Seven people were killed as a massive fire gutted thousands of camps in Bangladesh’s Cox Bazaar area which houses around 1 million Rohingya refugees from Myanmar. Firefighters struggled for around five hours to douse the fire, reported Dhaka Tribune. 

Reports suggested the fire started in the camps on Monday at around 4 pm (local time) and quickly spread to camp 7 and camp 8 in the Cox Bazaar area.  

“At least 9,000 shanties of Rohingya families and more than 100 shanties of Bangladeshi families have been gutted in the devastating fire in the Rohingya camp,” a Bangladeshi official was quoted as saying by Dhaka Tribune.

Personnel of various UN agencies, and international NGOs, worked along with Bangladeshi firefighters, and army personnel to put down the flames. Soldiers from the Border Guards Bangladesh also assisted in rescue works. 

The incident once again vindicates the Bangladesh government stand, which stressed the need to decongest the tightly packed camps that remained vulnerable to various disasters. The government, however, faced flak from various international agencies and NGOs for shifting around 13000 people from Cox Bazaar camps to Bhasin Char island. 

What exactly caused the massive fire is still under investigation, a Bangladeshi official said.