Visiting Amnesty International top official Salil Shetty says he doesn’t expect things to “change dramatically in a couple of years” regarding the Rohingya crisis.
In an interview with the Dhaka Tribute, the rights body’s secretary general said the international community has not done enough on the issue.
“The US government and we have worked together to create pressure and the US Congress is putting some targeted sanctions against some of the military authorities. But the pressure has not been enough to compel things to change, so obviously it’s not adequate,” the newspaper quoted him saying.
According to him, the pressure should be comprehensive, involving trade and finance. “Myanmar government should be made to feel the pain of the actions they have committed so far and they are obviously not feeling that enough.”
He said it seems to him that Myanmar is not serious about the repatriations and described Bangladesh’s measures involving the refugees as ‘short-term’.
“I don’t think things are going to change dramatically in a couple of years…It will be a slow paced process. But within the next couple of years, Bangladesh will have to find ways of providing support that go beyond humanitarian assistance.”
On Bangladesh’s plan to relocate the refugees, Shetty said the Bangladesh government needs to clarify whether the refugees will have access to services there and whether they would have some freedom of movement, being stuck in the island.
“We were a bit skeptical when we first heard of it because it sounded like it’s not really a solution. Everybody fully understands that Bangladesh doesn’t have spare land, that’s the biggest challenge for Bangladesh so, we don’t want to be kind of dismissive out of hand,” he said.