Some 31 more Bangladeshi migrants returned home yesterday from Iraq on grounds of lack of security.
Speaking to the Dhaka Tribune over the phone, Shajahan Miah, one of the returnees, said they were flown home on a Qatar Airlines flight which landed at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport around 5:45am.
Shajahan was working at Hanwha Engineering and Construction Corporation, a South Korean Company. Around 6,000 Bangladeshis are employed there.
Shiite army men beat up about 20 of the Bangladeshis who work at the company, he said, adding that three were badly injured and had been admitted to a hospital in Iraq.
Mahabub and Abdul Mannan were among those hospitalised, he said.
“Who could tell me for sure that I would not be beaten up?” Shajahan Miah questioned. He said he had been unable to go out for about seven months.
“When I was interviewed, I was told that I would be allowed to go outside every week,” added Shajahan.
The Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment Ministry knows nothing about the return of 31 migrant workers.
Sources said a committee had been formed, headed by the ministry’s Joint Secretary Nurul Islam, to look after the situation in Iraq. When asked about the latest returnees, Islam said: “I have to verify the report.”
Besides security reasons, migrants could also return home normally, the official claimed. Earlier, over 100 migrants returned home from Iraq feeling insecure in the war-torn country.
According to the Foreign Ministry, 15 Bangladeshis who were stranded in northern Iraq are scheduled to return home this morning.