Special Correspondent :
Only 34 per cent of the $434 million fund required to provide assistance for 1.2 million people, including host communities, has so far been raised, says a report on Monday.
The UN agencies earlier appealed for the fund from the global community to response to the Rohingya refugee crisis in Bangladesh. There are more than 830,000 Rohingyas in Cox’s Bazar: 625,000 of them have poured over the border since August 25.
One hundred days after the start of the most recent influx, the Inter-Sector Coordination Group (ISCG) released the report highlighting the overall status of the humanitarian response to the Rohingya Refugee Crisis in Bangladesh.
“Humanitarian partners are working round the clock to respond, but the reality remains that the needs are massive and urgent, and the gaps are wide. More funding is needed,” said Mia Seppo, UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries in the world, but more land is needed to improve conditions in the congested camps, said the UN official.
These Rohingyas are now living in ten different camps, and among Bangladeshi host communities.
One of the camps has become the largest and fastest growing refugee camp in the world, where approximately half a million people are living extremely close to each other without access to basic services such as toilets or clinics, said the report.
“The government of Bangladesh is struggling to cope with the world’s most rapidly developing humanitarian crisis. We already sought global help to share the burden to the unprecedented crisis,” Md Shah Kamal, Secretary to the Disaster Management and Relief Ministry, told The New Nation.
The Monitoring Report, which covers the first two months of the response from August 25 to October 31, highlights the work of the government of Bangladesh, in cooperation with humanitarian partners who are working to provide relief services for the refugee population and Bangladeshi host communities. Of the 1.2 million people in need, around half have been reached with assistance.
The report also explains the challenges and gaps that remain.
The risk of disease outbreak is high, and the impact of a cyclone or heavy rain would be massive.
There is not enough land to provide adequate living conditions for the more than 830,000 Rohingyas that now crowd Cox’s Bazar.
The report defines life-saving priorities for the coming months.
These include improving nutrition, preventing and managing disease outbreak, adequate planning for the new camps, and improving protection across all areas of the response.
“It (Rohingya refugee crisis) is one of the most severely underfunded crises in the world. The global community must extent their funding support to save lives and protect the Rohingya people,” an official of UN aid agency told The New Nation yesterday.
He added, “Funding is a major constraint. We need more fund to keep pace with intensifying needs of the refugees who arrived Bangladesh’s border town Cox’s Bazar fleeing violence and persecution in Myanmar.”
The mass exodus of refugees into Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh began August 25 after Rohingya insurgents killed nine police officers, triggering vicious reprisal attacks by the Myanmar security forces on Rohingya minority community.
Rohingya refugees earlier described, heart-rending accounts of “killings, arson, rape, torture, and other abuse,”
The UN Aid official, preferring anonymity, warned the arrival of a huge number of displaced people in Cox’s Bazar “created massive socio-economic and demographic pressure on Bangladesh” and added that other human security risks exist including “fear of epidemics.”
