BANGKOK: The United Nations plans to slash food aid to Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, blaming a funding shortfall for cuts that agencies warned on Friday would deepen food insecurity and malnutrition in the world’s largest refugee settlement.

About 730,000 refugees, a persecuted mostly Mus­lim minority from Myanmar’s Rakhine state, fled to Bangladesh in 2017 to escape an army crackdown the UN said was carried out with genocidal intent. Including others who left in prior waves, nearly one million live in huts made of bamboo and plastic sheets.

The World Food Program (WFP) said it would reduce the value of its food assistance to $10 per person from $12 starting next month. Donor budgets have been stretched by the pandemic, economic downturn and crises across the globe.

The WFP appealed for $125 million in urgent funding, warning of “immense and long-lasting” repercussions on food security and nutrition in camps rife with malnutrition, where more than a third of children are stunted and underweight.

“That the international donor community is now turning its back on half a million Rohingya children and their families really shows the limits of its commitment to some of the most vulnerable people in the world,” Onno Van Man­en, director of Save the Children’s country in Bangl­adesh, said in a statement.

Two UN special rapporteurs, Michael Fakhri and Thomas Andrews, warned of the “devastating consequence” of the funding shortfall, saying it was “unconscionable” to cut rations just before Ram­azan, the UN human rights agency said.

Published in Dawn, February 18th, 2023