‘Only about 20 of us from the entire village managed to survive’

Tasnim Ara has been left so traumatised by the violence in Myanmar that until Sunday she could not even name her newborn child, four days after giving birth to her. After fleeing the unrelenting crackdown by the Myanmar army in Rakhine state, Tasnim can barely stop recounting the harrowing atrocities which left only 20 people alive in her home village of Tula Toli. “They killed almost all my family members and neighbours [but] their brutality did not just stop there; they hacked many corpses into pieces,” Tasnim said, with both fear and tears in her eyes. Tasnim estimated that barely 20 people from her entire village had managed to escape the carnage of the Myanmar Army and Rakhine Buddhists, and had been able to cross over with her into Bangladesh. But few could have found the journey as arduous as the 20-year-old, who was at the last stage of her pregnancy when she made it to Cox’s Bazar in early September with the help of some of the survivors. “I am so tired, I do not feel good. Never thought I would be struggling so much,” she said. “It would have been better if I had been killed along with most others in my family and village.” Tasnim had to leave behind her husband, who had sustained bullet injuries during the attacks. “I heard that my husband also managed to come to Bangladesh later,” she said. Tasnim thought her husband was being treated at a local hospital in Bangladesh, but she was not sure of his whereabouts. “I am yet to see my husband here in Bangladesh. I don’t think he got the news of becoming a father yet,” she said. The journey for the expecting mother had been almost unbearable, since she had to walk all the way to Cox’s Bazar from Tula Toli. It took Tasnim seven days including hiding in the hills of Rakhine state to finally reach the Balukhali refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar. “I was forced to starve on many occasions during the days of persecution and while on the way to Bangladesh,” she said of her ordeal. Some joy and relief came at last for Tasnim in the shape of the baby girl she gave birth to once inside Bangladesh. “I am not going to name her right now as my husband is still being treated. We will do that together after we reunite,” she said.