Qatari Businessman Donates Over $35Mln To Assist Rohingya, Yemeni Refugees - UNHCR

UNITED NATIONS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 17th April, 2019) The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) received more than $35 million in a landmark individual contribution to support Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and internally displaced persons in Yemen, the UNHCR said in a press release.

"UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, announced today a major individual contribution of more than $35 million from Qatari businessperson Sheikh Thani Bin Abdullah Bin Thani Al-Thani for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and displaced Yemenis," the release said on Tuesday.

The contribution, which represents the largest individual donation made to the UNHCR, will be split into two parts: around 300,000 Yemeni displaced persons and the host communities will receive over $13 million in cash assistance, while more than $22 million will support an estimated 450,000 Rohingya refugees in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.

The announcement came a day after UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock said that the Yemen response plan had received only about 10 percent of the $2.6 billion funding pledged by donors for 2019.

Yemen has been suffering from a conflict between forces loyal to President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and the Shiite Houthi movement which escalated after a Saudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 to back the Yemeni government. The conflict has resulted in a massive humanitarian crisis that the United Nations has deemed the worst in the world.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas, a Muslim minority in Myanmar, have fled their homes to avoid violence following the government's deployment of police and military units in Rakhine state. The government's operation was launched in response to an attack by Rohingya insurgents on security posts on August 25, 2017. According to the International Organization for Migration, nearly 700,000 Rohingyas left the country for neighboring Bangladesh within a year after the tensions began, fearing possible persecution.