The bodies of four Bangladeshi expatriates, three of whom had died while being evacuated from the strife-torn Libya, arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in the capital on late Wednesday and Thursday night, airport officials said.
The bodies of three evacuees, who had drowned in the Mediterranean as they jumped off the ship carrying them from Libya to Greece, arrived at the airport first, on late Wednesday, the officials said on Thursday.
The deceased were identified as Mohon Kamal of Barisal district, Farid Khalifa of Gopalganj, and Moriruzzaman of Barguna.
The fourth body, of Selim Chowdhury of Noakhali, who had died at Libya’s border with Tunisia, arrived on Thursday evening by a plane chartered by the International Organisation for Migration, IOM Dhaka office spokesperson Asif Munier told New Age.
A Korean Airlines flight chartered by Daewoo Engineering and Construction Company, carrying the bodies of the three Bangladeshis drowned in the sea and around 192 Bangladeshis who used to work in Libya, landed at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at 11:58pm on Wednesday, immigration officer-in-charge Md Moniruzzaman, an assistant superintendent of police, told New Age.
The bodies of Mohon Kamal and Farid Khalifa were handed over to the respective families at the cargo village of the airport at about 3:00am on Thursday, said a welfare officer at the expatriates’ welfare desk at the airport.
The body of Moriruzzaman, son of Aziz Hawlader of Barguna, which had initially been misidentified by the authorities and received by the family of one Shafiul Azam, son of Abdul Aziz of Savar in Dhaka, was later hand over to Moniruzzaman’s family on Thursday night.
Each of the families of the deceased received Tk 35,000 from the government to cover the burial and carrying cost, the welfare officer said.
Around 50 Bangladeshi migrant workers jumped off a ship evacuating them from Libya to the Greek island of Crete on March 6 at night. Three of them drowned, 11 went missing, and a large number of the rest were hospitalised.
Courtesy of New Age