With a view to upgrading Bangladesh’s border management facilities, a high-powered government panel has suggested wire fencing along its border with Myanmar.
The National Taskforce on Implementation of the National Strategy Paper on Myanmar Refugees and Undocumented Myanmar Nationals yesterday asked the Home Ministry to take measures in this regard.
Myanmar shares a 271km border with Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar and Bandarban, of which 54km is with Teknaf upazila alone.
Md Ruhul Amin, deputy commissioner of Cox’s Bazar, told the Dhaka Tribune: “We have requested the Home Ministry to set up a fence along Bangladesh-Myanmar border.”
The senior secretary of the Home Ministry was present in the two-day meeting held in Cox’s Bazar.
He also said the Water Development Board would make a 50km embankment on the Naf River along the border to ensure smooth motor patrolling by the border management authorities.
The local administration of Cox’s Bazar several years ago made a set of proposals that include establishing fences at the pocket gates for legal movement, a road on the dam surrounding the Naf River and increasing the number of border outposts (BOP) in the Teknaf area.
Foreign Secretary M Shahidul Haque after the meeting told reporters that they had decided to send back the undocumented and refugee Myanmar citizens to their country. “The process will start in the near future. A survey would be launched soon to identify their number.”
He also said a high-powered delegation from Myanmar would visit Bangladesh soon to discuss security and other issues.
Representatives of several ministries, Cox’s Bazar civil administration and Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) were present at the meeting.
A BGB official said they had requested the authorities to set up a fence along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, improve road facilities in the border area, initiate registration of boats that ply the Naf River and a better mobile phone network.
Myanmar officials at a meeting with its Bangladesh counterpart in August this year agreed to take back in phases the documented Rohingyas staying in two refugee camps – in Noapara and Kutupalong. The process was supposed to begin in two months. There are around 28,000 Rohingyas living in the camps while the number of undocumented Rohingyas would be 2,50,000-5,00,000.
Cabinet approved the strategy paper on September 9 last year. An inter-ministerial meeting of the task-force, chaired by the foreign secretary, held on October 24 the same year made a number of decisions.
According to a document regarding that meeting, the issue of straightening the Bangladesh-Myanmar border management would be given the utmost priority.
It was decided that the Home Ministry would coordinate with the BGB and work towards expediting the approval and roll-out of the proposals submitted by the latter “in order to enhance their surveillance capacity along the border.”
The Cox’s Bazar district administration was tasked to issue registration cards, preferably based on national ID cards and interviews, to all Bangladesh fishermen working in the coastal area “as a means of pre-empting their likely involvement with trafficking or smuggling of Myanmar nationals into Bangladesh territory.”
The Commerce Ministry was asked to review the border trading pass system in order to further regulate the duration and movement of Myanmar nationals beyond a specific time limit and destination within the Bangladesh territory.
The Statistics and Informatics Division was supposed to develop a project proposal in consultation with the local district administration on conducting a survey of undocumented Myanmar nationals residing in Cox’s Bazar and the surrounding districts.
The issue of humanitarian assistance for the undocumented Myanmar nationals living in makeshift camps outside the two refugee camps would need to be coordinated among the government agencies...in order to help the three international NGOs, which were asked to halt their activities in the area, to entirely wind down their work.
The document also mentioned that the IOM and the ICRC wanted to support the primary healthcare facilities in the Cox’s Bazar district and provide water supply and sanitation. The meeting observed that the Unicef, if necessary, could be involved in the process in line with their mandate and competence.”
