Misery for thousands!Last week I wrote about too much water in New Zealand, Germany and China. Now again I write about severe flooding, this time in the Rohingya refugee camps in west Bangladesh. Here's how the expert rain website Floodlist¹ explained the disaster:
More to come'Cox’s Bazar town recorded 114.24 mm of rain in 24 hours k27 July and 781.03 mm so far this month. More heavy rain is forecast over the coming days. Rain is not the only problem for the refugee communities in the district. Some areas also saw coastal flooding after a high tide during full moon phase on 25 July 2021 caused embankments to collapse.' ¹ What it's like'“We are having a nightmarish life,” even after escaping to Bangladesh, said Mohammad Jubair, a Rohingya volunteer who said he saw a landslide destroy an entire hillside of shelters in the Balukhali refugee camp on Tuesday. At least three people, including a mother and her two children, were killed, he said.' ² Yes it is a nightmareYes it is a nightmare compared with the life I live. Last weekend at my home ere in New Zealand we had a terrific downpour – the worst I've ever experienced. A sudden local flood but the water came only to my front doorstep. My house wasn't washed away. It's not built of bamboo with just a tarpaulin for a roof. Anyway the rain soon stopped and the water drained. Moreover I hadn’t lost my first house in March to a fire which took out thousands of shelters. And I'm not in an impossible-to-keep Covid lockdown. Covid is not rampant here. Moreover, I had plenty of food for an evening meal. Food is shortFood is short at times in the refugee camps because neither the Bangladesh authorities nor the string of NGOs working on the ground have enough funds. They together have only 30% of what they need for a year. The British government announced shocking cuts to its aid in support of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. The £27.6 million announced amounts to a 42% cut in aid compared to what the government contributed in October 2020 and less than a quarter of what the UK contributed in 2019. And smaller and personal donors seem to have acquired donor fatigue. Rescued
AwareI write about happenings such as the floods in Bangladesh, because I'm hoping more and more of us will be aware and react in whatever way we can: alert our friends or community groups; remind our local government representatives to look beyond our borders; give some money. I know that whatever we do we are, at present just being the proverbial ambulance at the foot of the proverbial cliff but it is a large cliff and we do need a large ambulance. Aim - permanent homeThese Muslim stateless people, victimised and banished because of who they are, want and need to find a place where they can live in peace and safety. They have come since 2017 from Myanmar and they would like to go back there. But given the military takeover and turmoil in that country at present, negotiations to that end seem a long way off. For the present the ambulances will have to stay in place.□ John McInnes Friday 30 July 2021 References: please click the red text Postscript: Agencies accepting donations for the Rohingya crisisMost international NGOs will accept Rohingya donations. Here are three which are geared up for this flood crisis: UNHCR; Norwegian Refugee Council; Care. Please click the name. ##########
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