Buddhist Children Forced Into Islam In Bangladesh

(Basu Das’s article direct from The DHAKA TRIBUNE on 04 January 2017.)

Child Trafficking Victims Forced to Convert to Islam: Bangladeshi Police 

uncover a crime ring which lures Buddhist children and then converts them

to Islam and trafficks them.

At least 72 children were converted to Islam and trafficked over the last seven years 

by a Bangladeshi criminal ring that preyed on impoverished, indigenous Buddhist and 

Hindu children, according to the Dhaka Tribune. Left is the file picture of converted 

boys reciting Koranic verses in a madrassa where the spiritual leader of the extremist 

group Ansarullah Bangla Team used to teach.

An investigation found an extremist Muslim group was going door to door among
indigenous communities in the eastern Bandarban district on Burma-Bangladesh
border. The group enticed impoverished families to hand over their children, saying
they would receive better education and food.

However, once the ring was in possession of the children, they shipped them across
the country to Dhaka and other places, converted them to Islam and placed them in
madrasas. Police arrested two of those involved in the crime ring on January 1, in
a raid in which they also rescued four children from a hotel. The two were charged with
human trafficking.

Although police rescued 72 children from this ring over the past seven years, 
it is not known how many more children were trafficked by the gang. The 
phenomenon is not new. In January 2010, police rescued 33 Buddhist children
 who were trafficked to Dhaka after criminals told their families they would be 
placed in a good school. In 2013, 13 Buddhist children escaped while on 
route to Dhaka from Chittagong and alerted authorities, who were able to 
rescue six further children from the clutches of traffickers.

"Indigenous communities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts are often already victims of
land-grabbing and displacement. The forced religious conversion of young
children adds yet another facet to the already severe marginalization of ethnic
and religious minorities in Southeastern Bangladesh,” a spokesperson for the
Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization told Christian Post, commenting
on the trafficking.

Indigenous Buddhist children at risk of forced religious conversion

There is an alarming presence of forced religious conversion of indigenous children
at the hands of radicals in Bandarban on the Burma-Bangladesh border.

Muslim fanatics seduce underprivileged families with scopes of a better 
education and lifestyle for their children, and forcefully convert the children 
in madrasas in Dhaka without their parents’ knowledge. Over the past seven 
years, police have rescued 72 children from this crime ring.

Investigation has revealed that a Machiavellian group has initiated some members
of the indigenous community and sustained them financially in order to manipulate
them. These new initiates go from door-to-door in underprivileged, indigenous
households which are predominantly Buddhist in around seven upazilas. The
neo-converts enroll the children in madrasas around the country where they are
indoctrinated and converted.

On Sunday night, police raided a residential hotel in Bandarban district town
and rescued four indigenous children and arrested two involved in the crime ring.
The arrestees- Abu Bakar, alias Mongshoi Pru Tripura, and Md Hossain –
are residents of the Bandarban bus station area. Their accomplice Sumon
Kheyang, a resident of Rajsthali in Rangamati, escaped the arrest and is on the run.

Locals tipped the police off, which prompted the raid. The four rescued children are
aged between 9-13 years and are from Betchhara locality under Roangchhari upazila.
They were students of first to fifth grade at various schools in their neighbourhood.
A human trafficking case has been filed with the Bandarban sadar police station in this
connection.

Aung Thwai Ching Marma, a parent of one of the children rescued, told the Dhaka
Tribune that families like his were lured with false hopes into a better future for their
children, which their parents had never had a chance to attempt.

Indigenous Buddhist children from Bandarbin District in Bangladeshi on Burma border.

Not a new phenomena

Investigation revealed that the child trafficking ring has been active for quite some
time. In January 2010, law enforcers rescued 33 Buddhist children from Otithi
Boarding – a motel – in Bandarban town. Police arrested Gordon Tripura alias
Rubel, Abu Horaira – a student of Darul Ihsan Madrasa in Dhaka, and Abdul
Gani, a resident of Shyamoli.

The 33 rescued Buddhist children were from Thanchi upazila in Bandarban 
and lured to Dhaka with promises of enrolment in Dhanmondi Adorsho 
Madina School. Again in February 2010, police arrested one Mohan Tripura 
and rescued 16 indigenous children from Habib Residential Hotel.

This particular raid was carried out on suspicions of the existence of Bangladesh
Tribal Association of Baptist Church in Bandarban’s Hafezghona. Police maintained
the children were possibly going to be trafficked to madrasas in Dhaka.

Aung Cho Mong, president of the Bandarban sadar upazila human rights commission,
told the Dhaka Tribune that the headmen in the Chittagong Hill Tracts must take proactive
roles to create awareness among the people. He said if parents were more aware of these
schemes, child trafficking could be minimised in the region.

In 2013, indigenous student activists rescued six Tripura children from Fakirapul Bus
Terminal in Dhaka. The six children were part of a batch of 19 children being trafficked
from Chimbuk to a madrasa in Pirojpur.

The other 13 children had gotten away from the clutches of the traffickers in Chittagong
and raised an alarm, leading to the rescue of the former six aforementioned. Bandarban
superintendent of police Sanjit Kumar Ray told the Dhaka Tribune that it is very common
for child traffickers to entice families with good fortune for their children.

(Blogger Notes: Bandarban District in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh is 
one of the most heavily militarized border districts and all those Islamist Proselytizing 
activities can not be happening without the full knowledge of Bangladeshi 
military or the notoriously-corrupt Bangladeshi paramilitaries The BGB - Border 
Guards Bangladesh.)

For Gratitude to "The Dhaka Tribune"
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