At least 52 members of a Rohingya armed group fled into Bangladesh following clashes with Myanmar’s Arakan Army on Sunday.
The Rohingya armed group members entered into Bangladesh through the Hwaikyang border in Cox’s Bazar’s Teknaf upazila.
Confirming the incident, Colonel Mohiuddin Ahmed, commander of BGB’s Cox’s Bazar sector, said that one Bangladeshi who was collecting crabs in the Naf River also crossed into Bangladesh around noon.
Members of BGB, RAB, the Bangladesh Navy, Army, APBn, and police took them into custody, he said.
Earlier, around 9am, a Bangladeshi child suffered bullet injuries when gunfire from clashes between the Arakan Army and the Rohingya armed group along the Techchibridge border area of Hwaikyang under Teknaf struck a house on the Bangladesh side.
The child, Afnaan, 7, is the daughter of local resident Jasim Uddin.
Local police initially reported that the child had died. However, around 2:45pm Sub Inspector Khokon Chandra Rudra, also in charge of Hwaikyang Police Outpost, clarified that although reports of her death circulated in the morning, she was still alive.
M A Mannan, deputy commissioner of Cox’s Bazar, told TIMES of Bangladesh that the child has been sent to Chattogram Medical College Hospital for advanced treatment.
Fighting broke out in the morning inside Myanmar territory opposite Teknaf’s Hwaikyang union, with heavy gunfire exchanged for several hours between the Arakan Army and the Rohingya armed group. At one stage, the Rohingyas retreated toward the zero line of the border.
Shah Jalal, acting chairman of Hwaikyang union, said that locals blocked a road after rumors spread about the child’s death. Later, with the intervention of law enforcement agencies and public representatives, the situation was brought under control, and it was confirmed that the child was alive.
