Eighty one percent of the Bangladeshi migrants travel to Libya for work before they take treacherous journey towards the European Continent, according to a recent study.
Over 96 percent migrants used the ‘Central Mediterranean passage’ from Libya to Italian shores for their travel with an average migration cost around $8000, says the UK-funded report by Dhaka-based Ovibashi Kormi Unnayan Program (OUKP).
Seventy nine percent migrants dare to risk their lives despite knowing they could “die in the sea” en route while 90.02 percent of their families were aware of the risks and vulnerabilities, reads the study titled ‘Gambling on Life: Context and Consequence of Irregular Migration from Bangladesh to Italy’.
So far, 396 of Bangladeshis migrants came to Italy from other EU countries in an attempt to regularize their documents, say the report.
It says irregular migration of Bangladeshi nationals towards Italy reached at peak in recent years, particularly in 2016 and 2017.
Bangladeshis became the second largest nationality in the first half of 2017, who arrived in Italy through irregular means, according to the study.
It found that 66 percent Bangladeshi migrants are aged between 18 and 30 years while 19 percent were below 18 years.
Ninety percent migrants do not have any kind of educational qualification.
Different factors forced the Bangladeshi migrants, either who came from Libya or who came directly from Bangladesh, to be trafficked and smuggled to Italy.
These include deterioration of socio-political milieu, debts back home, financial hardship in the family, network of families and friends abroad.
The whole migration process either from Libya or from Bangladesh is operated by rackets comprising of local militant groups, law enforcement agencies in Libya, and the agents of origin nationalities, says the study.
“Migrants can succeed or not in the game depending on luck. They can be apprehended, detained or die in the sea in taking part in the game,” reads the UK-government funded study.
Onsite survey in Italy found 79.9 percent migrants were tortured physically and mentally while 1.4 percent were sexually assaulted en route the journey.
The research was based on responses of 279 onsite migrants and 92 left behind families, in parallel, 32 in-depth case studies, two focus group discussions and 10 key informant interviews in four major cities in Italy and in three villages in an Upazila in Bangladesh.