On the fringes of the 79th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York, Foreign Affairs Advisor Md. Touhid Hossain met with prominent UN representatives to talk about the current Rohingya crisis and international migration issues.
According to a message received here today, the foreign adviser expressed worries over the ongoing Rohingya situation that has put a huge strain on Bangladesh during a meeting with UN Special Envoy on Myanmar Julie Bishop on Tuesday (NY time).
The topic of debate was the international community’s responsibility to address the situation and look into potential solutions that would allow the Rohingya people to return to their country of Myanmar in safety and dignity.
The summit emphasized the necessity of a more forceful international reaction and ongoing pressure on Myanmar to establish favorable conditions for repatriation.
Advisor Hossain called on the UN and international community to keep up their active efforts in locating a long-term solution that protects the Rohingya people’s rights and safety.
In the Cox’s Bazar district of Bangladesh, more than a million Rohingyas have been forcibly displaced since August 25, 2017. The majority of these refugees arrived following a military crackdown by Myanmar, which the UN referred to as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing” and other rights groups as “genocide.”
In the last seven years, not a single Rohingya went back home. Myanmar agreed to take them back, but repatriation attempts failed twice due to trust deficit among the Rohingyas about their safety and security in Rakhine state.
In a separate meeting on the same day, foreign adviser Hossain held talks with Director General of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) Amy Pope. The Rohingya crisis was also a focal point of this discussion, with both sides exploring avenues to facilitate the protection and well-being of the displaced people as well as ways to enhance international cooperation on migration management. Pope recognized Bangladesh’s efforts to handle migration in a secure, orderly, and humanitarian manner and commended the nation for its leadership as a champion of the Global Compact for Migration.
She also reaffirmed IOM’s dedication to helping Bangladesh continue to address migration-related issues, such as those brought on by the Rohingya inflow.
