At least 1.3 million children are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance across the Bay of Bengal region following severe weather over the past one week, UNICEF has warned.
Devastation wrought by Cyclone Mora in Myanmar and Bangladesh, and torrential monsoon rains across Sri Lanka have left children homeless and in need of protection, nutrition and health services.
UNICEF is particularly concerned about children and families who were already displaced and living in precarious conditions before the bad weather struck.
This includes some 74,000 Rohingya refugees who recently crossed into Bangladesh and were sheltering in an area badly affected by Cyclone Mora, and 120,000 displaced people in Myanmar’s Rakhine State.
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The destruction caused by the storms in each of the three countries has been brutal. Initial reports from Myanmar indicate severe damage from Cyclone Mora to villages, schools and shelters accommodating displaced people in Rakhine and Chin states.
While in Bangladesh, Cyclone Mora has affected around 2.8 million people in vulnerable coastal districts, in Sri Lanka, flash floods and landslides from monsoon rains have so far affected more than 631,000 people, displacing at least 77,000.
UNICEF and its partners are ramping up efforts to provide children and families from all communities devastated by the storms in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Myanmar with lifesaving services and support, regardless of their ethnicity, religion and citizenship status.
Photo courtesy: UNICEF
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