DHAKA: Around 8,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled to Bangladesh in recent months, escaping escalating violence in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state, according to Bangladeshi officials. The violence has intensified as fighting between Myanmar’s ruling junta and the Arakan Army, a powerful ethnic militia drawn from the Buddhist majority, continues to worsen.

“We have information that around 8,000 Rohingya crossed into Bangladesh recently, mostly over the last two months,” said Mohammad Shamsud Douza, a senior official in charge of refugees for the Bangladeshi government. “Bangladesh is already over-burdened and unable to accommodate any more Rohingya,” he told Reuters on Wednesday.

The Bangladesh government has not previously provided any estimate of how many Rohingya have crossed over in the last few months. The government will hold a “serious discussion at the cabinet” within the next two to three days to address the crisis, Bangladesh’s de-facto foreign minister, Mohammad Touhid Hossain, told reporters late on Tuesday. While expressing sympathy for the Rohingya, Hossain said that the country no longer has the capacity to provide humanitarian shelter to additional refugees. “It is not possible to fully seal the border,” he said, adding that efforts will be made to prevent further infiltration.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh held rallies in camps on August 25, marking the seventh anniversary of the 2017 military crackdown that forced them to flee Myanmar, demanding an end to violence and safe return to their homeland. Over one million Rohingya currently live in overcrowded camps in southern Bangladesh, with little hope of returning to Myanmar, where they are largely denied citizenship and other basic rights. The recent surge in violence is the worst the Rohingya have faced since the 2017 Myanmar military-led campaign, which the United Nations described as having genocidal intent. Rohingya who recently fled to Bangladesh have urged the government to provide them with shelter.

“How long can we stay with relatives in such a cramped space?” said a Rohingya refugee who fled to Bangladesh last month with his wife and parents. “We appeal to the government to provide us with shelter and ensure we receive food and other essential assistance.”

Last month, Hossain told Reuters Bangladesh cannot accept more Rohingya refugees and called on India and other countries to take greater action. He also urged the international community to apply more pressure on the Arakan Army to cease attacks on the Rohingya in Rakhine state.

Meanwhile, Myanmar’s embattled junta chief has warned civilians in territory recently captured by ethnic minority armed groups to prepare for military counterattacks, state media reported on Wednesday. The military has lost swaths of territory near the border with China in northern Shan state to an alliance of armed ethnic minority groups and “People’s Defense Forces” battling to overturn its 2021 coup. The groups have seized a regional military command and taken control of lucrative border trade crossings, prompting rare public criticism by military supporters of the junta’s top leadership.

Junta troops “will... launch counterattacks”, junta chief Min Aung Hlaing said on Tuesday in the Shan state capital Taunggyi, according to the Global New Light of Myanmar. He accused the alliance of using “administrative buildings and innocent civilians as human shields”, according to the newspaper. “Therefore, the people residing in towns and villages where the terrorists unlawfully occupied should be aware of security so as not to face exploitation.”

The junta is battling widespread armed opposition and its soldiers are accused of bloody rampages and using air and artillery strikes to punish civilian communities. It announced this week that the three main ethnic minority armed groups battling the military in Shan state had been officially declared “terrorist” organizations.

The declaration will not affect the fighting against the Arakan Army (AA), Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), however those found supporting or contacting them can now face legal action. The alliance and PDF groups have battled closer to the second city of Mandalay, home to around 1.5 million people and the military’s central command. Opponents of the military launched a rocket attack on Mandalay on Tuesday, damaging buildings and wounding one person, local media reported, in a rare attack on an urban area. — Agencies