I. Bangladesh’s Response to the Rohingya Refugee Crisis
Starting in late August 2017, over 700,000 ethnic Rohingya crossed into Bangladesh
fleeing atrocities by the Myanmar military. 2 Bangladesh was already hosting between
300,000 to 500,000 mostly undocumented Rohingya refugees who had fled previous
waves of persecution in Myanmar. The Kutupalong-Balukhali Expansion Camps in Cox’s
Bazar, built quickly and haphazardly on a hilly jungle, is now the world’s largest refugee
settlement. 3
The settlement has taken up not only thousands of acres of forested land but put a strain
on already tight national resources. At the same time, tension has increased between the
Bangladeshi host population and refugees in the camps. The government has imposed
numerous restrictions on the Rohingya refugee population—building fences, arbitrarily
cutting internet access, denying formal education—that appear designed at least in part to
demonstrate that the settlement in Cox’s Bazar is only temporary. 4
At the same time, both Bangladeshis and Rohingya refugees are on the frontlines of
another crisis: climate change. Situated in the world’s largest river delta, a three-foot (91
centimeter) sea-level rise could submerge almost 20 percent of Bangladesh and displace
2 Human Rights Watch, Massacre by the River: Burmese Army Crimes against Humanity in Tula Toli, December 19, 2017,
https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/12/19/massacre-river/burmese-army-crimes-against-humanity-tula-toli; Human Rights
Watch, “All of My Body Was Pain”: Sexual Violence against Rohingya Women and Girls in Burma, November 16, 2017,
https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/11/16/all-my-body-was-pain/sexual-violence-against-rohingya-women-and-girls-burma;
“Burma: Military Commits Crimes Against Humanity,” Human Rights Watch news release, September 25, 2017,
https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/09/25/burma-military-commits-crimes-against-humanity; “Burma: Scores of Rohingya
Villages Bulldozed,” Human Rights Watch news release, February 23, 2018, https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/02/23/burmascores-rohingya-villages-bulldozed.
3 Human Rights Watch, “Bangladesh is Not My Country”: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees from Myanmar, August 5, 2018,
https://www.hrw.org/report/2018/08/05/bangladesh-not-my-country/plight-rohingya-refugees-myanmar.
4 Human Rights Watch, “Bangladesh is Not My Country”; Human Rights Watch, “Are We Not Human?” Denial of Education for
Rohingya Refugee Children in Bangladesh, December 3, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/12/03/are-we-not-
human/denial-education-rohingya-refugee-children-bangladesh; “Bangladesh: Halt Plans to Fence-In Rohingya Refugees,”
Human Rights Watch news release, September 30, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/09/30/bangladesh-halt-plansfence-rohingya-refugees; “Bangladesh: Internet Ban Risks Rohingya Lives,” Human Rights Watch news release, March 26,
2020, https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/26/bangladesh-internet-ban-risks-rohingya-lives; “Bangladesh: Internet
Blackout on Rohingya Refugees,” Human Rights Watch news release, September 13, 2019,
https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/09/13/bangladesh-internet-blackout-rohingya-refugees.
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HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | JUNE 2021