While Human Rights Watch (HRW) has issued a statement urging Bangladesh's interim government to lift restrictions on education for Rohingya children, the appeal has drawn criticism from policy analysts and rights advocates within the region, who say the statement is another instance of international organizations placing pressure on frontline countries like Bangladesh—without providing the necessary support.

HRW’s statement, issued Wednesday (25 June), called for the immediate recognition of community-led Rohingya schools and demanded that Rohingya children be allowed to enroll in schools outside refugee camps. However, the call comes at a time when Bangladesh is already struggling with the burden of hosting nearly 1 million Rohingyas—one of the world’s largest protracted refugee crises—without adequate and sustained global support.

Double Standards and Donor Hypocrisy

Critics have pointed out the glaring contradiction in HRW’s stance: while acknowledging that the United States and other foreign donors have cut humanitarian aid, leading to the closure of thousands of learning centers in the Rohingya camps, HRW simultaneously demands that Bangladesh expand access and recognition of education systems without providing a roadmap for funding, security, or legal feasibility.

“It's convenient for a US-based NGO to lecture Bangladesh on rights, while the US itself slashed Rohingya aid from $300 million in 2024 to just $12 million in 2025,” said Dr. Arif Mahmood, a Dhaka-based researcher on refugee policy. “You can’t cut funding and then blame a host country for not doing more. That’s not advocacy—it’s abdication.”

Indeed, the very learning centers HRW is lamenting were run by NGOs dependent on international donor funding. With that funding withdrawn, Bangladesh is now left to manage the fallout, including rising violence and loss of educational access—issues it did not create but is expected to solve unilaterally.

Security Risks Ignored

Bangladesh’s security concerns have also been largely overlooked in the HRW report. Camp-based criminality, armed group recruitment, cross-border trafficking, and child abductions have all sharply increased in recent years. HRW itself notes that 51 child abductions were reported in the first quarter of 2025 alone. Given this volatile environment, calls for integrating Rohingya students into local schools—without any legal clarity, political consensus, or donor-backed infrastructure—seem detached from ground realities.

“Would the US government allow tens of thousands of undocumented refugee children, from a different country and culture, to freely enroll in public schools during a crime surge?” asked a senior Bangladeshi education official. “We’re not saying no to education. We’re saying the global community must share the responsibility—not just dump it on Bangladesh.”

Legal and Policy Constraints

Rohingyas are not legally recognized as citizens of Bangladesh. Integrating them into the national education system without formal status raises legal questions and risks setting a precedent that could further stall repatriation efforts. Bangladesh has consistently maintained that the solution to the Rohingya crisis lies in safe, voluntary, and dignified repatriation to Myanmar, not permanent settlement.

Moreover, donor agencies themselves helped develop the Myanmar Curriculum Pilot to be taught in the camps—a curriculum designed to help Rohingya children prepare for future reintegration in Myanmar. But with funding cuts and reduced engagement, even this collaborative model is faltering.

Call for Real Support, Not Rhetoric

What Bangladesh needs is not finger-pointing, but meaningful support. This includes:

Immediate restoration of international funding, particularly from the US and EU;

Strengthening of in-camp education under the Myanmar curriculum with technical, financial, and security assistance;

Regional diplomacy to pressure Myanmar to create conditions for safe return;

Recognition and funding of community-led schools, only after appropriate legal frameworks and quality standards are jointly developed.

Bangladesh has hosted the Rohingya community for nearly eight years with compassion and resilience. But calls for more responsibility—without proportional support—risk deepening both domestic tensions and the refugee community’s despair.

As one Bangladeshi official bluntly put it, “If the world wants to avoid a ‘lost generation’ of Rohingya, it must first stop abandoning them—and us.”

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