Bangladesh. Lal Moti (35) and her daughter, Osmaitara (3 months), in Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh. As an estimated 655,500 people sought safety in Bangladesh between late-August and November 2017, UNHCR stepped up its emergency response, providing shelter and other forms of assistance in the camps near Cox’s Bazar. © U N H C R / R og e r A r n old CASE STUDY: ROHINGYA POPULATION At the start of 2017, approximately one million stateless people resided in Myanmar’s Rakhine State,28 almost all of whom were Muslims who self-identified as Rohingya. They were born and raised in Myanmar for multiple generations and know no other place to call home. The Rohingya are stateless due to the restrictive provisions and application of the Myanmar citizenship law, which primarily confers citizenship on the basis of ethnicity. As a direct result of their statelessness, the Rohingya in Myanmar suffer entrenched discrimination, marginalization, and denial of a wide range of basic human rights. Rohingya refugees have fled Myanmar in previous waves of displacement in 1978, 1991-1992, and 2016. On 25 August 2017, security operations initiated in the northern townships of Rakhine State, triggered by attacks on security posts by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, 24 forced Rohingya residents to flee targeted killings and widespread human rights violations. By the end of the year, some 655,500 Rohingya had fled to neighboring Bangladesh, increasing the estimated number of stateless Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh to more than 930,000.29 The vast majority arrived during a massive exodus following the August violence. At the height of the emergency, thousands of refugees arrived in Bangladesh daily, which 28 UNHCR Myanmar reported a baseline estimate of 900,000 non-displaced stateless people in Rakhine State at the start of the year. However, in light of the 655,500 arrivals from Myanmar reported in Bangladesh in 2017, and some 470,000 non-displaced stateless persons estimated to be remaining in Rakhine State at year-end, it is now clear that the baseline estimate was too low. 29 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar continue to be stateless, even though they are now counted among the global refugee population. The substantial decrease in Myanmar’s reported population of stateless persons in 2017 is not because the situation of statelessness has been resolved, but rather is due to the exodus of stateless Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh. Please consult the Text Box on p. 53 for more information about statistics on stateless refugees and IDPs. unhcr > Global trends 2017