This week marks the sixth anniversary since over 700,000 Rohingya women, men and children fled Myanmar to Bangladesh, following coordinated attacks by the Myanmar military. They joined hundreds of thousands of other Rohingya who had previously sought refuge in the country. The United Nations (UN) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are calling this week for renewed commitment from the international community to sustain the humanitarian response for nearly one million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.
The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) is appealing for the international community to provide financial support to sustain the humanitarian response. UNHCR said Tuesday that decreasing funds levels have led to the reduction of refugeesâ food assistance.
Nearly one million Rohingya refugees are currently living at the Kutupalong and Nayapara refugee camps in Bangladeshâs Coxâs Bazar region. For decades, the Rohingya, an ethnic Muslim minority, have faced institutionalized discrimination in Myanmar, such as exclusion from citizenship. In August 2017, the Myanmar government launched a military campaign that forced hundreds of thousands of Rohingya to flee their homes in Myanmarâs Rakhine State to Bangladesh.
The United Nations called the campaign ethnic cleansing; the United States declared the Myanmar government committed genocide against the Rohingya. The campaign of mass atrocities in Rakhine State began on August 25, 2017.
At least 740,000 Rohingya Muslims arrived in the already overcrowded Bangladeshi refugee camps in Coxâs Bazar district in 2017. The refugees are now living in the squalid spread of a 28-square-kilometer camp that was once a sanctuary for rare Asian wild elephants. Rohingya refugees rely almost entirely on humanitarian aid, as they cannot leave the camps and legally work to sustain their families.
Rohingya people have endured unspeakable hardship for years. An estimated 600,000 Rohingya people, living in Myanmarâs Rakhine State, are unable to move freely and are subject to government persecution and violence.
In Bangladesh, nearly one million Rohingya refugees remain in refugee camps located in an area off the coast of the Bay of Bengal, which is extremely vulnerable to cyclones, flooding, landslides, fire outbreaks and the impacts of climate change.
Recurring natural disasters have a devastating impact on the congested camps and their frequency barely leaves time to rebuild shelters made of bamboo and tarpaulin before the next fateful blow strikes. While Coxâs Bazar was spared a direct hit when Cyclone Mocha made landfall in May this year, considerable destruction to shelters and infrastructure occurred in the camps.
As the humanitarian conditions in the worldâs largest refugee settlement worsen, the challenges surrounding this protracted crisis continue to increase. Steep decline in funds is forcing humanitarian actors to focus on the most critical and life-saving needs.
The funding crush in 2023 has for the first time led to the reduction of refugeesâ food assistance, raising concerns about dramatic consequences: rising malnutrition, school dropout, child marriage, child labor and gender-based violence.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has cut food assistance to Rohingya refugees twice this year due to funding shortages. In May, WFP slashed food vouchers in Bangladeshâs Coxâs Bazar to just US$ 8, or less than 9 cents per meal. In March, WFP had to reduce its life-saving food vouchers from US$ 12 to US$ 10 per person per month.
Humanitarian agencies have appealed for US$876 million this year to assist some 1.47 million people, including Rohingya refugees and their host communities. However, as of August 24, the Rohingya Humanitarian Crisis Joint Response Plan 2023 was only 29.8 percent funded.
On Wednesday, the international humanitarian organization MĂ©decins Sans FrontiĂšres (MSF, Doctors Without Borders) warned that medical needs in the world's largest refugee camp remain pressing and that health care is increasingly inadequate.
Despite being one of the largest healthcare providers in the camps, the medical aid organization said it has reached capacity in several areas, and is now obliged to set stricter admission criteria to cope with the overwhelming medical needs of patients coming to its facilities. Unsanitary living conditions complicate the health situation considerably, leading to various health issues.
âInternational donors must significantly scale up their financial contributions to provide adequate support and prevent further irreversible consequences on the physical and mental health of Rohingya peopleâ, MSF urged in a statement.
Today, the non-governmental organization Save the Children warned that the health and well-being of more than half a million children in Cox's Bazar is at risk due to the recent drastic cuts in food assistance. The humanitarian and child rights organization fears people will be pushed further into hunger and illness without urgent additional funding.
According to Save the Children, some Rohingya refugees fear they could even starve. Parents told the NGO they regularly go without food to feed their children and cannot sleep at night due to anxiety about how their families will survive.
While a dignified and sustainable return to Myanmar seems the primary long-term solution to the refugee crisis, the security and political conditions in Myanmar prevent such a solution. UNHCR said Rohingya refugees continue to tell the agency they want to return to Myanmar when it is safe for them to do so voluntarily.
The international human rights group Human Rights Watch (HRW) noted recently that Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh face little prospect of safely returning home, six years since the Myanmar military launched its campaign of mass atrocities in Rakhine State.
âRohingya on both sides of the Myanmar-Bangladesh border are trapped in stateless purgatory, denied their most basic rights, awaiting justice and the chance to go home,â said Shayna Bauchner, Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch.
âInstead of addressing these issues head on, UN Security Council inaction and government aid cutbacks are leaving Rohingya in even more desperate straits.â
According to the human rights organization, Rohingya in both Bangladesh and Myanmar describe a pervasive sense of hopelessness that grows each year as restrictions increase and conditions deteriorate on both sides of the border.
Further information
Full text: Living on 27 US Cents a Day: Six years After Fleeing Violence, Rohingya Families Survive on Rice and Oil, Save the Children press release, published August 24, 2023
https://reliefweb.int/report/bangladesh/living-27-us-cents-day-six-years-after-fleeing-violence-rohingya-families-survive-rice-and-oil
Full text: Funding for Rohingya must increase as medical needs surge in camps, MSF press release, published August 23, 2023
https://www.msf.org/bangladesh-funding-rohingya-must-increase-medical-needs-surge-camps
Full text: Six years since the Rohingya refugee influx in Bangladesh, UNHCR appeals for sustained support and solutions, UNHCR press release, published August 22, 2023
https://data.unhcr.org/en/documents/download/102948
Full text: Future Bleak for Rohingya in Bangladesh, Myanmar, HRW press release, published August 20, 2023
https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/08/20/future-bleak-rohingya-bangladesh-myanmar