41 NGOs withdrawn from Rohingya camps: FM

Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen today said 41 non-government organisations (NGOs) have been withdrawn from all kinds of activities in Cox's Bazar Rohingya camps for their wrongdoings.

A total of 139 NGOs have been operating in the Rohingya camps since the Rohingya crisis began in August, 2017, he said.

The Foreign Minister came up with the information while inaugurating waste management activities at Dakshin Surma under Sylhet City Corporation.

Dr Momen also said actions will be taken against NGOs if they do something going beyond their terms and references.

The NGO Affairs Bureau on Thursday suspended six different projects being run out of the Cox's Bazar branch of an NGO called Mukti - on allegations of making sharp weeding tools for distribution among Rohingyas.

Some 600 of these tools were allegedly made. An official suspension order signed by the Assignment Officer of NGO Affairs Bureau Sirajul Islam Khan was issued on Wednesday.

On August 29, the Foreign Minister said action will be taken against the NGOs operating in Rohingya camps if evidence is found about their activities that go beyond the terms and references.

"We'll surely take action against those NGOs if we get evidence or proof that they're involved in any political or instigative activities (inside Rohingya camps)," he told reporters at state guesthouse Padma after briefing diplomats over the latest Rohingya situation.

Bangladesh is now hosting over 1.1 million Rohingyas. More than 730,000 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh after the Myanmar military launched a brutal offensive targeting the mainly-Muslim ethnic minority on August 25, 2017.

A UN fact-finding mission said the violence had "genocidal intent".