Myanmar’s Border Guard Police (BGP) severely beat up three Rohingya firewood gathering teenagers and robbed their belongings in Maungdaw Township on January 31, according to the local sources.

The incident took place when the teenagers, on their way back home in the evening, encountered a gang of BGP from the head-quarter based in Kyi Kan Pyin village also known as Khawar Bil. Upon that, the BGP held them for no reason, arbitrarily beating them up and robbed their firewood and wood-cutter knives.

The victims are identified to be Shakir (son of) Tahir, 13; Nabi Hussein (son of) Bashar, 12; and Hussain (son of) Bashir Ahmed, 13. All of them hail from the southern Hamlet of Khawar Bil, northern Maungdaw.

A villager dishearteningly said “we, Rohingyas, here even including teenagers have to work so hard to make our daily ends meet because we are boycotted and economically crippled. On top of that, the BGP always harasses and beats up Rohingya firewood gatherers like this.

They extort money from the sole-traders of vegetables, fishes and other basic commodities and sometimes, loot their goods to their (BGP’s) hearts’ content. If the situation continues like this, what else we could do for our livelihood when our movements are restricted within a specified region