Washington is watching “carefully” the situation in the Bangladesh-Myanmar border after Burma’s deployment of additional troops on their side.
Bangladesh protested against the move on Thursday afternoon by summoning Myanmar ambassador in Dhaka. But that is hours after Burmese border police fired shots in the air on their side of the Tambru border at Naikkhyangchharhi in Bandarban.
“I can just tell you that we’re watching that carefully. I can certainly understand that would be a concern of the government of Bangladesh, but we’re watching that one closely,” Department of State’s Spokesperson Heather Nauert said, replying to a query at the regular briefing in Washington on Thursday.
Around 17,000 Rohingyas have been living in no man’s land between the countries, including nearly 7,000 in Tambru, since Myanmar launched a military operation dubbed as “ethnic cleansing” in the Rakhine State on August 25 last year.
Bangladesh Border Guard troops patrolling near the Tambru border in hill tract district of Bandarban on Thursday. Myanmar’s latest move puts at risk the Rohingyas on the Tambru border.
“We also heard a hullabaloo in the Rohingya camp on the zero line at the time [firing]. No one was injured,” Bangladesh guard 34 Battalion Commander Lt Col Manjurul Hasan had said.
According to bdnews24, the foreign minister handed a protest note to the Myanmar Ambassador and said such military build-up would create confusion in Bangladesh and escalate tensions on the border.
Bangladesh also expressed the concern that such an event may hamper the repatriation process which both the sides agreed to implement.
Around 700,000 Rohingyas fled into Bangladesh since August 25 last year when the military crackdown began in the Rakhine State.
