Bangladeshis were shot dead during a clash with the human traffickers on a Malaysia-bound trawler which was carrying some 300 illegal migrants on June 11 last year.
