Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics is going conduct a survey to profile undocumented Rohingyas living in the country.
“Many undocumented Rohingyas are living in Bangladesh and we need to have their profiling due to security reason,” Foreign Secretary Md Shahidul Haque told the Dhaka Tribune.
Rohingyas, the Myanmar nationals, started to come to Bangladesh since their first influx in late 1970s following sectarian violence and ethnic cleansing in the Rakhine state, close to Bangladesh border, by the Myanmar government.
Bangladesh hosts 30,000 refugees in camps in Cox’s Bazar, and in addition to the number, about half a million undocumented Rohingyas are residing in Bangladesh, posing serious threat to security, environment and society in the country.
The secretary said Rohingya problem was created by Myanmar and it must be solved by the country.
The Foreign Ministry organised a meeting yesterday to brief foreign diplomats on the national strategy about the undocumented Rohingyas in Bangladesh.
Ambassadors from US, India, Saudi Arabia, European Union, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Canada, France, Australia and the UK and officials from different UN offices took part in the meeting.
The EU Ambassador William Hanna told the Dhaka Tribune European Union was concerned about the plight of Rohingyas.
He said it was very useful to have a comprehensive strategy to solve the problem.
He suggested that it should be a very useful idea to disseminate the national strategy to international partners to let everybody know what Bangladesh was doing.
An official of the Foreign Ministry said if the government failed to keep track of the undocumented Rohingyas, it might fall in the hand of extremists.
“Many ambassadors put forward the idea that addressing the nationality problems of Rohingyas is the solution to everything,” he said.
Dhaka wanted to contribute to socioeconomic development of the Rakhine state to create an environment for voluntary return of the Myanmar nationals residing in Bangladesh, he said.
Bangladesh had been providing humanitarian assistance to Rohingya refugees for over 30 years and it was committed to do so, he added. “But the country is overburdened with the problems as it has a very limited capacity,” he said.
After recent tensions spiraled into violence in June and October 2012, nearly 200 people were killed and approximately 1,40,000 people, mainly Muslims, displaced and up to 60,000 Rohingyas fled the Rakhine state by boat, the highest number in over 20 years.
