Nearly one million Rohingya refugees are living in threadbare camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, after they fled their homes in Myanmar due to the military’s crimes against humanity - which are currently the subject of a case under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide at the International Court of Justice.

Now, COVID-19 has exacerbated the conditions of the Rohingya in the camps. Many Rohingya refugees struggle to access healthcare due to language barriers, ill-treatment from some medical staffs and lack of access to information about availability of healthcare services in the camps.

Women in the camps told Amnesty International that their husbands, aggrieved by the loss of opportunity to work, put pressure on them to bring in money, and were violent towards the women in the household.

More than 100 Rohingya refugees have been allegedly killed in extrajudicial executions between August 2017 and July 2020, according to Odhikar, a Bangladeshi human rights organization.

The authorities have begun construction of barbed wire fences around the camps, to curtail their movement outside the camps. In May 2020, Bangladeshi authorities took more than 300 Rohingya men, women and children to Bhashan Char, a remote silt island at the Bay of Bengal. The prolonged confinement of the refugees on the island against their will amounts to arbitrary detention and violates Bangladesh’s obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Authorities plan to relocate 100,000 Rohingya refugees to the island.

The future of nearly half a million Rohingya children hangs in the balance with limited access to an accredited and certified education. With no place to call their home, no livelihood opportunities to secure a future for them, hundreds of Rohingya men, women and children, take dangerous recourse to boat journeys in the sea to go to neighbouring countries every year during the break from monsoon season between October and June.

For decades, the Rohingyas in Myanmar have been denied their rights to nationality, freedom of movement and access to services including education, employment and healthcare. By promoting and protecting their human rights and dignity, the Bangladeshi government and the international community can empower the Rohingya community to claim their rights. That can only happen when they are given a voice in the decisions that affect them.

Sign the petition to urge Bangladesh’s government and the international community to:

Ensure the participation of Rohingya refugees in the decisions that affect them in order to protect their human rights.

Petitions are currently addressed to the governments of Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, Indonesia and the United States.