‘On that day Myanmar Army picked me up from my house along with around 30 youths of different villages. After taking us in an open field, they tied our hands with ropes and took off our clothes. Then they started beating us with iron rod and bamboo. Some extremist Mog people joined the army in that torture. Because of the nonstop brutal torture, many of us got fainted. When they fell on the ground, army personnel shot them to dead.’

Thus, these words of Rahim Miah, a Rohingya youth portray the brutality of Myanmar Army’s torture.

Among those youths, only Rahim Miah could have survived the extreme torture of Myanmar Army and managed to escape Myanmar with the gunshot wounds in his body.

On October 21, Abdul Aziz, a Bangla Tribune Correspondent talked with Rahim Miah at Balukhali Rohingya Camp, Ukhia.

Rahim Miah told that his house is the south of Buthidaung and near the Maungdaw Township in the Rakhine state. His father Abul Kalam has died two years ago. He is the eldest of four sisters and three brothers. He was the only earning person of his family. They had been living happily before the army crackdown started.

To describe the next part of the horrific memories of that day Rahim Miah said, ‘Those who did not get fainted, the soldiers opened their knots of hands and asked them to run away. But how could they run away while they were not even in a condition of walking properly? However, all started to run away to escape the deathly torture of the soldiers. But the Myanmar soldiers did not give us the chance to escape away. Soldiers started to shoot from behind. I got shot and fell on the ground and lost my consciousness. When I regained my consciousness, I found myself lying on the ground with all the dead people around me. I saw that the soldiers and the Mogs were taking rest and passing their time in exhilaration. As I had no other option left to escape, I stayed lying on the ground as a dead body. At the evening the soldiers left the place.’

Rohim Miah said, after the departure of the soldiers, other people of the village who were hiding in the jungles and hills rescued him from the Death Valley. On that very night, he started for Bangladesh with other Rohingyas. But he was unable to walk properly. He reached the Anjumanpara border of Ukhia's Palangkhali union on the shoulders of other Rohingyas.

Rahim Miah said, ‘When we reached the no-man’s land area, BGB helped us to reach Balukhali Rohingya Camp, Ukhia. I don’t know whether my brothers and sisters are alive or not. If they are still alive, certainly we will meet someday in any of the Rohingya camps of Bangladesh.’