As violence surges in Rohingya camps, victims have no path to justice

Bangladesh's Rohingya refugee camps have become rife with gangs and violence, but advocates say the people living there have nowhere to turn for justice or protection.

A new report by the advocacy group Human Rights Watch (HRW) details murders, kidnappings, extortion, sexual assault, and forced marriage inside the sprawling camps.

The victims and their families say Bangladeshi authorities working in the camps have, at best, ignored their pleas for help, and at worst, put them in further danger.

"The situation in the camps right now is one where the Rohingya tell us that every night they hear gunshots and they wonder if this is their turn to die," Meenakshi Ganguly, HRW's deputy Asia director, told As It Happens host Nil Köksal.

HRW says it documented 26 cases of violence against Rohingya through interviews with 45 refugees between January and April 2023, as well as supporting evidence including police and medical reports. Only three incidents led to arrests, and in one case, family members say the suspect was freed after paying police a bribe.

"Victims report facing layers of barriers to police, legal, and medical assistance, with the authorities failing to provide protection, improve security, or prosecute those responsible," reads the report, which CBC has not been able to independently verify.

The Bangladesh government did not respond to CBC's requests for comment directed to its foreign ministry or its high commission in Ottawa. 

The Rohingya are a long-persecuted, predominantly Muslim, ethnic minority group who, until a brutal military crackdown in 2017, primarily resided in the Buddhist-majority country of Myanmar.

It's been six years since hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled a campaign of violence, which the Myanmar military referred to as "clearance operations." Canada, several other countries — and many survivors — call it genocide.

Most ended up in neighbouring Bangladesh, which set up temporary camps for the sudden influx of refugees.

This, however, proved to be a lot less temporary than planned. Today, there are now an estimated one million people living in camps in Cox's Bazar or the isolated silt island of Bhasan Char.

Bangladesh has long maintained that the best way to help the Rohingya is to repatriate them to Myanmar. But HRW maintains it is not safe for them to return.

They are not permitted to work or receive formal education in Bangladesh. That policy, Ganguly says, leads to gang violence.

"We recognize that Bangladesh has taken on the role of a responsible government that has provided sanctuary to people at risk. But it cannot be one where the refugees are constantly being made to feel that they are unwelcome and that this is a temporary situation," Ganguly said.