Days of heavy rainfall have pelted Rohingya refugee camps in southern Bangladesh, destroying dwellings and sending thousands of people to live with relatives or in communal shelters.
On Wednesday alone, more than 30cm of rain fell on the camps in Cox’s Bazar, which host more than 800,000 Rohingya, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said.
That is nearly half of the average July rainfall in one day, while more heavy downpours are expected in the next few days in a monsoon season that stretches over the next three months.
Photo: AP
“The situation is further compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic,” the agency said. “There is currently a strict national lockdown in response to rising cases across the country.”
The agency said that it was saddened by the deaths of six people at the camps earlier this week, five in a landslide caused by the rains and a child swept away by floodwaters.
More than 12,000 refugees have been affected by the heavy rainfall, while an estimated 2,500 shelters have been damaged or destroyed, the agency said, citing initial reports.
More than 5,000 refugees have temporarily been relocated to other family member’s shelters or communal facilities, the agency said.
Refugees said that they were struggling to eat or drink properly.
“Due to the continuous rainfall for the last four days, today my house is full of water,” said Khatija Begum, who has five children. “We are not even able to eat.”
Begum said she fears that her children will drown and die in their sleep.
Cyclones, heavy monsoon rains, floods, landslides and other natural hazards are an annual difficulty in the camps.
More than 700,000 Rohingya have lived in refugee camps in Bangladesh since August 2017, when the military in Buddhist-majority Myanmar began a crackdown on the Muslim ethnic group following an attack by insurgents.
The crackdown included rapes, killings and the torching of thousands of homes, and was termed “ethnic cleansing” by global rights groups and the UN.
While Bangladesh and Myanmar have sought to arrange repatriations, many Rohingya fear returning home.
The International Organization for Migration has said that Cox’s Bazar, where more than 1 million Rohingya refugees live, is one of the most disaster-prone parts of Bangladesh.
It is a delta nation crisscrossed by many rivers that gets intense rainfall regularly due to its monsoon climate and location on the Bay of Bengal, where the warm waters can generate destructive tropical cyclones.
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