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STORY: GENEVA / ROHINGYA REFUGEES UPDATE
TRT: 2:31
SOURCE: UNTV CH
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 17 OCTOBER 2017 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Exterior, Flags
2. Wide shot of Press Room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Andrej Mahecic, Spokesperson, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“We are gravely concerned about the humanitarian conditions in Bangladesh, obviously conditions of thousands of new arrivals who are stranded near the Bangladesh-Myanmar border. Since Sunday night, an estimated 10,000-15,000 Rohingya refugees have entered Bangladesh through the Anjumam Para border.”
4. Med shot, journalist
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Andrej Mahecic, Spokesperson, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“As of this morning, they are still squatting in the paddy fields of Anjumam Para village in Bangladesh. They are waiting for permission to move away from the border, where the sound of gunfire continues to be heard every night from the Myanmar side.”
6. Close up, journalist
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Andrej Mahecic, Spokesperson, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“The new total, as you have heard, stands at 582,000.”
8. Wide shot, journalists
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Marixie Mercado, spokesperson, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF):
“About 58% of the refugees are children. I think that comes up to 337,000 thousand.”
10. Med shot, journalist
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Marixie Mercado, spokesperson, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF):
“Right now the lifesaving priority is the most critical and children need safe water, they need to live in a clean environment, they need to be protected by disease, and they need all of us to be prepared in the event that something, a major outbreak, does occur.”
12. Close up, journalist
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Fadela Chaib, Spokesperson, United Nations World Health Organization (WHO):
“The situation in Cox’s Bazar is very challenging from a health perspective. There are many challenges to rolling out the emergency response. The terrain is very difficult, the population is dispersed over many many settlements and camps and beyond. The population is also very mobile, impacting response operations.”
14. Med shot, journalist
15. SOUNDBITE (English) Marixie Mercado, spokesperson, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF):
“Rohingya children have already endured atrocities. All of them need the lifesaving basics – shelter, food, water, vaccinations, protection – not tomorrow, or next week, or next months, but right now. UNICEF is appealing to donors to help fulfil these children’s most fundamental right to survive.”
16. Med shot, journalists
17. SOUNDBITE (English) Andrej Mahecic, Spokesperson, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“We are advocating with the Bangladeshi authorities to urgently admit these refugees fleeing violence and increasingly-difficult conditions back home. Every minute counts given the fragile condition they are in.”
18. Various shots, presser
Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh now number 582,000, with nearly 60 percent of these refugees being children, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF).
Many of the new arrivals are now stranded near the border awaiting permission to move inland, where the sound of gunfire continues to be heard every night from the Myanmar side.
“Since Sunday night, an estimated 10,000-15,000 Rohingya refugees have entered Bangladesh through the Anjumam Para border,” UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic told reporters today in Geneva. “The new total, as you have heard, stands at 582,000,” he added, referencing the number of refugees who have crossed into Bangladesh since 25 August, with thousands more projected to cross in the coming weeks.
“We are gravely concerned about the humanitarian conditions in Bangladesh, obviously conditions of thousands of new arrivals who are stranded near the Bangladesh-Myanmar border,” Mahecic said. “As of this morning, they are still squatting in the paddy fields of Anjumam Para village in Bangladesh. They are waiting for permission to move away from the border, where the sound of gunfire continues to be heard every night from the Myanmar side,” he added.
UNHCR and partners – the Bangladesh Red Crescent and Action Against Hunger, are delivering food and water to the stranded refugees, among them many children, women and the elderly who are dehydrated and hungry from the long and harrowing journey.
“About 58 per cent of the refugees are children. I think that comes up to 337,000 thousand,” UNICEF spokesperson Marixie Mercado told reporters today in Geneva. “Right now the lifesaving priority is the most critical and children need safe water, they need to live in a clean environment, they need to be protected by disease, and they need all of us to be prepared in the event that something, a major outbreak, does occur,” Mercado added.
According to UNICEF, the growing needs are far outpacing resources. As of today, UNICEF has received just 7 per cent of the $76 million required to provide emergency support to children over the next six months.
“Rohingya children have already endured atrocities. All of them need the lifesaving basics – shelter, food, water, vaccinations, protection – not tomorrow, or next week, or next months, but right now. UNICEF is appealing to donors to help fulfil these children’s most fundamental right to survive,” Mercado said.
The health situation of the refugees is also concerning with the possibility of cholera and other diseases still looming as more refugees arrive. “The situation in Cox’s Bazar is very challenging from a health perspective,” United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson Fadela Chaib said. “There are many challenges to rolling out the emergency response. The terrain is very difficult, the population is dispersed over many many settlements and camps and beyond. The population is also very mobile, impacting response operations,” Chaib added.
A massive cholera vaccination campaign was launched by WHO on 10 October near Cox’s Bazar to protect the newly arrived Rohingya and host communities from the life-threatening diarrheal disease. This followed a risk assessment carried out with WHO support. WHO reports that 900 000 doses of the oral cholera vaccine (OCV) have now been mobilized.
Despite these many challenges and the crowding of border areas in Bangladesh, humanitarian aid agencies continue to assist those in need while increasing their funding appeals. UNHCR is reiterating the need for Bangladeshi authorities to continue accepting Rohingya refugees and allowing them to move inland from the border.
“We are advocating with the Bangladeshi authorities to urgently admit these refugees fleeing violence and increasingly-difficult conditions back home. Every minute counts given the fragile condition they are in,” Mahecic said.
