Deadly landslides expose Rohingya camp crisis and policy failures, says HRW

Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Monday said the recent deadly landslides in the Rohingya refugee camps in Cox's Bazar were not simply the result of heavy monsoon rains, but also of longstanding policy failures, overcrowding, and funding shortages.

"These are not simply natural disasters, but a predictable outcome of policies that put refugees' lives at risk," said Meenakshi Ganguly, deputy Asia director of HRW, in a press statement.

The rights watchdog urged the Bangladesh government, the United Nations and donor countries to reduce overcrowding in the camps and urgently restore funding for embankments, drainage systems, access roads and emergency relocation sites.

The warning comes after a series of landslides and weather related events in July killed at least 15 Rohingya refugees and displaced more than 9,700 people in the squalid camps in Cox’s Bazar in the last one week as UNHCR reported.

The events affected 43,000 people from more than 9,400 households. 

Bangladesh hosts more than one million Rohingya refugees for nearly a decade, with expanding families living in bamboo-and-tarpaulin shelters on steep, deforested hillsides that are highly vulnerable during the monsoon season.

New arrivals face greatest danger 

As more refugees continue to flee Myanmar, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has repeatedly warned that overcrowded camps remain at high risk from cyclones, flash floods and landslides.

The organisation said newly arrived refugees are particularly vulnerable because they are not allocated formal shelters and often rent or build makeshift homes in unsafe locations.

HRW interviewed nine people, including five Rohingya refugees affected by the landslides and four humanitarian workers involved in the emergency response.

A water, sanitation and hygiene civil engineer told the rights group that the camps' design had been flawed from the outset.

"When the Rohingya first took shelter here, the camps were made by cutting hills and without planned drainage systems," he said. "Now, because of funding cuts, sustainable landslide-prevention work, especially brickwork, cannot be done properly, while the Bangladesh government refuses to allow permanent constructions in the camps."

"I repeatedly asked NGO staff for a shelter, but they told me shelters were not being allocated for new arrivals," said one refugee who arrived in Bangladesh in August 2024.

His two daughters and two grandchildren were killed in a landslide on 6 July after the makeshift shelter he had built on the edge of a hill collapsed.

"I didn't know the hill would collapse like this," he said.

As of May, more than 1,50,000 fresh Rohingya refugees had arrived in Cox's Bazar since fighting resumed in November 2023 between Myanmar's military and the Arakan Army, an ethnic armed group.

HRW said the 2025 Joint Response Plan had initially planned for 50,000 new arrivals, but the actual number has already reached more than three times that figure, leaving humanitarian planning and resources severely overstretched.

The Bangladesh government has yet to approve a UNHCR request for additional land to accommodate the newcomers, who have instead been squeezed into the existing 24 square kilometres allocated for the camps.

Immediate funding for safer shelters

Emergency relocation remains difficult because of severe congestion and the limited number of temporary shelters, aid workers said, according to HRW.

In December 2024, the Bangladesh government approved stronger temporary shelters to replace the existing bamboo-and-tarpaulin structures. It also approved three semi-permanent shelter designs, considered pilot projects for two-storey shelters to ease congestion and agreed to rebuild 50,000 shelters.

However, those plans stalled after humanitarian funding cuts announced in January 2025.

The Forest Department, local representatives and members of host communities have also objected to some proposals, arguing they could encourage permanent settlement and result in the loss of reserved forest land.

HRW said shelter safety should be treated as a human rights issue rather than as a concession towards permanent settlement.

It called on donors to finance the approved shelter models and urged Bangladesh to continue allowing disaster-resilient designs and safe relocation spaces.

"Rohingya refugees won't benefit from further hand-wringing, but by an urgent and effective response," Meenakshi said.