An island is for the Rohingya to prison

just in time for the end of the month the Marine from Bangladesh reported ready: Everything. The Work on the barrier island of Bhasan Char are completed, therefore, as well as, all of the accommodations ready. Now, only the residents who would like to settle on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina there is a lack of. 100'000 people would have a place in the new dwellings of Bhasan Char, declared the government. However, critics have great doubt that a small silt island is suitable in the Indian ocean for such an influx. Bhasan Char is just 40 square kilometres in size – and provoked the dispute far beyond the limits of the Asian state. It comes to the security of refugees and their Dignity.

Bangladesh to resettle part of the displaced Rohingya from Burma, the push for 2017 in huge Camps along the border, on the remote island. For this, the state has invested the equivalent of 275 million Swiss francs and three years to be built. Aerial images show on the island of closely spaced, long buildings with the red roofs, reminiscent of a military barracks. Around the settlement construction crews flood barriers have been built, because you know that the island is flooded during heavy weather easily.

The state assures that the high water is good for protection, but Refugee aid workers are sceptical. I have checked that Dhaka postponing the move at least until independent experts, the properties. If the government is involved it is open, again and again, she has pushed for a rapid Transfer.

Bangladesh seeks place in a country that is already inhabited, without the refugees is extremely tight.

in Order to reach Bhasan Char, you need from the nearest settlement, with the boat more than two hours. Twenty years ago, there has not been this place yet, in 2002, the island was sighted for the first time. It consists of deposited sediments of the major Streams of South Asia – Meghna, the Brahmaputra and the Ganges – through the Delta into the Indian ocean and beyond will bear. The Name of Bhasan Char means in Bengali "floating island", it has changed since its emergence several times their Size and shape, such as satellite images showed. It is criss-crossed with water canals around the mangrove to grow, but it has moved in here, there's never settled permanently. This suggests that the Locals have great respect for the pitfalls of this young island.

Bhasan Char is so shallow that large parts are flooded in a very short time, if it rains in the monsoon months of intense, or if cyclones are racing to the Delta and storm surges lash. A review of the forest service listed the dangers in February 2017. However, the government made nevertheless more and came to the conclusion that you could be by technical means, of the risks. She was so around the flood barriers to build this powerful defences to prevent Erosion of the soil. And tower, and similar protected spaces for the future residents, when the storms are raging.

refugee experts responded initially speechless, some thought the project was a joke, what you admitted to be so, however, only in private conversations. Bangladesh does not let himself be dissuaded from the Plan. Solar technology is there to provide outside power, collection systems, rain water collecting. And the first refugees could be this month settled, local media reported.

No choice

There is talk on the lists of the government and the beginning is from 4000 to 7000 refugees to. No one should be forced to move, assure the representatives of the government. But the word "voluntary" has a hollow sound to people who were forced to flee from their homeland and are now in an uncertain future.

The fugitive Abul Kalam said the newspaper "New Age" that the government had made promises. The new place on the island was safe, and it will taken care of for you. "We have no other choice than to go there, because we can not return home, according to Rakhine state."

Rohingyas in Jamtoli refugee camp in Bangladesh near the border to Burma. Photo: Keystone

He speaks of his home in the West of Burma, where the military 700'000 Muslims expelled. It was the largest Asian Exodus since the Vietnam war. Burma denies the Rohingya the citizenship rights. The UN complains that the religious minority had been expelled in 2017, with "genozidaler intention" of the predominantly Buddhist-populated Burma. The perpetrators remain unpunished.

For the Rohingya, this means that the way is blocked in the home, a return to Burma would be dangerous to life. However, many reject a move to the island. As the government made plans for Bhasan Char for the first time known, said some of the Rohingya that they would rather die than to drag out to sea. The 23-year-old Maung Maung Soe told the Australian news network ABC: "Bhasan Char will be like a prison for the Rohingya."

Brad Adams of Human Rights Watch Asia summarizes in a comment, what do think many of the Refugee volunteers: "Persecuted and traumatized people are just on Bhasan Char dump, where her life is again in danger, this brings no solution." He called the Plan in 2017, "cruel" and "not feasible".

Mental Stress

fears that a mass relocation to unsuitable places provokes new crises will be Added. Experience with refugee centers on the Pacific Islands, which Australia uses, migrants keep, are warning examples. You the same internment camps, people are suffering under tremendous mental Stress, because the places do not offer employment, because they appear to be hopeless.

But Dhaka urges the international community to sanction the plans, the UN is yet to examine the project. The pressure is growing, however, because hardly any country is willing to Rohingya to be incorporated to relieve the pressure on Bangladesh. In this respect, Dhaka, was forced to find new places in a state that is already inhabited, without the refugees, extremely dense, and by a rising sea level is also much the country will lose.

Created: 01.11.2019, at 20:25