The government has now planned to start transferring the Rohingya to Bhasanchar Island by this November amid many donor bodies' reservations about the process.
"We're ready. Whenever the government directs us, we'll start the process," commissioner of Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commission Mahbub Talukder told the FE.
According to officials, several hundred Rohingya members who are now at refugee camps in Cox's Bazar have given consent to
get shifted to Bhasanchar.
In the first phase, around 5,000 refugees will be transported by ship, said an official of the disaster management ministry said.
However, foreign minister Dr AK Abdul Momen has recently told the FE that the government would not send any Rohingya to Bhasanchar by force.
Sources said a delay in their repatriation has mainly motivated the refugees to change their minds. They were primarily reluctant to move to Bhasanchar when the first attempt was made last year.
The refugees think repatriation has become uncertain for them, said a volunteer who works at camps.
"Since the camps are cramped and Bhasanchar is found to be a better place to live, they're now willing to move there," he told the FE.
On the other hand, the government has launched a campaign to encourage the refugees to go to Bhasanchar.
Video clips of the island projecting different facilities are being shown to Rohingya families through their community leaders, known as majhi.
Last week, several majhis spoke in favour of Rohingya relocation to Bhasanchar.
The Rohingya leaders made their opinions at a top-level meeting attended by representatives from both disaster management and relief, and home ministries.
It is said that top donors like the UN bodies have been opposing this move, citing that this would disrupt humanitarian activities for remoteness of the island.
Bhasanchar is a floating island under Hatiya sub-district in southeast Noakhali district of Bangladesh.
The government has a plan to move more than 100,000 Rohingya there to reduce pressure on the world's largest refugee settlement in Cox's Bazar.
More than 1.0 million Rohingya fled to Bangladesh to escape military atrocities in Myanmar in 2017.
Defending their plan, officials told the media that Bhasanchar is secure with embankments, and the homes and cyclone shelters are better than anything available to millions of Bangladeshis.
But donors say the government is yet to provide convincing assurances that the refugees will be safe there, and their freedom of movement and right to livelihood protected. Yanghee Lee, the United Nations special rapporteur on Myanmar, in a recent statement cast her doubt about the habitability of the island.
"A number of things that remain unknown to me even following my visit, chief among them being whether the island is truly habitable," she said.
Aid groups, concerned about refugee health and safety in Cox's Bazar, said isolating Rohingya to Bhasanchar, with likely limited access to education and health services, could be even more problematic.
But when Lee warned that an ill-planned relocation would have the "potential to create a new crisis," the government said resettling the Rohingya is an internal matter.
Many in the government also blamed non-governmental organisations for highlighting safety and sustainability concerns.
"Dumping a battered and traumatised people on Bhasanchar to face yet another threat to their survival is not a solution," a statement from the Human Rights Watch said.
"Bangladesh should terminate relocation plans unless or until independent experts determine that the island is suitable, and until the government ensures that refugees who consent to relocate there will be allowed freedom of movement on and off the island."
Last week, US State Department assistant secretary Alice Wells also urged Bangladesh not to shift Rohingya to Bhasanchar during a hearing of the foreign affairs subcommittee of the Congress.
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