Hundreds Missing After Fire Overtakes Rohingya Refugee Camp
By Network Media Group
Friday, March 10, 2023
More than 300 children and others were still missing on Tuesday, 7 March, a couple days after a tragic fire destroyed thousands of homes in the Balukhali Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
Ro Aung Myaing, a resident, said more than 2,500 of the 12,000 people affected by the fire were injured. The hospital and schools in the camp were also swept in the blaze.
He told NMG they have three mobile teams are “helping people who are traumatised” and the International Organisation for Migration (OIM) is attending to the medical needs of the injured.
Firefighters, the army and specially trained Rohingya volunteers were unable to bring the fire, which broke out at noon on 5 March, under control until 6pm. 35 schools, 15 mosques and a hospital were destroyed in the camp, where 30,000 people live in 7,000 houses.
Fires occur in the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh every dry season, according to Samuel Falsis, head of humanitarian aid and operations for IOM. The organisation and its partners have provided tarps and other materials to help the refugees rebuild after the fire.
According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, there are over 900,000 Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, most of whom fled a massive clearance campaign by Burma’s military in Rakhine State in 2017.
