Arakan News Agency
Bangladesh’s foreign ministry summoned Myanmar’s ambassador for the second time in five weeks to complain about Rohingya Muslims fleeing into Bangladesh, saying some 50,000 refugees had arrived since Oct. 9.
Bilateral and Consular Secretary Kamrul Ahsan also protested a Burmese navy’s “unprovoked attack and firing” on a Bangladeshi fishing boat recently that “seriously injured” four Bangladeshi fishermen, a foreign ministry statement said.
In his meeting with Ambassador Myo Myint Than, Bangladeshi counterpart Kamrul Ahsan “expressed deep concern at the continued influx of Muslims from the Arakan State of Myanmar” and said that “around 50,000 Myanmar citizens took shelter into Bangladesh since Oct. 9, 2016.”
“The Secretary (Bilateral & Consular) demanded early repatriation of [the] entire Myanmar population staying in Bangladesh,” the statement said, referring to hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who have sheltered in southeastern Cox’s Bazar district for years.
“He also requested the Myanmar government to urgently address the ‘root cause’ of the problem in the Arakan State so that Rohingya Muslims are not required to desperately seek shelter across the border.”
The Rohingya are a stateless minority largely concentrated in western Myanmar’s Arakan state. According to Bangladeshi government estimates, some 300,000 to 500,000 Rohingya refugees live in and around Cox’s Bazar.
Most have fled persecution at the hands of Myanmar’s Buddhist majority. Since early October, tens of thousands of Rohingya have crossed over from Arakan amid deadly violence and a military crackdown that followed the killing of nine Burmese border guards in Maungdaw township.
When Ahsan first summoned the Burmese envoy on Nov. 23, he handed him a diplomatic letter conveying Bangladesh’s concerns over the influx. The local border police have tried to repel it by turning away hundreds of boats carrying Rohingya across the Naaf River that separates the neighboring countries.
Source :benarnews
