US under secy to visit Rohingya camps today

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Visiting US Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy and Human Rights Uzra Zeya will travel to the Rohingya camps in Cox’s Bazar today.

Heading a three-member US delegation, she arrived in Dhaka yesterday evening, and was received at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport by Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen.

The delegation also includes Donald Lu, assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, and Anjali Kaur, deputy assistant administrator of the USAID Asia bureau. They flew from Delhi after a four-day visit.

Tomorrow, Zeya, who is on a four-day visit to Bangladesh, is scheduled to hold meetings with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, her Private Sector Industry and Investment Adviser Salman F Rahman, Law Minister Anisul Huq, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan and Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen.

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She will also engage with civil society organisations on freedom of expression and association, labour rights, governance and democracy, said US State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller during a briefing in Washington on Monday. Zeya will leave Dhaka on Friday.

Miller said Zeya would meet senior government officials to discuss shared humanitarian concerns, including the Rohingya refugee crisis, human rights, free and fair elections, and combating trafficking in persons.

Her visit is considered important given the prevailing discord over the polls-time administration. The BNP is adamant about reinstating the practice of a polls-time caretaker government, while the ruling Awami League insists that its government would conduct the election as per the constitution, like it did in 2014 and 2018.

Washington, which has been critical of the elections in 2014 and 2018 for alleged irregularities, on May 24 announced visa restrictions on individuals and their immediate family members if they are found to undermine the democratic election process in Bangladesh.