The US government has pointed out to the increasing security risks from the Rohingya refugee crisis for Bangladesh and India amid the ongoing conflict between the army in Myanmar and rebel groups, Bangladesh’s newsportal bdnews24,com reported
In a discussion organised by the US Institute for Peace, Donald Lu, the US assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia said that the crisis is proving to be a major security issue for both Bangladesh and India.
“But the one I actually spend a lot of time on is thinking about Bangladesh and the Rohingya refugees who were there, and the effects of instability in Burma and what it means for the region,” Lu said.
During the discussion, Lu said that during his visit to the camps, he had seen the tremendous generosity of the Bangladesh government and people for housing over a million people.
The international community and the US, Lu said, were working together to find a solution to house these refugees until it’s safe enough for them to go back.
“The situation there does not appear to be getting better and what worries me is that this refugee crisis, the security problems that it’s creating for Bangladesh and potentially for India as well, could get deeper in the coming days,” Lu added.
Recently, India and Bangladesh’s foreign ministers stressed on the need to repatriate Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to Myanmar.
Bangladesh’s foreign minister Muhammad Hasan Mahmud “reiterated [his call for] India’s support in the early repatriation of Rohingya refugees.”
Dhaka has said that it will not allow any more Rohingya refugees from Myanmar to enter the country as the large number of refugees were posing a security threat.
Rohingyas have been facing persecution in Buddhist-majority Myanmar for decades and nearly a million of them are camped in the border district of Cox’s Bazar.
