Columnist Farhad Mozhar addresses a discussion at Dhaka Reporters' Unity in the city yesterday.Photo: STAR

Bangladesh should take the initiative in resolving the Rohingya problem regionally for the sake of its own interest.
This was stated by the speakers at a discussion titled 'The Rohingya crisis: South and South East Asian perspective' at Dhaka Reporters Unity auditorium yesterday. It was organised by Neeti Gobeshona Kendra.
While presenting the keynote paper, Director and Trustee of the Kendro Mahbubul Haque said the gravity of Rohingya crisis has now touched other South-East Asian countries also.
The plight of some Rohingya people over the refusal by different countries in the region to anchor their boats off their coast got wide coverage in the media, he said.
The Myanmar government is also refusing to recognise these people as their citizens, and as a result Rohingyas are becoming threats for the region, he added.
Three representatives of Rohingya community also spoke at the discussion meeting.
“The Myanmar government has been showing discrimination towards us since independence in 1947. They are persecuting us in a way which can be called genocide,” they said.
Claiming themselves as Arakanese they also urged the international community to solve their problem.
Columnist Farhad Mozhar said the problem should be dealt with not only from political angle but also from humanitarian point of view.
“Apart from an ethnic issue, it has also become a religious problem and after the 9/11, this crisis has become more acute from international perspective,” he added.
Farhad said unless democracy is established in Myanmar the solution of this problem will not be easy.
Brig (retd) Shafaiat Ahmed said “Bangladesh is badly affected by this problem and different South-East Asian countries are also coming in contact with this problem now. So a regional initiative has become important to solve the problem.”
Prof Naimul Ahsan Khan of law department at Dhaka University, journalist Abu Sayeen Khan and Fazlus Sattar also took part in the discussion.
They urged the government to raise the issue at the upcoming Asean summit in Thailand this month and take a leading role to resolve the problem regionally.
Sheikh Taufiq, another trustee of the Kendro, chaired the discussion.