The Rohingya crisis has caught the attention of human rights activists from across the world since their exodus from Myanmar. However, while there has been no shortage of support for their cause, it has not resulted in any tangible gain for the Rohingya, who are currently dispersed across Asia, continuing to wait for their rights and freedoms to be secured by the international community. Apart from the socio-economic challenges that continue to threaten their existence, their communities face a rising physical threat due to the squalid living conditions that they are forced into. One such threat, which has devastated several camps in Bangladesh and India, is the fires ravaging their settlements and destroying their shelters.
Fires in Rohingya camps are increasingly threatening the livelihood of Rohingya Muslims in both Bangladesh and India. Louise Donovan, the spokesperson for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, expressed her concern about the “worrying trend” in the rising number of such incidents. On June 12, a massive fire in a camp in New Delhi destroyed 55 shelters. This was the second time the camp had witnessed such a large-scale fire since 2018. Moreover, the Hindustan Times reported a statement by a resident of the camp saying that there had been three other minor fires in the camp since the beginning of the year.
Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, which hosts over one million members of the community, these incidents are even more frequent. In April, a fire in a Rohingya camp resulted in three deaths. This was closely preceded by another such incident on March 22, which caused the death of 15 residents, with 400 others missing. In addition, since 2017, Cox’s Bazaar, which houses 850,000 Rohingya Muslims and where the residents are already vulnerable to floods and cyclones, has reported 73 such incidents. Just in the first three months of 2021, fires in Cox’s Bazaar have resulted in the death of 14 refugees on the flood-prone island.
Against this backdrop, the question arises as to why fires at Rohingya refugee camps in both Bangladesh and India are becoming so common.
To begin with, neither country has a formal legal mechanism guiding their governments’ responsibilities on the protection of the rights and liberties of refugees. Both India and Bangladesh are not parties to the United Nations 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol. Consequently, their responsibilities are guided by their local laws, which are insufficient, to say the least.
In India, the Foreigners Act, 1946 is the legislation applicable to the Rohingya refugees housed in the country. However, this law is problematic because it doesn’t create a specific classification for refugees and asylum seekers, allowing them all to be labelled as “illegal migrants.” The Rohingya Muslim community in India also found itself facing the brunt of the 2019 Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which disallows Muslims from neighbouring countries from attaining Indian citizenship. Moreover, in 2020, the budget for Relief and Rehabilitation for Migrants and Repatriates was also reduced by one-third from the previous year.
Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, while Human Rights Watch has celebrated the Bangladeshi government for being “generous and compassionate” in accepting the Rohingya, the country’s laws continue to remain resistant to acknowledging the Rohingya’s rights. This is primarily driven by concerns amongst policymakers that providing suitable conditions for refugees and asylum seekers would result in an even higher influx, which would, in turn, further drain the resources of the country’s already vulnerable economy.
In the absence of laws explicitly recognising the governments’ obligations to secure the lives and liberties of the exiled community, the Rohingya are made to live in unsafe and squalid conditions, making them vulnerable to fires. Typically, modern buildings ensure compliance with health and safety regulations, particularly those that could prospectively result in fire regulation violations. However, as most Rohingya camps have make-shift shanties made of bamboo and tarpaulin, they are inevitably more vulnerable to fires. This issue is further worsened by the high population density in these camps, and the use of open flames for cooking and the number of open wires within them.
In addition, the location of the camps is also such that emergency services take longer to reach them, as they are often situated in the outskirts of cities. For example, in New Delhi, the fire brigade took 40 to 45 minutes to reach the camp to begin rescue operations. In fact, UNHCR spokesperson Louise Donovan has previously raised concern about the wires around the camps, pointing to the fact that they restrict firefighting equipment from being brought closer to the fires. Furthermore, the barbed fence around the camps also restricts the residents from escaping the premises.
Apart from the poor and dangerous living conditions, the lack of legal recognition of the rights of refugees also results in the “othering” of the Rohingya Muslims in both Bangladesh and India. In both countries, there is a narrative that the Rohingya Muslims are a threat to national security due to their involvement in illegal activities, including domestic drug smuggling. Many locals are also concerned about having to compete for already scarce resources and employment opportunities.
This resentment amongst the host countries’ citizens has also raised scepticism amongst residents of the fires being a result of a deliberate attempt of arson. For instance, in June’s incident in New Delhi, residents of the camps, speaking to Al Jazeera, said that the camps were “deliberately torched” by Hindu right-wing groups who often warned them to vacate the premises. Amnesty International’s South Asia campaigner, Saad Hammadi, too, has spoken of the possibility of the fires in Rohingya camps in Bangladesh being instances of arson. He said that “the frequency of fire in the camps is too coincidental, especially when outcomes of previous investigations into the incidents are not known and they keep repeating.” However, the lack of recognition of their rights often results in these claims being rubbished as conspiracies, with their complaints not taken seriously by authorities.
A major issue with the handling of the Rohingya crisis is the absence of shared responsibility, which results in the countries housing the refugees becoming increasingly resistant to welcoming them, especially with no hope of repatriation in sight. In South Asia and Southeast Asia, merely four countries are signatories to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, with most others not having any domestic legislation on their duties towards exiled communities. Moreover, significant groupings of the region that should be ensuring the safety of the community, including ASEAN, SAARC, and the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC), have only superficially engaged with the crisis, by recognising it as a concern but failing to provide any tangible assistance. This has resulted in countries like India and Bangladesh growing increasingly resistant to keeping the Rohingya in their countries, which has resulted in the refugees being forced into clustered and uninhabitable living conditions where fires are more frequent. Without acknowledging the issue of the Rohingya exodus as one that requires international collaboration, the Rohingya will continue to face threats to their livelihood, both in Myanmar at the hands of the military and in India and Bangladesh at the hands of such devastating incidents.
Why Are There so Many Fires in Rohingya Camps?
The surge in incidents of fires ravaging Rohingya camps in Bangladesh and India is the direct result of the government’s failure to acknowledge the rights and freedoms of the community.
July 1, 2021
SOURCE: NPR