'Adventure' trip to mystery Indian island kills U.S. citizen

Published on 25-Nov-2018

Khushboo Razdan

‍"He was attacked with arrows but he continued walking, we saw his body was half buried in the sand" – this chilling account was narrated by one of the five Indian fishermen who aided an American citizen in fulfilling his "strong desire" to visit North Sentinel Island in India's Andaman and Nicobar, where the indigenous Sentinelese people live.

"The man, identified as 27-year-old John Allen Chau, sought help from seven individuals, including an electronic engineer (named) Alexander, a watersports service provider, and five local fishermen to evade the patrolling teams to approach the island," Dependera Pathak, director-general of police on India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, told CGTN Digital.

"Chau had paid 25,000 Indian rupees (around 351 US dollars) to each fisherman."

The Sentinelese stand guard on an island shore. /courtesy of Survival International by Christian Caron

The 60,000-year-old Sentinelese community, believed to be the last pre-Neolithic tribe in the world, has remained in isolation for centuries and its members are known for reacting with hostility and violence to attempts by outsiders to interact with them. The island is off-limits to visitors under Indian law and the tribe is protected under the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Regulation Act, 1956.

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