More injured Rohingya arriving in Bangladesh as Myanmar war intensifies

Medical charity MSF warns of urgent need to protect civilians caught up in escalating conflict in western Rakhine State.

More Rohingya are arriving in Bangladesh from Myanmar with war-related injuries amid escalating conflict between the military and the Arakan Army (AA) in western Rakhine State, according to international medical group Doctors without Borders, known by its French initials MSF.

MSF said its teams in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, treated 39 people for conflict-related injuries including mortar shell injuries and gunshot wounds in the four days leading up to August 7. More than 40 percent of the injured were women and children, it added in a statement.

Staff at its clinic said it was the first time in a year that they had seen serious injuries on such a scale.

“Considering the rise in the number of wounded Rohingya patients crossing from Myanmar in recent days, and the nature of the injuries our teams are treating, we are becoming increasingly concerned about the impact of the conflict on Rohingya people,” said Orla Murphy, MSF’s country representative in Bangladesh. “It is clear that safe space for civilians in Myanmar is shrinking more each day, with people caught up in the ongoing fighting and forced to make perilous journeys to Bangladesh to seek safety.”

The mostly Muslim Rohingya have long been a target of discrimination and ethnic violence in Rakhine.

In 2017, at least 750,000 Rohingya fled into Bangladesh after the Myanmar military launched a brutal crackdown that is now being investigated as a genocide. Many of the thousands who remain continue to live in camps where their movements are restricted.

Fighting in the state has escalated in recent months after the AA, which claims to represent Rakhine’s Buddhist majority and is fighting for autonomy, joined armed groups fighting against the military, which seized power in a coup in February 2021.

At the end of June, the UK-based Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK) warned of an “intensifying genocide” in Rakhine amid fierce fighting in Maungdaw, a coastal town near the Bangladesh border where many Rohingya live.

The same month the fighting forced MSF to suspend its health services in northern Rakhine.

MSF said the Rohingya seeking its assistance in Bangladesh had told them a “desperate situation” was unfolding in Rakhine.

“Some reported seeing people bombed while trying to find boats to cross the river into Bangladesh and escape the violence,” the statement said. “Others described seeing hundreds of dead bodies on the riverbanks. Many patients spoke of being separated from their families en route to safer areas and of loved ones being killed in the violence. Many people said they were fearful that family members remaining in Myanmar would not survive.”

A drone attack just outside Maungdaw a week ago killed dozens of people waiting to cross into Bangladesh, the Reuters news agency reported at the weekend.

A heavily pregnant woman and her two-year-old daughter were among the victims, it added, with the military and AA each blaming the other for the atrocity.

MSF said there was a need to immediately protect civilians caught up in the conflict.

“People must not come under indiscriminate attack and should be allowed to leave for safer areas, while all those in need of vital medical care should have unhindered and sustained access to medical facilities,” Murphy said.