A team of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is now on a fact-finding mission in Cox’s Bazar to see for themselves the situation that evolved from the recent influx of Myanmar nationals, commonly  known as Rohingyas, from Rakhine state bordering Bangladesh. At the same time, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Yanghee Lee is undertaking a visit to the Rakhine state to gather information. And, according to international media reports, she has been denied access to some areas of the Rakhine state. The Special Rapporteur is undertaking the visit from January 9 to 20 in Kachin State (Myitkyina, Hpakant and Laiza) as well as Rakhine State (Sittwe, Rathedaung, Buthidaung and Maungdaw), in addition to Nay Pyi Taw and Yangon in order to assess recent developments. According to sources concerned at the Foreign Ministry, the UN team comprising 3-4 functioning level officers has been in Cox’s Bazar since January 11 and has been visiting two registered refugee camps and the makeshift camp where undocumented Rohingyas are housed. The delegation members have also been talking to the Rohingyas who were forced to cross into Bangladesh following the military crackdown on the Rohingya populace in Rakhine after nine Myanmar border guard police personnel were killed allegedly by Rohingya extremists, they said. “It is OHCHR which offered to send a delegation to Bangladesh to see the ground realities and Bangladesh has agreed to facilitate their visit,” said an official.
Another team of functioning-level officers will arrive after this team has concluded its visit, said the sources, adding that they will report back to their head office in Geneva for the next course of actions.
After the atrocities by Myanmar military and local Buddhists began following the October 9 attack, the UN has issued strong statements against the violence against the Rohingya populace.
A top UN official alleged the Myanmar authorities of ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas from Rakhine while another likened some of the atrocities by the Myanmar forces to war crimes.
On December 16, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein warned the government of Myanmar that its ‘short-sighted, counterproductive, even callous’ approach to handling the crisis in northern Rakhine – including its failure to allow independent monitors access to the worst affected areas – could have grave long-term repercussions for the country and the region.
“The repeated dismissal of the claims of serious human rights violations as fabrications, coupled with the failure to allow our independent monitors access to the worst affected areas in northern Rakhine, is highly insulting to the victims and an abdication of the Government’s obligations under international human rights law,” he said.
“I appeal to the government of Myanmar to accept the outstretched hands of the international community offering to help resolve the increasingly dangerous and untenable situation in northern Rakhine, which is already spilling over into the wider region,” he added. According to the UN, about 65,000 Rohingyas crossed into Bangladesh since October 9. This figure is in addition to already 3-5 lakh Rohingyas living in Bangladesh for decades.