Stop weapons source to stop terror: Bangladesh FM

Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen has told three heads of different UN agencies to find out the source of weapons supply to the Rakhine State of Myanmar for causing trouble and also to terrorists elsewhere to stop terrorism.

“Please find out who supply weapons causing those troubles (in Rakhine),” he told them on Thursday when they jointly called on him at his office.

The foreign minister later told the reporters that he also pointed to the issue of terrorism in the wake of Sri Lanka bomb attacks.

“All make so many statements when people die of terrorism. But why do they never speak about the bullets and shrapnel used for that? Those are from which country? Who supplied them? If we can identify this, then terrorism will go away,” he said.

Heads of three UN agencies -- Filippo Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Vitorino, Director General of International Organization for Migration (IOM), and Mark Lowcock, Head of United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and Emergency Relief Coordinator – are jointly visiting Bangladesh on the Rohingya issue.

After the meeting, they left for Cox’s Bazar where Bangladesh has given shelter to over a million Rohingya refugees fled from Myanmar.

Bangladesh wants to send them back with safety and security.

“I said we have done our job. Now it’s up to Myanmar. So you better work with Myanmar,” he told the UN officials.

Momen also told them that there are many children who need education. “I told them they need education in their own language and culture. So, they should go back to their own country and learn their language and culture.”

On Wednesday, the UN officials met Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md Shahriar Alam.

Bangladesh also informed the visiting three top UN officials that the government has already developed Bhasan Char Island to accommodate some 100,000 Rohingyas.