‘We saw things we didn’t want to see’: 123 Malaysians evacuated from deadly Bangladesh protests left fearful and traumatised

Both sides blamed each other for the violence, which has triggered an unprecedented communications blackout that has shut down the internet and limited phone service.

Before the Malaysians landed, Mr Mahmudin Abas, 70, said he last heard from his 26-year-old daughter, Noorfaizzah, on Friday. this The internet was cut off in Bangladesh.

Mahmuddin said Norfaiza, a final-year medical student at Mymensingh Medical College, had been planning to fly back to Malaysia on Thursday after the protests broke out.

But Thursday morning, she told her father it was too dangerous to travel and was forced to return home near campus.

Mr Mahmuddin said his daughter had not stored enough food because she did not plan to stay, so she was trapped indoors when fighting broke out nearby.

“We started panicking. What if a building burned down and she had nowhere to go?” he said.

“She also told us that her friend who lived in the student dormitory had flown home a day earlier. But she lived alone near the campus. So, her safety was not guaranteed.”

On Friday, Mahmuddin and a group of Malaysian students’ parents went to Malaysia’s Foreign Ministry to seek help and asked the authorities to take “swift action.”

“At that time they agreed to bring the students home as soon as possible, but no decision had been made to charter a flight,” he said.

Despite this, Mr Mahmuddin was happy to receive confirmation from the authorities that his daughter had successfully boarded the evacuation flight and was relieved about her physical condition.

Fatiha’s father, Dr Fadli Hamid (53), said parents took action after receiving reports of food price hikes and student deaths due to the protests.

“When we heard that some students of Mymensingh Medical College had also died in the protests, we decided that we could not sit idly by and let our children continue to suffer,” he said.

Asked about accusations that the government did not act quickly enough, Saifuddin said the “bottom line” was that 123 Malaysians had returned home safely.

“We sent a special plane there and they returned safely,” he said, adding that the evacuation went “smoothly”.