June 27, 2017
Maungdaw- Another Rohingya man has been tortured to death in custody amid growing fears for those arrested from Maungdaw and Buthidaung townships in the last days of Ramadan and Eid-ul-Fitr.
Md Omar Sadek (s/o Nazir Ahmed), a religious scholar in his 30s was arrested by the BGP from Bay Gone Nah shortly after Eid prayers on Monday when he was visiting a local stall, according to our correspondent in the area.
On Tuesday morning, BGP came to his home and forced his family to sign a ‘confessional’ statement saying Sadek was suffering from multiple health problems and had died as a result of natural causes.
However, locals say Sadek was around 33 to 35 years old with no serious health conditions. He was arrested on Monday morning and probably died on the same night, according to multiple sources.
Sadek was being beaten publicly from the moment he was being arrested, multiple eyewitnesses have told our correspondent.
The death occurred in a short period possibly in a period of less than 24 hours. Custodial torture of Muslims is a common practise resulting in the deaths and permanent disabilities of hundreds since the riots of 2012.
Meanwhile, another man was arrested from the same village earlier. Family members have not heard from the prisoner Md Toyub (s/o Md Nazir) since his arrest.
Many Rohingyas have been arrested and attacked after they attended the special prayers of Eid-ul-Fitr which marks one of the biggest festivals of the Muslim religion following the end of Ramadan. Particularly gruesome has been the attack on Kya Maung in Northern Maungdaw by an army backed Rakhine gang.
Arrests were also made on the last days of Ramadan which are considered very holy by the Muslims.
