UN launches aid appeal for Rohingya refugees
Web Desk
The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres says that the number of Muslim Rohingya who have crossed into Bangladesh to escape ethnic unrest in Myanmar since August 25 hit 389,000.
The figure rose 10,000 in 24 hours, indicating the Rohingya crisis remains acute.
UN refugee agency spokesman Joseph Tripura gave the latest number. Other UN agencies have sounded the alarm over conditions for the Rohingya who have fled a military crackdown in Buddhist-dominated Myanmar’s Rakhine state.
Most of the influx is concentrated around the Bangladesh border town of Cox’s Bazar where more than 300,000 Rohingya refugees were packed into ill-equipped camps before the violence erupted last month in Rakhine.
The UN children’s agency, UNICEF, said that 60 per cent of the new arrivals are children. There are acute shortages of everything, most critically shelter, food and clean water. Edouard Beigbeder,UNICEF’s representative in Bangladesh said in a statement, conditions on the ground place children at risk of high risk of water-borne disease.
The UN refugee agency says not enough aid is getting through to the Rohingya who have fled to Bangladesh. Mr Guterres called on the international community to provide whatever assistance they could.
Meanwhile, the European Parliament today demanded the Myanmar military immediately end violence against Rohingya Muslims, adding to international pressure over the crisis.
MEPs urged Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been pilloried by rights groups for failing to speak up for the Rohingya, to condemn unequivocally all incitement to racial and religious hatred.
Meanwhile UN agencies UNHCR and IOM have launched a joint appeal seeking enhanced humanitarian assistance for fleeing Rohingyas fearing their number could exceed a million as surges of the minority ethnic community from Myanmar continued to hit Bangladesh.
“We urge the international community to step up humanitarian support and come up with help,” UN’s Organisation for Migration’s (IOM) operations director Mohammed Abdiker told news conference jointly with Assistant High Commissioner (operations) of UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) George Okoth-Obbo in the capital.
Asked if the ongoing aid flow for the displaced Myanmar nationals was adequate Abdiker said “not yet” describing the need as “massive”.
“We fear the Rohingya influx in Bangladesh may reach 0ne million (10 lakh) by this year if the refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine state continues,” the IOM official said.
UN officials working southeastern Cox’s Bazar earlier today estimated the current spate of violence in Ralhine drove out some 400,000 Rohingyas to take refuge in Bangladesh while Dhaka said the country was hosting another 400,000 before the latest influx began on August 25.