A Rohingya man pulls a child as they walk to the shore after crossing the Bangladesh-Myanmar border by boat through the Bay of Bengal in Shah Porir Dwip on Sunday. — Reuters photo
Intermittent heavy rains from Sunday night caused huge sufferings to Rohingays who entered or were trying to enter Bangladesh fleeing persecution and state sponsored violence in Myanmar.
Many of them remained stranded along the no man’s land or spent days together under the open sky or in makeshift shelters by roads and highways entering Bangladesh amid the rains.
Rohingyas, who entered Bangladesh, were living here and there in makeshift shelters they themselves built by roads and highways, cutting hills and forests in Cox’s Bazar and Bandarban.
But for food and water supplied mostly by locals, the ill-fated people on the run from Myanmar have no other steady source to get food or medicines they badly need in their plight.
Drenched by the rains aggravated the sufferings of the Rohingyas who had got totally exhausted while fleeing through the long and difficult hilly terrains before they had to cross the border river Naf to enter Bangladesh, said local people and Rohingya leaders.
They spent sleepless nights inside the shanties with plastic sheet covering unable to even lie down as rain water poured in.
The sufferers said that an end to the rains which could reduce their bitter sufferings was not in the sight until Monday noon.
Reuters reported that sectarian tensions appeared to be rising across Myanmar. A Maungdaw resident told Reuters by phone that about 500 houses in the south of the town were set on fire early Monday.
Rohingyas living in Bangladesh said that the escalating violence and persecution in Myanmar might increase the influx of fleeing Myanmar citizens into Bangladesh.
Agence France-Presse reported from New Delhi that The Dalai Lama urged Myanmar de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi to find a peaceful solution to the crisis in Myanmar and expressed concerns about violence that led about 300,000 Muslim Rohingyas to flee the Buddhist-majority country.
‘I appeal to you and your fellow leaders to reach out to all sections of society to try to restore friendly relations throughout the population in
a spirit of peace and reconciliation,’ the top Buddhist leader said in a letter to Myanmar’s de-facto leader seen by AFP.
Since August 25, when the latest round of violence erupted in Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state, at least 3.13 lakh Rohingyas entered Bangladesh according to the UN refugee agency UNHCR.
The new arrivals swelled the number of Rohingyas in Bangladesh to over seven lakh.
According to Border Guard Bangladesh and foreign ministry estimates, another one lakh persecuted Rohingyas were waiting along the border to cross into Bangladesh.
An UN estimation said that the number of killed in the ongoing violence would be 1,000.
Hashem Ullah, a 40-year old Rohingya staying under the sky near a mosque at Sabarang of Teknaf, said that his only prayer was to see an end to the rains.
‘You can’t imagine the plight of so many families passing their days completely drenched,’ he said three days after arriving from southern Maungdaw in Rakhine.
Met office in Dhaka said that some 14mm rainfall was recorded in Cox’s Bazar Sunday night.
It was unknown that how many Rohingyas were staying in open places including roadside.
International Organisation for Migration sources said that about 156,000 new arrivals took shelters at Balukhali, Kutupalang, Ledha and Shamlapur makeshift camps and Kutupalang and Nayapara refugee camps.
About 67,000 took shelter at spontaneous shelters at Mainar Ghona, Thangkhali, Unchiprang and Hakimpara of Cox’s Bazar and 90,000 at places of host communities at Teknaf and Ukhia.
Rahim Miah, a just arrived Rohingya living under the open sky at Balukhali, said that the rain forced him and many others to keep standing throughout the night.
Rohingays living along Cox’s Bazar and Teknaf road as well as Marine Drive said that no sooner the rain started late Sunday night their makeshift places made with plastic sheet overflowed. Similar reports poured in from Rohingyas taking shelter at Balukhali and Kutupalang of Ukhia and Shamlapur and Shah Parir Dwip and Sabarang.
Rohinagys said that they were starving in absence of food and facing huge problem as drinking water was running out.
Local people were seen throwing away packets of biscuits, chips, in some cases puffed rice, to the Rohingays living by the Cox’s Bazar-Teknaf road and Marine Drive.
At places of the two roads, Rohingays were seen stretching their hands for food when any vehicle passed by.
Cox’s Bazar district Rohingya control room supervisor Serjaul Islam said that they were distributing relief materials that reached them. Several charitable organisations have so far handed over some foods and other materials.
Cox’s Bazar additional district magistrate Khaled Mahmud, also the focal person on Rohingya issue, said that gathering of Rohingyas at the under-construction camp from different areas continued.
‘We have erected about 100 shelters, each having capacity of 150 people,’ he said at about 5:30pm on Monday.
He said that biometric registration of new coming Rohingyas would begin today as concerned officials reached the beach town on Monday.
While visiting Cox’s Bazar, National Human Rights Commission chairman Kazi Reazul Hoque on Monday termed genocide the repression of Rohingyas by Myanmar authorities and suggested that if Myanmar did not stop the repression, Bangladesh should move the International Criminal Court.
‘Rohingyas have to be sent back to their country through negotiations with Myanmar. The UN, OIC, ASEAN and the global community should work for it. And if Myanmar doesn’t respond positively, a case can be filed with the International Criminal Court against it for committing genocide,’ he said.
Awami League general secretary Obaidul Quader, also the road transport and bridges minister, after distributing relief among Rohingyas said that prime minister Sheikh Hasina would visit Cox’s Bazar today.
‘Prime minister Sheikh Hasina will come here tomorrow, she will make on the spot visit. She will give a proposal for a solution to the Rohingya problem. This problem will be solved through her courageous steps,’ he said.
Reuters reported that communal tensions appeared to be rising across Myanmar on Monday after two weeks of violence in Rakhine state that triggered an exodus of about 300,000 Rohingya Muslims.
A mob of about 70 people armed with sticks and swords threatened to attack a mosque in the central town of Taung Dwin Gyi Sunday evening, shouting ‘this is our country, this is our land’, according to the mosque’s imam Mufti Sunlaiman.
‘We put off the lights in the mosque and sneaked out,’ the mufti, who was in the mosque at the time, told Reuters by phone.
The Myanmar government said in a statement that the mob was dispersed after police with riot shields fired rubber bullets.
Rumours spread on social media that Muslims, about 4.3 per cent of the Buddhist-majority country’s population of 51.4 million, would stage attacks on September 11 to avenge violence against Rohingyas in northern Rakhine.
Security was stepped up on Mandalay Hill, a peak overlooking the city of Mandalay studded with pagodas of Buddhists, Myanmar Times reported.
In social media groups, Muslims voiced fear that other mosques would come under attack and proposed tighter security, according to posts seen by Reuters.
Muslim elders urged people to show restraint, the posts showed.
Thousands of Rohingya refugees are still stranded on the Myanmar side of the River Naf, which separates the two countries, with the biggest gathering south of the Rakhine state town of Maungdaw, monitors and sources in the area told Reuters.
Source: New Age
