Kaladan News

Dated: Sunday, May 29, 2005

Bangladesh Authorities Prepare a new List of Illegal Rohingya Refugees

Teknaf, May 29: Bangladesh concerned authorities are preparing a new list of illegal Rohingya refugees from 6 Unions of Teknaf, a town of Bangladesh-Burma border.

Mohammad Mohsin Chowdhury, the Thana Nirbahi Officer (TNO) of Teknaf upazila asked the concerned village unions Chairmen in last March 2005, to prepare a new list of illegal Rohingya refugees and have to submit it to the TNO office. But, its failure to submit in time so that he was compelled to order again to the concerned authorities to prepare a list of illegal refugees this month, said a Union Chairman of Teknaf.

The State Deputy Minister for communication Salah Uddin Ahamad, MP directed the district administration to prepare a new list of illegal Rohingya refugees and take necessary steps to solve the problem. The Deputy Minister was presiding over a meeting of Law and Order Committee of Cox’s Bazar, which was held at the conference hall of the Deputy Commissioner in March 2005, said sources.

Though, the lists were prepared by the concerned authorities, some illegal Rohingya refugee families were excluded from the lists as various conditions. As a result, some local concerned authorities submitted it to the higher authorities to include again the families which were debarred from the lists.

According to a local official, the Bangladesh authorities would prepare the lists of Rohingya who have been living here since 1978.

About 20,000 official refugees are staying in two refugee camps of Kutupalong and Nayapara while over 600,000 illegal Rohingya refugees have been staying across the country, according to the annual report of 2004 of Centre for Development Studies (CDS), Bandhujana Lawer Association (BLA) and Human Rights Forum (HRF), including about 10,000 unofficial refugees of Dumdumia refugee camp of Cox’s Bazar District.

When asked an unofficial refugee Abul Alam said “According to the preparation of lists we would be forcibly repatriated to Burma. The arrangements of lists are dangerous to us. We don’t want to remain as refugees forever. We want to go back to our motherland, but, we would be brutally tortured by Nasaka and police. They raped our women forcefully. We always need peace; we do not want their persecution.”

However, Bangladesh authorities accuse to the Rohingyas that they destroyed the ecological harmony of Bangladesh and are damaging to economic development, the Deputy Minister of Communication said in a meeting held in Cox’s Bazar in March 2005.

Rohingya refugees of Bangladesh fear of the preparation of the lists as it will be risky and would come some retaliation against the refugees in near future, said a refugee leader, from Teknaf who is declined to mention his name.

The public of Bangladesh and the refugees do not know the exact purpose of the government’s aim of the preparation of illegal Rohingya refugee lists, said a local Bangladeshi named Sultan Ahamed from Teknaf.

For more information, please contact at:

Phone: +880 11 227 138

Email: [email protected]

Website: www.kaladanpress.org