Bangladesh to Exile 100K Rohingya Refugees to an Island “Prison”
By Brad Adams, Asia
Director (Human
Rights Watch)
Bangladesh authorities say they will soon start relocating over
100,000 Rohingya refugees to Bhasan Char, a tiny island in the Bay of Bengal.
Officials said this is necessary to reduce pressure on the world’s largest
refugee settlement in Cox’s Bazar, where nearly 1.2 million Rohingya have fled
to escape military atrocities in Myanmar. Bhasan Char is a spit of land made of accumulated silt. Officials say
the island has been secured with embankments, and the homes and cyclone
shelters are better than anything available to millions of Bangladeshis. But
they have yet to provide convincing assurances that the refugees will be safe
there, and their freedom of movement and right to livelihood protected.
The government brought
some diplomats and other foreign officials to see the infrastructure on the
island. But Yanghee Lee, the United Nations special rapporteur on Myanmar, who
visited in January, noted, “There are a number of things that remain unknown to
me even following my visit, chief among them being whether the island is truly
habitable.” Residents from nearby
Hatiya Island say it is not. “Part of the island is eroded by the monsoon every
year,” one man told Human Rights Watch. “In that time, we never dare go to that
island, so how will thousands of Rohingya live there?”
Humanitarian aid groups
are concerned about refugee health and safety in the Cox’s Bazar settlement,
but isolating them on Bhasan Char, with likely limited access to education and
health services, could
be even moreproblematic. Although Bangladeshi authorities say there will be
no forced relocations, there is little evidence that any of the refugees would
be willing to move there. “Bhashan Char will be like a prison,” one local
journalist said.
But when Lee warned
that an ill-planned relocation would have the “potential to create a new crisis,” the
government said resettling the Rohingya is an internal matter. Minister AKM Mozammel Haq
actually blamed nongovernmental organizations for highlighting
safety and sustainability concerns.
Dumping a battered and
traumatized people on Bhasan Char to face yet another threat to their survival
is not a solution. Bangladesh should terminate
the relocation plans unless or until independent experts determine
that the island is suitable, and until the government ensures that refugees who
consent to relocate there will be allowed freedom of movement on and off the
island.
