Former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan, accompanied by military and government officials, visits a burned Rohingya village in Rakhine State near Bangladesh border on Saturday.
20,000 entered recently, Rohingya leaders claim
About 20,000 Rohingya Muslims have entered Bangladesh fleeing military crackdown on the religious minority community in Rakhine state in Myanmar since October 9, claimed refugee leaders.
They told New Age on Saturday that hundreds more of Rohingyas were still waiting along the frontier to cross the bordering river Naf.
Border Guard Bangladesh officials said that it was tough for the border guards to restrict the entry of fleeing Rohingysa to the country.
‘I believe at least 20,000 Rohingyas have already entered Bangladesh,’ said Rohingya camp representative committee general secretary Amir Hossain.
Many other Rohingya leaders also echoed Amir.
Earlier on November 30, UN refugee agency said that the actual number of newcomer Rohingya refugees could be more than 10,000. The local administration in Cox’s Bazar and Teknaf said that they could not tally the number amid continued influx of Rohingyas.
The new arrivals said on Saturday that the flow of Rohingya refugees fleeing ethnic cleansing in Myanmar would continue to rise as hundreds more gathered along the border to sneak into Bangladesh.
‘I waited two days for boarding a boat to enter Bangladesh crossing the river Naf,’ said Gulbahar, who entered the country Friday night.
‘Hundreds, if not thousands, are waiting along the border trying to enter Bangladesh,’ she added.
With her seven children, Gulbahar was driven out of her home in Maungdaw district in Myanmar about two weeks ago by a military attack on her village. Gulbahar tried not to leave her country and sought refuge in neighbouring villages over few days, but in turn, all the villages she had taken shelter had been burned to ashes by the military, she said.
‘Chased by military, all these people were left with no choice other than entering Bangladesh,’ said Gulbahar.
Half of the Saturday’s new arrivals took shelter at unregistered refugee camp at Kutupalang, better known as Kutupalang Tal, a refugee camp established eith years ago that became home to 42,000 Rohingyas.
It grew faster after 2012, when a violent attack on Rohingyas by Buddhists killed several hundred and sent thousands out of Myanmar.
‘It would be better if the government starts enlisting the new refugees as they are coming in an overwhelming number,’ said Abdul Hafiz, a Rohingya leader at Kutupalang.
Hafiz is in charge of one of the 14 blocks of the Kutupalang camp. About 1,200 families are living in Hafiz’s block.
‘We have so far offered shelter to 350 new refugee families in our block,’ said Hafiz.
According to him, since Myanmar military launched the crackdown on Rohingyas following attacks on border guard police of Myanmar on October 9, about 5,500 Rohingyas have taken shelter at the camp.
About 30km from the camp, 4,000 new refugees are believed to have taken shelter at the Leda makeshift camp, said Amir Hossain.
Both Hafiz and Amir believed the number of refugees who entered the country in the wake of fresh violence in Myanmar would be higher than what was estimated by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
‘A count on the number of new refugees is necessary for many reasons…We need it if we want to provide them with relief and whenever we get the chance to have them repatriated to Myanmar,’ said Mohammad Ali, former lawmaker elected from Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar.
Cox’s Bazar acting deputy commissioner Kazi Mohammad Abdur Rahman said that they wrote to the home ministry and cabinet division as there was a possibility that the new refugees might become untraceable if not listed immediately.
‘We are waiting for a decision to be made in this regard,’ he said.
Border Guard Bangladesh battalion commander at Teknaf Abu Zar Al Jahid believe that they were ready to check intrusion through the border from Myanmar.
Still, it is not an easy task to keep away hundreds of people running away from death.
‘It is not possible to check the flow of refugees from entering Bangladesh unless Myanmar is forced to stop cleansing of its own ethnic minority,’ said Rohingya leader Amir Hossain.
– See more at: http://www.newagebd.net/article/4081/bgb-finds-it-tough-to-restrict-rohingyas#sthash.SXM099z2.dpuf
Source: New Age
