An enormous hearth at an overcrowded Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh has left hundreds homeless.
The blaze broke out at Camp 11 in Cox’s Bazar, a southeastern border district the place greater than 1,000,000 Rohingya refugees dwell.
Police superintendent Rafiqul Islam mentioned: “We currently don’t have an estimate for damages but there are no reports of casualties.”
Police didn’t present an estimate for the variety of properties destroyed.
Mr Islam added that the blaze was below management, with a second police official saying the reason for the hearth was unclear.
Thick black clouds of smoke had been additionally seen within the space.
Selim Ullah, a 40-year-old refugee and father of six kids mentioned: “I couldn’t save anything. Everything burnt to ashes. Many are without homes. I don’t know what will happen to us.”
“When we were in Myanmar we faced lots of problems… our houses were burned down. Now it has happened again,” he added.
Most refugees residing within the space fled a marketing campaign of persecution by Myanmar’s navy in 2017, with some left homeless for the second time after Sunday’s hearth.
The brutal crackdown worsened in 2021 after the navy takeover.
Read extra:
Inside Myanmar: How life has modified for the reason that junta got here to energy
Rohingya lady’s perilous journey from Myanmar to Bangladesh refugee camp
The US mentioned final yr that the oppression of Rohingya in Myanmar quantities to genocide after authorities confirmed mass atrocities by the navy in a scientific marketing campaign in opposition to the ethnic minority.
Muslim Rohingya face vital discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, the place most are denied citizenship and lots of different rights.
Fires are frequent within the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar. A hearth in March 2021 killed at the very least 15 refugees and destroyed greater than 10,000 properties.
Source: information.sky.com”