Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday urged the international community to step up pressure on the Myanmar government and compel it to create conditions conducive for the repatriation of the Rohingya people to their homeland with safety and dignity.
She said Bangladesh had provided temporary shelter to more than 1.1 million Rohingyas, who were forced to flee en masse to evade genocidal atrocities from their ancestral homes in Myanmar.
The premier reiterated her government's commitment to preventing genocide and sought cooperation from the international community to prevent such crimes and promote a culture of peace all over the world, BSS reported.
Many innocent people continue to face atrocities, oppression, and persecution all over the globe incited by xenophobia, racism, intolerance and hatred, she lamented in a message on the occasion of the "International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and the Prevention of this Crime” and the 74th anniversary of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
The premier said the decade-long marginalization, atrocities and persecution faced by the Rohingyas in Myanmar are painful examples of such crimes.
"Bangladesh joined the international community in paying solemn tribute to the victims of genocide throughout the history of the world," said the prime minister.
Referring to the genocide launched on March 25, 1971, Sheikh Hasina said the oppressive Pakistani forces unleashed brutal mass killings on the innocent civilians of erstwhile East Pakistan (Bangladesh) to annihilate the ethnopolitical identity of the Bengali nation.
She also paid rich tributes to the memory of three million martyrs, who were the victims of genocide inflicted upon the people of Bangladesh,
Sheikh Hasina said: "The pain and trauma that we suffered in 1971 motivate us to seek an end to genocide anywhere and demand justice for the victims of this heinous crime.
“Our government feels relieved to have redeemed our promise to bring accountability and justice for our people by ensuring the trial of the perpetrators responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, and other crimes committed on an international scale in 1971.”
