In Rohingya crisis, world is giving lip service: Toufique Imrose Khalidi

The international community is just giving lip service and not delivering on its funding promises for Rohingya people, said bdnews24.com’s Editor-in-Chief Toufique Imrose Khalidi.

Khalidi discussed the lingering Rohingya issue with Ines Pohl, chief editor of Deutsche Welle, or DW, in Dhaka on Saturday. DW, Germany’s international broadcaster, has services in 30 languages. 

Pohl visited the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar and shared her experiences with Khalidi who highlighted different aspects of the crisis from the Bangladesh point of view.

“There is a huge funding gap. The international community pledged money but they have not delivered. They’re just giving lip service,” he said citing UN agencies’ joint response report, in which different international partners pledged $1 billion for the period from March to December, but the UN received only 38 percent of the promised fund.

“With this kind of funding, it’s very difficult for Bangladesh,” he said, as Bangladesh lacks resources. “There is a lack of response.”

The Myanmar army launched a crackdown on the Rohingyas on Aug 25 last year, forcing over 700,000 of the ethnic minority to cross the border and take shelter in overcrowded refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar. With this, the number of Rohingyas living in Bangladesh crossed a million.

Both the chief editors said they understand that the issue is not going to be resolved anytime soon.

Pohl asked the Bangladesh government to accept the fact that Rohingyas will stay here for long and integrate them into the society so that they get education and jobs. She also spoke in favour of calling them refugees.

Khalidi said, as a journalist he always holds the government to account, but in this case he argued in favour of the government calling them “forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals” because the Myanmar army called them “Bengalis”.

 

Khalidi discussed a broader context to the crisis. “In the census of 1911 they were recognised as an ethnic community of Indian origin because Burma was part of India. In 1921, they were categorised as Arakanese, also known as Rakhine.”

“It’s more than proven. Suddenly in 1982, they were stripped of all rights and citizenship. These are the people who sent their representatives to parliament. Many of them were ministers. Many of them were top leaders in Burma,” he said.

“These people will not go back unless they are given some sort of paper or documentation recognising them as citizens,” Khalidi said.

He also pointed out the difference between Bangladesh and Germany, one of the richest countries in the world. “Standards are different. Economic, social and political contexts are different.”

“Everyone formally and informally recognises the fact that they are going to stay,” Khalidi said, citing a three-year funding plan for the Rohingyas by the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank. He also referred to a deal signed by Bangladesh and Myanmar to complete the repatriation within two years.

“Even my younger colleagues understand that. Just 12 weeks after the influx began, they came back and told me they don’t want to go back,” he said, referring to the journalists of hello.bdnews24.com, who are under 18.

“Life is harder there. They have seen their parents raped brutally, gang-raped. They have seen their parents killed. They think that, whatever the conditions may be, these camps are still better than the conditions back home in Rakhine.”

Khalidi, however, stressed providing psychological support to the children who witnessed murder and rape before fleeing to Bangladesh.

“These children growing up like this will emerge as a bigger danger to our society.”