Bangladesh building barbed-wire fences around Rohingya

AA
Najmus Sakib
DHAKA, Bangladesh
16.02.2020
Rights groups say move denies refugee rights, will turn area into concentration camps 

Bangladesh started erecting barbed-wire fences around Rohingya refugee camps to rein in illegal trafficking of the vulnerable refugees, the government said Saturday.

Other measures, including “installation of watchtower and CCTV cameras have also been started to this effect to strengthen the surveillance on the Rohingya people and the refugee camps,” according to Bangladesh Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal.

Bangladeshi Army Installs Barbwire Fence Along Rohingya Camps

The Irrawaddy
By Muktadir Rashid
10 January 2020

Bangladeshi soldiers oversee the installation of pillars for a barbwire fence near a Rohingya refugee camp in Ukhia, Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh in December 2019. / Helal Uddin

 

DHAKA—The Bangladeshi army has started installing a barbwire fence along the edge of Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar district where 1.1 million refugees are currently living.

A highly placed source in Bangladesh told The Irrawaddy that a 2.09 billion-taka budget (US$24.6 million) was approved for the installation of a fence along the camps in Ukhia and Teknaf subdistricts in Cox’s Bazar following instructions from the prime minister’s office, in order to protect the refugees from crimes.

Bangladesh: Halt Plans to Fence-In Rohingya Refugees

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

September 30, 2019

Barbed Wire, Guard Towers to Deny Freedom of Movement

 Rohingya refugees gather behind a barbed-wire fence in the “no-man’s land” 

border  zone between Myanmar and Bangladesh, April

25, 2018. © 2018 Ye Aung Thu/AFP/Getty Images

(New York) – The Bangladesh government’s plans for barbed wire and guard towers around Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar violate refugees’ rights to freedom of movement, Human Rights Watch said today. Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan announced the plan on September 26, 2019, saying it was specifically ordered by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Bangladesh to build barbed wire fences around Rohingya camps

The Telegraph  

Nicola Smith, Asia correspondent 

27 September 2019 

 

 

Rohingya refugees trapped in no-man's land between Bangladesh and Burma Credit: Ye Aung Thu/AFP

 

Bangladesh is planning to install barbed-wire fencing, guard towers and cameras around Rohingya refugee camps, raising fears of prison-like conditions in the already bleak settlements.

The move comes amid growing security concerns and rising impatience in Dhaka that no solution has been found to repatriate or rehouse some one million refugees who have fled from Burma’s Rakhine state to the Bangladeshi port of Cox’s Bazar, most during a murderous military crackdown in 2017.
"There are three large camps. We'll fence the three camps with barbed wires," Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan told reporters this week. "Watch towers and CCTV cameras" would also be set up to monitor activity in the Cox's Bazar district settlements, he added, according to AFP.