Man who left Coke for tribe on isolated island arrested

A 24-year-old American tourist has been detained in India for entering a remote tribal area where islanders have no contact with the outside world.

- SHWETA SHARMA

Mykhailo Viktorovych Polyakov, whose father is from Ukraine, set foot on North Sentinel Island, a part of India’s Andaman Islands, in an attempt to make contact with the isolated Sentinelese tribe, police said.

He recorded his visit to the island, leaving a can of Coke and a coconut on the shore as an “offering” to the people of the tribe.

The influencer, who runs a YouTube channel documenting extreme travel and previously visited Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, travelled nine hours in a small rubber dinghy with an outboard motor to reach the island and used binoculars to survey the area but saw no inhabitants.

He tried to get the attention of native people by blowing a whistle and briefly landed on the shore for a few minutes before leaving. He left the offerings and collected sand samples while recording a video, police said.

He arrived in the capital, Port Blair, on 27 March and was arrested three days later on Sunday after he was reported to police by locals, who saw him taking a boat to North Sentinel Island.