B’desh: Boat with 116 Malaysia-bound migrants detained

A joint patrol team of Bangladesh coast guards and navy detained a trawler in the Bay of Bengal on Tuesday after it was cast adrift with 116 Malaysia-bound illegal migrants on board, a coast guard commander said.

“There were 116 illegal migrants in the fishing trawler. They are all Bangladeshis,” coast guard station commander Dickson Chowdhury told AFP by phone.

Chowdhury said the trawler was cast adrift near Bangladesh’s southern-most island of St Martin’s, which is close to the border with <g data-gr-id="12">Myanmar,</g> after its crew abandoned it for another ship.

“It looks like a fishing trawler from Myanmar and that its crew were also from Myanmar,” he said, adding the crew may have abandoned the vessel after it was chased by Bangladeshi patrol boats.