UN Assistant Secretary General Visits Cox’s Bazar Rohingya Camps

Unaisi Lutu Vuniwaqa, United Nations assistant secretary general for Safety and Security, has visited the Rohingya refugee camps in Cox's Bazar.

She visited the Kutupalong-2 and Balukhali-8 refugee camps, as well as the extended part of the 20-year-old refugee camp in Ukhiya upazila on Tuesday.

Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Mizanur Rahman said during the visit, Vuniwaqa spoke to officials of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the UN World Food Program (WFP) and other humanitarian agencies involved in monitoring the situation in the camps.

Earlier in the day, the UN assistant secretary general held a meeting with officials of Bangladesh Armed Police Battalion (APBN) and tried to understand the overall security situation in the refugee camps.

The security situation in the Rohingya camps has been deteriorating for some time. The issues have been discussed several times in the meetings of the national task force formed to look after the Rohingyas.

This is the first time a representative of the UN Safety and Security Division has visited Bangladesh to monitor the security situation in Cox's Bazar.

The UN assistant secretary general arrived in Cox's Bazar on Monday morning.

She held a meeting with Cox's Bazar Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Mohammad Mizanur Rahman at 11:30am on Monday.

Later, she also held a meeting with Cox's Bazar deputy commissioner and superintendent of police.

It was learnt that Vuniwaqa is visiting Cox's Bazar to know more about the situation in the camps, and discuss the possible steps going forward to resolve the problems._UNB