Portland refugee reflects on 8-year anniversary of Rohingya genocide, new life in US

Eight years ago, the military in Myanmar launched a weekslong campaign of genocide against the Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim ethnic minority. Investigators from the United Nations documented the scale of the “extreme violence” they found: the killing of thousands of civilians; mass rapes of “hundreds, possibly thousands” of women and girls; nearly 400 villages burned to the ground. More than 700,000 Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh where they live in squalid conditions in the world’s largest refugee camp.  

Nurul Haque was born and raised in that refugee camp. About a decade ago, he started the Bangladesh Rohingya Student Union, an organization that helps expand educational and leadership opportunities for youth in the camp and advocates to stop child labor and human trafficking by criminal gangs. After being kidnapped, beaten and threatened with death by armed gang members, Haque successfully applied for refugee status in the U.S. for himself, his wife and young son. In December 2023, he and his family arrived in Portland, which he chose for resettlement because a relative lived there.  

Haque joins us to share what his life is like today and his continued advocacy for Rohingya communities here and abroad.