Humanitarian aid: EU releases over €43 million for Myanmar and Bangladesh

The EU has released over €43 million to address the humanitarian needs of people in Myanmar, as well as those of Rohingya refugees and their host communities in Bangladesh.

In Myanmar, the EU will provide over €18 million to respond to the dramatic escalation in needs following the military takeover of 2021. The funding will allow humanitarian partners to ensure the provision of life-saving support such as protection, food, shelter, healthcare and education, reads a press release of the European Commission.

"The EU will also continue to support the efforts of Bangladesh in responding to the Rohingya refugee crisis by providing over €23 million, part of which will also contribute to implement disaster preparedness programmes in the country. A further dedicated allocation of €2 million will help address the needs of Rohingya and other refugees in neighbouring countries, such as Indonesia and Malaysia," reads the release.

Background

In Myanmar, 17.6 million people are expected to be in need of humanitarian assistance in 2023, a dramatic increase from 1 million in 2021. A third of those in need are children.

Over 5 years after large-scale violence forced hundreds of thousands of Rohingya people to flee Rakhine State in Myanmar, Bangladesh still hosts almost 1 million refugees. Rohingya refugees live in precarious and deteriorating conditions, with the majority located in the congested refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, where they are entirely dependent on humanitarian aid.

The EU has been providing humanitarian aid to people in Myanmar since 1994, and in Bangladesh since 2002. With this additional funding, EU humanitarian aid for Myanmar now totals over €68 million since 2021. Support for Rohingya refugees, their host communities, and disaster preparedness efforts in Bangladesh since the beginning of the Rohingya crisis in 2017 now stands at over €242 million.