Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will seek global support at the United Nations to cope with the influx of refugees fleeing from Myanmar to Dhaka, AFP reported. Hasina on Saturday left for New York, where she will speak at the UN General Assembly. She is expected to address the Assembly on Thursday.

Hasina will “seek immediate cessation of violence in Rakhine state in Myanmar and ask the UN secretary general to send a fact-finding commission to Rakhine,” Nazrul Islam, spokesperson for the prime minister told AFP. “She will also call on the international community and the UN to put pressure on Myanmar for the repatriation of all the Rohingya refugees to their homeland in Myanmar.”

The UN on Saturday said a total of 4,09,000 Rohingya Muslims had entered Bangladesh since violence erupted in Rakhine state on August 25. The influx has overwhelmed Bangladesh’s border town Cox’s Bazar where 3,00,000 people had already taken shelter at camps.

On September 13, the Myanmar government had said that its de-facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi will not attend the UN General Assembly this month. The decision followed the global criticism Suu Kyi faced over her handling of the Rohingya Muslims crisis.

The Rohingya crisis

Rohingyas have been denied citizenship in Myanmar, and are classified as illegal immigrants, despite them claiming roots going back centuries in the country. The community has been subjected to violence by the Buddhist majority and the Army in Myanmar. The country’s de-facto leader and Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi has been criticised for failing to stand up for more than 10 lakh stateless Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine.