DHAKA: Some Rohingya refugees are making Bangladesh passports with the help of local and Rohingya brokers, who manage the required documents in exchange for large sums of money, police and passport officials said.
The syndicate collects national ID cards, birth and citizenship certificates and police verification from relevant government offices using their links as well as by bribing officials.
Police and passport officials say the Rohingya used fake names and addresses while applying for passports.
In the latest such discovery, Chittagong police arrested three Rohingya men with three Bangladeshi passports against their names from the city’s Kattoli area on Thursday night.
The trio, all of whom took shelter in refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar with their families in 2017, were on their way to Dhaka.
Two of them got their passports in December 2017, just months after their arrival, and the other in January this year, police said.
They were identified as Yusuf, 25, his younger brother Musa, 20, and Aziz, 25.
They made their passports in the south-eastern district of Noakhali and were going to the Turkish embassy in the capital Dhaka for visa processing, said Mustafizur Rahman, officer-in-charge of Akbar Shah Police Station in Chitaggong.
On the same night, Bayezid police detained four Rohingya women from the port city’s Barma Colony area, some 10km from Kattoli, one of which carried a Bangladesh NID (National Identity) card.
Mustafizur said the three men used to live in the Thaingkhali refugee camp in the Ukhia upazila (an administrative division similar to a borough or county) in Cox’s Bazar, and used an address in Noakhali to get their passports.
“They got the passports with the help of a syndicate that includes local and Rohingya brokers.
“They spent around 60,000 taka (RM2.971), 90,000 taka (RM4,457)or more for their passports,” he added.
To get a passport, the Rohingya first contacted Rohingya and Bangladeshi brokers in Cox’s Bazar.
They then collect documents from union parishads or city corporations to prove their citizenship with the help of the brokers, and submit those to the passport office along with their applications.
Last month, the Chattogram Divisional Passport Office detained two Rohingya – a man and a woman – when they went there to make passports.
At the time, the man identified as Faisal produced documents showing he was from Jungle Salimpur in the Sitakunda upazila.
The woman on the other hand identified herself as Sumaiya Akhter from Dhaloi in the Hathazaria upazila.
The two even produced NID cards of their parents, said Abu Sayeed, deputy director of Chattogram Divisional Passport Office.
“The Rohingya are submitting all the necessary documents to get passports. It is really difficult to identify the Rohingya from among a huge number of applicants,” he told The Daily Star.
He said they could not initially verify the authenticity of the documents, but after suspicion arose, they matched their fingerprints on the Rohingya database and found that they were Rohingya.
“We have limited access to the server of the NID of the Election Commission, but we have access to the recently-developed database of the Rohingya people,” he said.
During interrogation, the Rohingya told the passport officials that the brokers managed all the documents for them, he added.
Sayeed blamed local elected public representatives for issuing the documents. — The Daily Star/ANN
The syndicate collects national ID cards, birth and citizenship certificates and police verification from relevant government offices using their links as well as by bribing officials.
Police and passport officials say the Rohingya used fake names and addresses while applying for passports.
In the latest such discovery, Chittagong police arrested three Rohingya men with three Bangladeshi passports against their names from the city’s Kattoli area on Thursday night.
The trio, all of whom took shelter in refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar with their families in 2017, were on their way to Dhaka.
Two of them got their passports in December 2017, just months after their arrival, and the other in January this year, police said.
They were identified as Yusuf, 25, his younger brother Musa, 20, and Aziz, 25.
They made their passports in the south-eastern district of Noakhali and were going to the Turkish embassy in the capital Dhaka for visa processing, said Mustafizur Rahman, officer-in-charge of Akbar Shah Police Station in Chitaggong.
On the same night, Bayezid police detained four Rohingya women from the port city’s Barma Colony area, some 10km from Kattoli, one of which carried a Bangladesh NID (National Identity) card.
Mustafizur said the three men used to live in the Thaingkhali refugee camp in the Ukhia upazila (an administrative division similar to a borough or county) in Cox’s Bazar, and used an address in Noakhali to get their passports.
“They got the passports with the help of a syndicate that includes local and Rohingya brokers.
“They spent around 60,000 taka (RM2.971), 90,000 taka (RM4,457)or more for their passports,” he added.
To get a passport, the Rohingya first contacted Rohingya and Bangladeshi brokers in Cox’s Bazar.
They then collect documents from union parishads or city corporations to prove their citizenship with the help of the brokers, and submit those to the passport office along with their applications.
Last month, the Chattogram Divisional Passport Office detained two Rohingya – a man and a woman – when they went there to make passports.
At the time, the man identified as Faisal produced documents showing he was from Jungle Salimpur in the Sitakunda upazila.
The woman on the other hand identified herself as Sumaiya Akhter from Dhaloi in the Hathazaria upazila.
The two even produced NID cards of their parents, said Abu Sayeed, deputy director of Chattogram Divisional Passport Office.
“The Rohingya are submitting all the necessary documents to get passports. It is really difficult to identify the Rohingya from among a huge number of applicants,” he told The Daily Star.
He said they could not initially verify the authenticity of the documents, but after suspicion arose, they matched their fingerprints on the Rohingya database and found that they were Rohingya.
“We have limited access to the server of the NID of the Election Commission, but we have access to the recently-developed database of the Rohingya people,” he said.
During interrogation, the Rohingya told the passport officials that the brokers managed all the documents for them, he added.
Sayeed blamed local elected public representatives for issuing the documents. — The Daily Star/ANN
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