Myanmar guards policing waters off restive Rakhine state on Wednesday arrested a Bangladesh border guard following an exchange of gunfire with patrolmen on a boat they spotted entering the country’s territory, according to a local official.
“We heard that Myanmar border guards found a boat in the sea this morning,” said the border patrol guard who declined to be identified. “People from that boat fired at the Myanmar border guards when they tried to stop them. Then the Myanmar guards fired back at them.”
One of the Bangladesh border guards was arrested as he and others ran away from the boat, he said.
The incident occurred in Maungdaw township where guards were patrolling an estuary of the Naf River which begins in Myanmar and flows into the Bay of Bengal. The lower part of the river marks the border between Myanmar and Bangladesh.
In addition to the Bangladesh guard who was arrested, two others managed to escape, the Myanmar border official said.
Their boat had entered Myanmar waters as it followed another vessel that was heading into Myanmar territory from Bangladesh, he said.
The incident resulted in injuries on both sides, according to Rakhine state officials and Bangladeshi news reports, the Democratic Voice of Burma reported, with a Myanmar border guard sustaining a gunshot wound to his foot.
Bangladesh’s side of the story
According to a Bangladesh official, the two sides exchanged gunfire while the Bangladeshis were pursuing drug smugglers by boat on the river near Teknaf close to Cox's Bazar district in southern Bangladesh, Reuters reported.
The smugglers got away, but the Myanmar border patrol boat opened fire on its Bangladeshi counterparts, the report said, citing Colonel M. M. Anisur Rahman, the Bangladesh border guard commander in Cox’s Bazar. The Bangladesh patrol then returned the fire, he said.
One Bangladesh border guard went missing following the fight, while Myanmar authorities seized another who had fallen into the river, Reuters said.
The tense border area along the Naf River is heavily patrolled by both sides to deter Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar from entering Bangladesh and Bangladeshis from entering Myanmar.
The incident comes on the heels of Myanmar’s repatriation of Bangladeshi migrants housed in camps in Rakhine state back to their homeland after hundreds were found adrift off the country’s coast last month.
Reported by Min Thein Aung of RFA’s Myanmar Service. Translated by Khet Mar. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.