UN humanitarian chief, UNICEF executive director due tomorrow

Published: October 01, 2017 16:45:13 | Updated: October 24, 2017 13:08:15

United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock and UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake arrive here tomorrow on a three-day visit to
Bangladesh.

"The purpose of the joint mission is to see, first-hand, the devastating humanitarian situation of the Rohingya people," a UNICEF press release said Sunday.

During the visit, they will go to Cox's Bazar on October 2 to see the condition of the Rohingya people who were displaced from their homeland Myanmar.

Lowcock and Lake will brief the media on the latest updates on the Rohingya crisis, response and funding needs at the Ocean Paradise Hotel in Cox's Bazar town at 2 pm on October 3, the release said.

Since late August, it said, more than 500,000 Rohingya people, among them 60 per cent children, have arrived in Cox's Bazar alone, marking the largest Rohingya influx in the region in decades.

In Bangladesh, the total number of Rohingya people is now estimated to be well over 700,000 people, the release said.