Refugee

Rohingya Refugees Running Scared From COVID-19 Tests

Rohingya refugees infected with coronavirus are fleeing quarantine in their Bangladesh camps because they fear being transferred to an isolated island in the Bay of Bengal, community leaders said on Thursday.At least two infected refugees have gone missing since testing positive for the virus after the first COVID-19 death was reported on Tuesday, they said.About one million Rohingya - most of whom fled a military crackdown in Myanmar in 2017 - are packed into camps along the Bangladesh borde

5 June 2020
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Rohingya refugees agree move to island

Thousands of Rohingya living in Bangladesh refugee camps have agreed to move to an island in the Bay of Bengal, officials said Sunday, despite fears the site is prone to flooding.Dhaka has long wanted to move 100,000 refugees to the muddy silt islet, saying it would take pressure off the overcrowded border camps where almost a million Rohingya live.Some 740,000 Rohingya fled Myanmar in August 2017 in the face of a military crackdown, joining 200,000 refugees already in makeshift tent settleme

21 October 2019
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Bangladesh to fence Rohingya camps

Bangladesh is set to erect barbed-wire fencing, guard towers and cameras around Rohingya camps, the home minister said Thursday citing security concerns, in a move critics said would turn the refugee settlements into prisons.Dhaka has been growing frustrated with the Rohingya in Bangladesh - who number nearly a million - since the collapse of a recent repatriation attempt to encourage them to return home to Myanmar.The stateless Muslim minority live in large camps in southeastern border towns

27 September 2019
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Thailand releases refugee footballer

Refugee footballer Hakeem al-Araibi left Thailand on Tuesday after Bangkok dropped extradition proceedings against him at Bahrain's request, ending a two-month detention ordeal that stirred global outcry.Araibi, 25, a former Bahraini national youth team player, was granted refugee status in Australia after fleeing charges in the oil-rich kingdom connected to Arab Spring protests.But he was stopped at Bangkok's main airport at Bahrain's request on 27 November as he arrived in Th

12 February 2019
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Smugglers prey on Rohingya desperation

As desperation swells in the squalid camps that are home to a million Rohingya refugees, long-dormant - and often deadly - trafficking networks are being revived, Bangladeshi officials warn.Smugglers operating rickety fishing boats prey on the hopes of people who fled violence in Myanmar, charging them small fortunes for a dangerous journey to Southeast Asia, offering an empty promise of a fresh start.

24 November 2018
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ASEAN: Epicentre of human trafficking

The discovery of 28 abandoned human-trafficking camps and multiple unmarked mass graves in the dense jungle of Wang Kelian near the Thai-Malaysia border in May 2015 sent a shock wave through ASEAN and the rest of the world. Almost 800 victims were suspected to have been held in squalid conditions, in crudely built wooden cages and barbed wire that were too small for adults to even stand in.

31 July 2018
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Pessimism over attempt to repatriate Rohingya refugees

Amidst the Papal visit to Myanmar, one issue still looms – the humanitarian crisis unfolding at the Rakhine State in Myanmar near the Bangladesh-Myanmar border.Rohingya refugees who return to Myanmar following a Bangladesh-Myanmar repatriation agreement will initially have to live in temporary shelters or camps, Dhaka said Saturday."Primarily they will be kept at temporary shelters or arrangements for a limited time," Bangladesh Foreign Minister A.H.

25 November 2017
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Myanmar to take back Rohingya refugees

Myanmar has agreed to take back hundreds and thousands of Muslim Rohingya refugees who’ve been sheltering in neighbouring Bangladesh, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Dhaka said in a statement.Bangladesh Foreign Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali and Myanmar’s Union Minister U Kyaw Tint Swe signed the bilateral agreement in Myanmar on Thursday, just a day after U.S.

24 November 2017
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UN turns up pressure on Myanmar over Rohingya crisis

The UN Security Council on Monday called on Myanmar to rein in its military campaign in Rakhine state and allow hundreds of thousands of Muslim Rohingya driven from their homes to return.In a unanimous statement backed by China, the council strongly condemned the violence that has forced more than 600,000 Rohingya to flee across the border to Bangladesh.The council expressed "grave concern" over human rights violations, "including by the Myanmar security forces" against th

7 November 2017
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UN: Myanmar Rohingya must return as citizens

Myanmar must grant citizenship to the Rohingya to allow hundreds of thousands of people from the Muslim minority to return to Rakhine state from where they were driven by an army campaign, the UN refugee chief said Thursday."These people cannot remain stateless because this statelessness exposes them to discrimination and abuse, as has been the case in the past," said Filippo Grandi, the UN high commission for refugees.More than 600,000 Rohingya have fled Rakhine since late August d

3 November 2017
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Bangladesh eyes sterilisation to curb Rohingya population

Bangladesh is planning to introduce voluntary sterilisation in its overcrowded Rohingya camps, where nearly a million refugees are fighting for space, after efforts to encourage birth control failed.More than 600,000 Rohingya have arrived in Bangladesh since a military crackdown in neighbouring Myanmar in August triggered an exodus, straining resources in the impoverished country.The latest arrivals have joined hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees who fled in earlier waves from Myanmar&

28 October 2017
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Tillerson calls Myanmar army chief over Rohingya crisis

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urged Myanmar's army chief Thursday to help end the violence in Rakhine state that has forced hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims to flee.In a phone call with Min Aung Hlaing, Tillerson expressed "concern about the continuing humanitarian crisis and reported atrocities in Rakhine", according to a statement by State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert.

27 October 2017
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