UPSC Articles
Rohingya Crisis
Part of: Prelims and GS II – International relations
Context Bangladesh is planning to send more than 80,000 Rohingya refugees to a remote island- Bhasan Char– in the Bay of Bengal after sealing an agreement for the United Nations to provide help.
- Some 19,000 of the Muslim refugees from Myanmar have already relocated to the island, despite doubts raised by aid groups.
Background
- Bhasan Char is an island specifically developed to accommodate 1,00,000 of the 1 million Rohingya who have fled from neighbouring Myanmar.
- Human rights groups have criticised the move.
Who are Rohingyas?
- They are an Ethnic group, mostly Muslims. They were not granted full citizenship by Myanmar.
- They were classified as “resident foreigners or associate citizens”.
- Ethnically they are much closer to Indo-Aryan people of India and Bangladesh than to the Sino-Tibetans of Myanmar.
- Described by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres as “one of, if not the, most discriminated people in the world”.
