Mong Sing Hai Marma

A gang has allegedly been cutting trees for years in different neighbourhoods of the indigenous Mro community in Bandarban’s Lama upazila.

Over 400 indigenous people of six villages have been fleeing from their residences ever since eight people were killed during a “shootout” between two armed groups at Rowangchhari upazila in Bandarban on Thursday night.

He was a youngster with big dreams, hailing from Tangpru Para of Bandarban. Thoai Sing Hla Marma came to Dhaka in 2014, to pursue his goal of becoming a civil engineer, and got admitted to the National Polytechnic Institute.

Rapid Action Battalion arrested 17 members of newly formed militant outfit Jama’atul Ansar Fil Hindal Sharqiya and three members of Kuki-Chin National Front (KNF) following a daylong gunfight in Bandarban’s Thanchi upazila yesterday.

At least eight families of the Mro community, whose houses were allegedly set ablaze and vandalised by people of a rubber plantation in a village in Bandarban’s Lama upazila, are now living under the open sky, in the chilling winter cold.

Attackers torched and vandalised at least a dozen homes in Mro community in a village in Bandarban’s Lama upazila early yesterday.

The production of some high-value exotic fruits in Bangladesh has increased significantly in the past several years as many farmers have jumped on the bandwagon of growing them commercially since they fetch higher profits.