‘2023 should be Rohingya Home Year,’ demand refugees in Bangladesh

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AA) – “2023 should be Rohingya Home Year,” read a placard held up by a refugee boy as nearly 1,000 Rohingya people in a refugee camp in the southern border district of Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh on Saturday held a rally, demanding a peaceful and dignified return to Rakhine State of their home country Myanmar.

Carrying banners and placards with various slogans like “Rohingya Want to Smile in 2023,”, “No NVC (National Verification Cards)” and “Enough is Enough, Let’s Go Home”, a large number of the persecuted people attended the rally.

Addressing the gathering, Rohingya community leaders lamented that due to uncertainty around their peaceful and dignified repatriation and poor living conditions in Bangladesh’s 33 congested camps, their children are growing up without proper education and basic facilities.

Bangladesh is hosting more than 1.2 million Rohingya who fled a brutal military crackdown in Myanmar’s Rakhine State in August 2017.

According to the UN, the Rohingya are the world’s “most persecuted community”, having suffered genocidal violence and displacement.

Every year around 35,000 newborn babies are added to the number of refugees.

Despite efforts by Bangladesh, not a single Rohingya has been repatriated as the military junta scrapped safety, dignity, and citizenship rights under the controversial 1982 Citizenship Acton.

“If the situation remains so, we fear that in near future we will be part of a lost generation,” Moulavi Syed Ullah, a Rohingya community leader, said while addressing the rally.

Other Rohingya leaders called on the international community to put due pressure on the Myanmar government.

They said while the whole world is welcoming the New Year with joy, the Rohingya in Bangladesh’s squalid camps are waiting for the day when their misery ends.