Since the beginning of the unrest in Myanmar at the end of August, more than 500,000 members of the Rohingya Muslim minority have fled to neighboring Bangladesh. „This is the largest mass migration in the region in decades,“ Deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq said Thursday. If you take into account the former refugees, probably more than 700,000 Rohingya lived in Bangladesh.
Most of them were lodged in makeshift refugee camps in the border district of Cox’s Bazaar. They fled there after the end of August when Muslim insurgents attacked a number of police posts and beat back the military with a hard hand. Whole villages were burned down and civilians killed as well. Critics accused the Myanmar government of ethnic cleansing. The denied, however, that she was responsible for the arson.
