Massive fire destroys over 1,000 shelters in a Rohingya camp in Bangladesh | Watch

Dhaka: While Bangladesh was busy with the chaos of General elections, a massive fire swept through a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar, destroying over 1,000 shelters. According to The Dhaka Tribune, the incident took place on Sunday morning just hours before the country went to polls. While no casualties were reported in the incident, the authorities are still investigating the matter. 

Following the incident, Ukhiya police station Officer-in-Charge (OC) Shamim Hossein told local reporters that the fire originated at Block A of Camp No. 5 and went on to spread across four blocks.  Hossein noted that the fire department managed to douse the fire averting a major tragedy. “In our estimate, 1,040 shelters were destroyed,” Cox’s Bazar Fire Station in-charge Atish Chakma told local reporters. “However, we did not find any causality in the fire. There is no missing report either," he furthered. 

The deplorable situation of the Rohingya camps

The Rohingya refugee camps are usually prone to fire due to overcrowding and lack of facilities. The fragile nature of the homes made of bamboo and plastic enables the fire to spread widely. A similar incident took place in March last year when a massive fire destroyed over  3,000 shelters, and 155 facilities, including hospitals and educational centres, and displaced over 32,000 refugees, The Dhaka Tribune reported. Following a thorough investigation, the Bangladesh authorities concluded that the fire was an act of sabotage. Meanwhile, in February last year, the Bangladesh Defense Ministry informed the parliamentary panel that 222 incidents of fire occurred in Rohingya camps between January 2021 and December 2022.