India, China sympathetic to Rohingyas

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday said diplomats of India and China saw for themselves the plight of the Rohingyas and they were very much sympathetic to them.

She was responding to a question during a press conference at the Permanent Mission of Bangladesh to the UN.

The PM also mentioned that India and China came forward with humanitarian assistance, and they were sending relief materials to Bangladesh for the Rohingyas. "They're extending all sorts of cooperation."

Hasina said all the diplomats, stationed in Dhaka, went to the Rohingya camps in Cox's Bazar to see for themselves the sufferings of the refugees. "They talked to them ... they're all sympathetic to the Rohingya refugees."

She added that after giving shelter to some 800,000 Myanmar nationals in Bangladesh, the country was facing a complex crisis over their food, accommodation, emergency relief and their repatriation.

On her meeting with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Hasina said he highly appreciated Bangladesh for standing in their bad time by the Rohingyas fleeing persecution by Myanmar security forces in Rakhine State. "He also said he would do everything possible from his side to resolve the problem permanently," she added.

The PM said as the government was providing food to Bangladesh's 16 crore people, it would not be a big deal for the country to feed another 800,000 Rohingyas. "If needed, we'll eat one time a day and share our food with them at other times."

In reply to a query about dialogue with the BNP, Hasina sharply reacted to it, asking for not raising the issue before her.

The PM alleged that the BNP was a "terrorist" and "militant" party which created Bangla Bhai, former leader of militant outfit Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), and its leader Ziaur Rahman killed her father along with the whole family and blocked the path to get justice.

"This party killed hundreds of people in arson attacks in the name of an anti-government movement and to resist the election."

Hasina said she called BNP chief Khaleda Zia before the 2014 election and went to her house after the death of her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko. "But the reaction was humiliating."

Saying that there is no need to sit with the BNP to forge a national consensus on the Rohingya issue, she said a consensus had already been built across the world. "Please don't tell me to sit with the BNP anymore. This is not acceptable to me at all."

The PM also talked about some misdeeds "committed" by the BNP and its ally Jamaat in recent years against the country and its people.

Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali and Bangladesh Permanent Representative to the UN Masud Bin Momen were present at the press conference conducted by PM's Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim.