"Over a quarter of a million Rohingya refugees from Myanmar have now been jointly registered and provided with identity cards by the Bangladesh authorities and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. Rohingya refugees sheltering in Bangladesh are stateless. Despite living in Myanmar for generations, the Rohingya lost their citizenship following a change in Myanmar laws in 1982. Today, more than 900,000 Rohingya refugees are in crowded settlements in Cox’s Bazar, 741,000 of these being people who have fled from Myanmar since August 2017. The registration exercise, which began in June 2018, is about safeguarding the right of Rohingya refugees to be able to return home voluntarily to Myanmar in future. So far, the Government and UNHCR have registered 270,348 refugees (59,842 families) in the settlements in Cox’s Bazar district. Each day, over 4,000 refugees are registered at six different locations, where more than 450 staff are working long hours with the goal of completing the process by late 2019. Comprehensive registration is important for improving the accuracy of data on refugees in Bangladesh. It provides national authorities and humanitarian organizations with a better understanding of the population and their needs. Data will facilitate the planning of programmes and the targeting of assistance to where it is needed most, particularly for people in acute need, such as women and children heading families and people with disabilities..."