Three men from a predominantly Kuki Chin village in Bandarban were shot dead allegedly by some armed assailants,  while another sustained bullet injuries but was found alive at Paikhong Para in Rowangchhari upazila of Bandarban district on Monday.

The deceased were identified as Pathang Bom, Nemthang Bom and Lam Lian Bam  - all from Ranin Para.

Acting on a tip off that some criminals were exchanging fire, a team of police and Army personnel rushed to the spot, but only arrived in time to recover the three dead bodies, said Tariqul Islam, superintendent of Bandarban Police.

They also found the fourth man from the same village, Mansar Bam, injured with bullets. He was taken to a local hospital.

On April 7, eight men of the same ethnic group were found dead in the same area, not far from where the killings took place today.  Understandably, the incident aroused a sense of panic in the area, in the entire community. A sense that certainly finds vindication today. That the Kuki Chinhave become moving targets is no more a secret. The only doubt remains over who is targeting them?

For months now, the Bangladesh security establishment has driven a narrative that a separatist element within the Kuki Chin, known as the Kuki Chin National Front or KNF, has been training a new batch of jihadist militants in exchange for money in the remote hills of the CHT. The actual existence of such a deal, or even such a facility that the KNF uses to make money, has never been proven. 

Tensions kept flaring over months. Even Indian authorities have been forced to take note, as a steady stream of the Kuki Chin began migrating from the region.

Then the killings started. Kuki Chin who had nothing to do with the KNF, at least their families maintain and no one has proved otherwise, were killed in the shootout on April 7, for which the locals pointed their fingers at a splinter group of the UPDF, calling itself UPDF (Democratic). The breakaway faction has always been suspected of enjoying close ties to the Army.

The latest killings as well, some local people and the KNF, which claims to defend the Kuki Chin with its armed wing KNA, blamed UPDF (Democratic) cadres for the killings, with the Army as their real masters. Today this entire community feels fairly convinced that the Army is determined to 'exterminate' them - leaving them with few options but to flee.

With the tensions failing to die down, the residents of the area have left, even as the Army intensified patrols in the area following the massacre.