Housing for B'desh Rakhine
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Myanmar authorities say they will arrange long-term housing in Rakhine State for the Rakhine ethnic groups who recently fled communal violence in Bangladesh.
More than thousand people in 253 households are currently living as refugees in temporary camps in the state, after fleeing violence since October 2012, according to the Border Areas Immigration Supervisory Headquarters (BAISH).
“After the [communal] violence in Rakhine, Buddhist monasteries in Bangladesh were attacked and destroyed last September. Since then, [Rakhine ethnic groups] have fled into the state,” said Colonel Aung Naing Oo, who is head of BAISH.
“We have arranged housing and food supplies for them as they arrive in Rakhine, because they have no one to depend on here. They fled in fear. They faced injustice and land confiscation before they fled. The Buddhist monasteries there were burnt down as security forces stood by. So most of the Rakhine ethnic groups, who were a minority in Muslim-majority [Bangladesh], fled here.”
