Cox's Bazar (Bangladesh), Oct 14 (AFP) Wild elephantskilled four Rohingya refugees including three children as theywere building a shack on forest land in southern Bangladeshtoday, police said.
The incident occurred at Balukhali camp in Cox's Bazardistrict, where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have set upmakeshift shelters since fleeing violence across the border inMyanmar.
"They were trampled to death by seven or eight wildelephants. They include a woman and three children," AfrozulHaq Tutul, deputy police chief of Cox's Bazar, told AFP.
Two people were also injured, he said, adding all thevictims were Rohingya who were building a shack on in a partof the forest where wild elephants frequently search for foodand shelter.
This is the second time Rohingya refugees have beenattacked by wild elephants in the area. Earlier two Rohingya -an elderly person and a child - were killed by elephants asthey were sleeping in a makeshift shelter.
An estimated 536,000 Rohingya have arrived in Bangladeshsince a fresh outbreak of violence erupted on August 25 inMyanmar's westernmost Rakhine state.
Space at established refugee camps in Bangladesh has beenall but exhausted, with new arrivals hacking away trees andother vegetation anywhere they can to erect shelters from themonsoon rain.
Many newly arrived refugees are camping in the open oralong roadsides, where they rush aid trucks for food and otherdesperately needed supplies.
The Bangladesh government has allocated 3,000 acres(1,214 hectares) of forest land to build proper shelters forthe refugees but many have already set up shacks before theactual construction begins.
A Cox's Bazar district forest official told AFP thatclashes between animals and refugees were "inevitable" as thecamp areas have been a roaming ground for elephants forcenturies.
"The is a reserve forest land, frequented by wild Asianelephants all the time," he said, speaking on condition ofanonymity.
The authorities want to extend the existing camps aroundKutupalong and Balukhali into a refugee city for 800,000Rohingya, but the United Nations has warned such a settlementwould be dangerously overcrowded.
The latest violence erupted after Rohingya militant raidson 30 police posts in Rakhine triggered a military crackdown.
The UN calls the army fightback a "textbook example ofethnic cleansing" with villages set ablaze to drive Rohingyacivilians out. (AFP)MRJ.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.