With this close to 8700 Rohingya refugees have been sent to Bhashan Char from the camps of Cox’s Bazar. The Rohingya refugees reached the Bhashan char island in the afternoon after covering the distance from Patenga at Chattogram in about 3 hours by four naval ships.
Earlier, they had arrived from the Ukhiya Baluakhali camp at Cox’s Bazar on Sunday, reports the official news agency BSS. Fleet Commander of the Bangladesh Navy Rear Admiral Abul Kalam Azad told BSS that another batch of 1600 Rohingya refugees will leave for Bhashan Char on Tuesday. of Bangladesh started relocating the Rohingya refugees from Cox’s The Government Bazar to Bhashan Char from December 4 despite groups and UN agencies about the safety of the relocated persons as the island is a newly emerged landmass. doubts raised by environmental.
Mohammad Samsuddauja, additional commissioner of the government’s Refugee Relief and Repatriation Office, said that the government has made arrangements accommodate more than 1 lakh Rohingya refugees on 13,000-acres of char land at a cost of Taka 3,095 crore.
to Bhashan char is an uninhabited island which formed in the Bay of Bengal about two decades back. The environmentalists say that the Bhashan char falls in an ecologically fragile area prone to floods, erosion and cyclones. But the government says that adequate safety arrangements in terms of embankments and cyclone shelters have been made for the protection of the people in case of any natural calamity.
Currently more than a million Rohingya are living in refugee camps in Bangladesh after fleeing the military crackdown in the Rakhine province of Myanmar in August 2017.
