Rohingya crisis to be in focus at OIC-CFM starting in Dhaka today

The 45th Session of the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers (OIC-CFM) will begin today with a special focus on the Rohingya issue and other challenges facing the Muslim countries. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is scheduled to open the two-day event at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka in the morning. Fifty-seven countries, including 52 out of the 56 member states of the OIC, have confirmed their participation in the meeting. Some 600 delegates, including 27 foreign ministers and 12 state ministers, will join the event, Bangladesh Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali told journalists on Thursday. Canada will attend the event as a special guest country, with its delegation led by its Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland. This year’s theme is “Islamic Values for Sustainable Peace, Solidarity and Development.” This is the second time Bangladesh is hosting a CFM after holding the first one in 1983. In Dhaka, the CFM chairmanship will pass from incumbent Cote d’Ivoire to Bangladesh for the next one year. The 45th session of the CFM will end tomorrow with a closing session preceded by a sideline brainstorming session styled “the humanitarian challenges in the OIC member states with a particular focus on the humanitarian situation on Rohingyas”. During the session, meetings of OIC Special Committee, Ministerial Contact Groups, and elections, including those of the assistant secretaries general of OIC, will be held at the same venue. Officials at the Bangladesh Foreign Ministry said the Rohingya crisis and the challenges facing the Muslim world will be discussed at length at the council. “Protection of their (Rohingyas) rights and fundamental freedoms will remain a major preoccupation of this CFM,” State Minister for Foreign Affairs M Shahriar Alam said. Also on the CFM agenda are the problems of terrorism, extremism, sectarian tendencies, hatred, prejudice and Islamophobia, humanitarian crises affecting the rights and dignity of Muslim minorities, persistent poverty, and socio-economic development of Muslim societies. “CFM addresses these issues through resolutions and proposals that are now at the final stage,” the minister said. The recently-concluded meetings of the Permanent Finance Committee, Economic, Social, Cultural and Family Affairs Commission, largely discussed the resolutions and sought to find solutions and approaches to addressing the ongoing problems in the Muslim world. Dhaka sees these issues being approached under four broad ranges of draft resolutions: those relating to peace, conflict, mediation and security; those relating to OIC economic and development agenda; those relating to minorities and humanitarian questions, and those relating to OIC reforms.