Bangladesh plans
to move Rohingya refugees to island in the south
Forced relocation of camps would be controversial, warns
UNHCR spokeswoman as Dhaka seeks to foster tourism in region near Burmese
border
Bangladesh plans to relocate thousands of Rohingya
refugees who have spent years in camps near the Burmese border to a southern
island.
The government has started planning the move to Hatiya
Island in the Bay of Bengal in a plan backed by the prime minister, Sheikh
Hasina, according to a government official, Amit Kumar Baul.
“The relocation of the Rohingya camps will definitely
take place,” said Baul, the head of the government’s Myanmar refugee cell. “So
far, informal steps have been taken according to the PM’s directives.”
A Rohingya leader urged the government to rethink, saying
the plan would only make life worse for the refugees, many of whom have been
languishing in the camps for years. “We want the government and international
organisations to resolve our issue from here,” said Mohammad Islam, who lives
in one of the camps.
Bangladesh is home to 32,000 registered Rohingya refugees
who are sheltering in two camps in the south-eastern district of Cox’s Bazar.
The Muslim Rohingya leave Burma largely to escape discriminatory treatment by
the Buddhist majority.
The UN refugee agency, which has been helping the
refugees in the camps since 1991, said such a scheme would have to be voluntary
to succeed. “The success of the plan would depend on what will be on offer in
the new location and if the refugees would like to be there,” said a UNHCR
spokeswoman, Onchita Shadman.
A forced relocation would be “very complex and
controversial”, she said.
Baul said the move was partly motivated by concerns the
camps were holding back tourism in Cox’s Bazar, home to a 125km-long sandy
beach. “The government has been giving importance to the tourism sector.
Therefore, a plan to relocate them to an isolated area is under way.”
Thousands of Rohingya from Burma, as well as Bangladeshi
migrants, have been attempting perilous boat journeys organised by people
smugglers to south-east Asia.
Migrants often travelled to Thailand by boat, then
overland to northern Malaysia. But Thailand has cracked down on smuggling after
the discovery of mass graves there, which appears to have thrown regional
human-trafficking routes into chaos.
More than 3,500 migrants have arrived on Thai, Malaysian
and Indonesian soil in recent weeks and hundreds or thousands more are feared
trapped on boats.
Seven camps – some with dozens of graves believed to
contain the bodies of Rohingya – have been uncovered in Thailand’s Songkhla
province, close to the Malaysian border.
Rights groups say local people must have been aware of
the trade and on Wednesday Thai police said they wanted villagers to aid their
investigation.
Malaysian media have reported that police are
investigating 12 of their own officers to determine whether they had links to
mass graves found in Malaysia, close to the Thai sites. A total of 139 grave sites
and 28 abandoned camps have been found on the Malaysian side of the frontier,
but the number of dead is unclear.
The US has backed the investigation, calling for a
“transparent, credible and expeditious effort” and urging Malaysian authorities
to prosecute those responsible.
Details of Bangladesh’s plans emerged just days after
Hasina slammed her country’s own economic migrants, calling them “mentally
sick” and accusing them of damaging the country’s image.
The island plan, reported this week in local media, has
not been formally announced but officials have been asked to prepare for it.
Badre Firdaus, the government administrator of Hatiya Island, said 200 hectares
had been identified as a suitable site.
The move would not include the estimated 200,000
unregistered Rohingya asylum seekers who have fled across the border over the
past decade and taken refuge in Muslim-majority Bangladesh. Most live close to
the two camps but are not entitled to food or other aid.
Rights groups say these Rohingya survive in appalling
conditions, living on the margins and running the gauntlet of Bangladeshi
authorities.
Hatiya, home to farmers and fishermen and located at the
mouth of the Meghna river, is a nine-hour journey by land and sea from the
camps.
Structure of the Lead：
WHO-Rohingys refugees
WHEN-Recently
WHAT-Helping Rohingys refugees
WHY-Because
of the civil war of Myanmar
WHERE-Bangladesh
HOW- the move to Hatiya Island in the Bay of Bengal
Keywords：
1.sheltering
in 躲避在...
2.discriminatory 歧視
3.scheme 方案
4.smugglers 走私者
5.human-trafficking 販賣人口
6.chaos 混亂
7.prosecute 起訴
8.hectare 公頃
9.appalling 駭人聽聞的
10.gauntlet 夾攻
It is dilemmatic for countries to solve refuge problems because what refugees pursue is a better life, and they try to immigrate out any at cost. However, when a great number of refugees throng to a country, the problems, such as jobs,economy,sanitation and cultural difference, emerge. It is hard to find a balance between the advantage and disadvantage of accepting refugees, and it also remain unknown what obstacles may come up next.
回覆刪除"Not to see these filthy things may be an option because there are too many things that I don't want to witness and even don't want to learn it." As the growing number of population in the globe, discrimination has never been weakened. It's becoming increasingly serious problem days after days. A news title ever been headlining that
回覆刪除"A sea elegy", with a lot of people packed in a raggedy boat. Where they can go ? We don't know and they don't know, too. Hoping one day someone can help them out. Today they live and tomorrow remain unknown, I feel sorry for them. I can't do anything but witness the outcome to the end.
Revision: Where can they go ?
刪除It's hard to make a decision for counties to shelter these refugees. In normal people's point of view, some people may think that if the government do not give the refugees shelters, it's ruthless. But on the other side, if the government do that, other may think it's waste to host them. So, that is still some contradiction on it. What's a pity that we can do nothing for them.
回覆刪除