An estimated 12,000 Rohingya have been left without shelter after a fire tore through part of a cramped refugee camp in southern Bangladesh on Sunday, destroying health centres, learning facilities and mosques.
The fire broke out at Camp 11 of Cox’s Bazar refugee camp, which is home to more than 1 million Rohingya refugees, including 700,000 who fled their home country, Myanmar, after a brutal military crackdown in 2017.
Tin Lwin, whose home was destroyed in the blaze, said the fire began at about 2.40pm on Sunday afternoon. His two young children were out playing at the time, he said, adding that it was two hours before the family was reunited. “There was a huge crowd. I was also busy trying to save my house,” he said. “It was a very bad time.”
The family spent Monday morning cleaning the burned debris that was once their shelter, and fixing a temporary roof. “We are still in fear, honestly, that this might set fire again. There is no safety or security here,” he said.
Fires are a frequent problem in the camps, where people live in extremely cramped conditions in flimsy, bamboo-and-tarpaulin shelters. Rohingya are also confined to the camps ringed by barbed-wire fencing, which has previously hampered attempts to flee fires and hindered the delivery of humanitarian services.
A Bangladesh defence ministry report last month said between January 2021 and December 2022, there were 222 fire incidents in the Rohingya camps – including 60 cases of arson.
In March 2021, at least 15 people were killed and about 50,000 others were displaced after a fire engulfed an entire block in a settlement.
Faruque Ahmed, a local police official, said the cause of Sunday’s fire was not clear. At least 35 mosques and 21 learning centres for the refugees were also destroyed, though there were no reports of any injuries or deaths, he added.
Mijanur Rahman, Bangladesh’s refugee commissioner, told Agence France-Presse that about 2,000 shelters have been destroyed, leaving an estimated 12,000 people without shelter.
Adnan bin Junaid, an Asia regional director for the International Rescue Committee, one of whose health centres was destroyed in Sunday’s blaze, said immediate action must be taken to prevent further fires.
“Necessary steps include rebuilding the camps in a safer way, with more space between shelters, as well as the provision of firefighting equipment and safety points throughout the camps. In the longer term, a fire evacuation plan must be established, volunteers trained and a monitoring system put in place,” he said.
The fire should also serve to bring the world’s attention back to the Rohingya crisis, Bin Junaid added.
More than five years since the military crackdown in Myanmar, Rohingya are stuck in a state of limbo. A military coup in 2021, which plunged the country into spiralling conflict, has made the prospect of a safe return to the country a distant prospect.
Last month, the UN said it had been forced to cut food rations for Rohingya refugees by 17% as a result of dwindling international donations.
Activists have cited the increasingly desperate situation in the camps as a reason for an increase in people taking dangerous boat journeys in an attempt to reach Indonesia and Malaysia. Almost 400 people, mostly Rohingya, are believed to have died during such journeys in 2022, according to the UNHCR, one of the deadliest years at sea in almost a decade for the Rohingya.
“The whole environment in the camps right now – whether it’s fires, the cutting of rations, the ongoing security situation or threats towards women – the environment is really dire,” said John Quinley, the director of the non-governmental organisation Fortify Rights.
“Bangladesh needs to create durable solutions for Rohingya – that would be allowing some sort of legal status for the Rohingya, some sort of freedom of movement, access to livelihoods.”
