In the past two weeks, 623 families living in flood-prone areas of Kutupalong were relocated to safer parts of the settlement. UNHCR is working closely with the government and other partners to prepare for the upcoming monsoon season.

Nobel Peace laureates Mairead Maguire of Northern Ireland, Tawakkol Karman of Yemen, and Iran’s Shireen Ebadi visited refugee settlements in Bangladesh to raise awareness about the plight of Rohingya refugees. The laureates’ visit took place as part of the Nobel Women’s Initiative.

UNHCR and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) launched a project to prevent dangerous encounters with elephants, which have resulted in at least 10 deaths in Kutupalong settlement. The highly congested site lies on one of the migratory routes for Asian elephants.

UNHCR teams continue to conduct protection monitoring and to identify protection incidents in settlements, facilitated by the use of complaint boxes and a hotline service that is open seven days a week. This week, UNHCR received almost 40 calls through the hotline, related to issues of family disputes, medical assistance, and violence. A tracking incidents system has been established and since the launch of the hotline on 3 January and 20 January, some 63 calls were referred to the appropriate services.