OIC to play strong role in resolving Rohingya crisis
Published: 4 May 2018, 04:22 PM | Updated: 4 May 2018, 04:26 PM
Terming the situation of “forcefully displaced Rohingyas” as “stain on civilization”, Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) Assistant Secretary General Hashmi Yousuf said that the OIC also will play a strong role alongside the UN and others international organizations to resolve the protracted Rohingya crisis.
What will be their role and how will they play those role, will be decided in the 45th annual session of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the OIC.
Yousuf, who is leading an OIC delegation said these to reporters after visiting the Rohingya refugee camps in Ukhia upazila of Cox’s Bazar on Friday afternoon.
“We’ve visited Rohingya camps, heard their tales of sufferings and collected information about brutalities inflicted on them by Myanmar army,” he said at a press briefing.
The Rohingya issue will be presented at the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers with a greater focus, he added.
The special flight carrying the delegation of ministers, secretaries and other higher officials from 38 countries landed at Cox’s Bazar Airport, around 08:45am.
Later, the high-level delegation went to visit refugee camps in Kutupalong of Ukhia upazila in the district.
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Special Envoy to Myanmar Bob Rae, Canada's Special Envoy to the OIC Masud Husain, Bangladesh Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali and State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md Shahriar Alam are accompanying the delegation.
The two-day OIC meet will begin at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre on Saturday in Dhaka.
The OIC is considered the second largest inter-governmental organisation after the United Nations, with the membership of 57 states, covering four continents, with a collective population of over 1.6 billion.
The delegation will return in the afternoon to attend a dinner hosted by Ali at the Sonargaon Hotel.
More than 700,000 Myanmar's Muslim Rohingyas took shelter after a military crackdown in Myanmar’s Rakhine State.
