As Rohingya Crisis Enters Its Ninth Year, Justice For All Calls on New UNGA President Khalilur Rahman to Prioritize Education, Accountability and Self-Reliance

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW YORK, June 5, 2026 – Following the election of Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister H.E. Khalilur Rahman as President of the 81st U.N. General Assembly, Justice For All calls on the incoming President to leverage his Rohingya experience to alter the international community’s failing response to that crisis. With 1.2 million refugees facing funding cuts and a third generation without schooling, President-elect Rahman must act decisively to break the “strategic limbo” trapping Rohingya in statelessness.

“President-elect Rahman is uniquely positioned to understand that trust cannot be restored while 500,000 children lack classrooms and families survive on rations smaller than a daily cup of coffee,” said Imam Malik Mujahid, President of Justice For All. “His Assembly theme, ‘Restoring Trust, Managing Transformation,’ will ring hollow if it does not deliver for the world’s most persecuted minority. We need concrete action, not diplomatic gestures.”

There is a $710.5 million funding gap for the 2026 Joint Response Plan, 26 percent lower than last year. The World Food Programme (WFP) rations have been cut to as low as $7 per person. The WFP’s tiered system assumes refugees can supplement meals despite being legally prohibited from employment. Over 500,000 Rohingya children have never attended proper school, a crisis disproportionately impacting girls. UNICEF’s 6,400 learning centers have largely closed after U.S. funding ended.

Justice For All thanks Finland for its €2 million pledge but warns the international response remains catastrophically underfunded. Vulnerable groups, especially women, children and the elderly, including 150,000 new arrivals since early 2024, face heightened risks daily.

Justice For All calls on President-elect Rahman to pursue six urgent actions: surge funding through border-based mechanisms bypassing the junta; establish safe corridors for aid delivery in Burma; secure immediate funding for camp operations and food aid; work with Bangladesh to lift camp employment restrictions to enable self-reliance; convene an emergency UNGA session on the education crisis; and demand ICC prosecution of genocide commanders.

The genocide continues today through ongoing atrocities, starvation in the camps, drownings in the Andaman Sea and a world that looks away. President-elect Rahman has the experience to change that. The question is whether the General Assembly will finally act.

Contact Information: Saffet Catovic, Director of U.N. Operations
Email: saffet@justiceforall.org.  Phone: 202-908-JUST
Website: https://www.justiceforall.org/burma-task-force/
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