Angelina Jolie to visit Rohingya victims in Bangladesh

DHAKA - Hollywood star Angelina Jolie told a Bangladesh delegation in Vancouver, Canada that she planned to visit Rohingya women living in the refugee camps in Cox's Bazar.

Angelina Jolie has condemned sexual violence inflicted on Rohingya women in Myanmar, where a military counter-insurgency operation has sent hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees across the border to Bangladesh.

Jolie is a special envoy of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). “Later she mentioned accordingly in her keynote speech about the sexual violence faced by almost each female Rohingya who fled to Bangladesh and condemned the armed conflict in Myanmar,” Bangladesh’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday. However, it gave no details of Jolie’s proposed trip.

More than 607,000 Rohingya have fled Buddhist-majority Myanmar since late August, driven out by the military’s actions that a top United Nations official has described as a classic case of “ethnic cleansing.” Accusations of organized mass rape and other crimes against humanity were leveled at the Myanmar military on Sunday (yesterday) by another senior UN official, who had toured camps in Bangladesh where Rohingya refugees have taken shelter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdpM4-xc6RI

Pramila Patten, the special representative of the UN secretary-general on sexual violence in conflict, said she would raise accusations against the Myanmar military with the International Criminal Court in the Hague.

As human right groups gave a report about the barbarity, the Myanmar military denied all accusations of wrongdoing.

In parliament on Wednesday, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh would overcome obstacles to resolve the Rohingya crisis, with the help of the international community. “I strongly believe we will find a peaceful solution to the unprecedented crisis with the help of the international community, despite various obstacles,” she said.