About 800 fruit-bearing trees in a privately owned papaya orchard on the outskirts of Rangamati town have been cut down after a 10 lakh (1 million) taka extortion demand was not met, according to the Parbatya Chattagram Nagarik Parishad (PCNP). The group’s central committee expressed deep concern over the incident.
It also demanded strict action against those it called the “tribal terrorists” involved in the incident. The demand was made in a press release issued to the media on Saturday, signed by PCNP central chairman Abdul Hamid Rana and secretary general Solaiman.
The leaders said: “We express deep concern at the alarming recent rise in extortion, abduction, beatings over extortion demands and various other acts of terrorism in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.”
They urged the administration to take strict legal action against all terrorist and extortionist groups active in the Chittagong Hill Tracts and to ensure the safety of ordinary people’s lives and property. If effective measures were not taken immediately to stop such acts, the PCNP said, it would be forced to announce a tough programme together with the affected people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report