In Photos: Refugees Expand Camps Around Cox’s Bazar

Amir Khan, 63, has been in Bangladesh since August. He has set up a tailoring business in the Hakinpara camp, making and repairing clothes, with his daughter Umme Habib (pictured), who is 20. Habib was married at 15, and has a young daughter. Her husband died of an illness on the way to Bangladesh. He was buried without any rituals, she says. Khan says he makes about 400 takas a day through tailoring, which, with rations, means ‘we are surviving’. Khan was a tailor at home, but had to buy new sewing machines when he arrived in Cox’s Bazar. ‘We just left with what we were wearing’

Sultan Ahmed, 60, sells beans, onions, garlic and other vegetables from his stall in the camp. He buys the produce from shops near the camp’s perimeter to sell inside, earning between 200 and 400 takas a day. Ahmed fled Myanmar in October with his wife and three children. ‘I want to stay here,’ he says. ‘I have too much fear of Myanmar’s people, so I don’t want to go home.’ He fears he will be killed ‘like the others’ if he returns

Aid agencies are currently assessing how they can reduce the risk of landslides and tragedy before the rains and cyclones hit the camps. They have made a start by relocating and reinforcing their health facilities and feeding centres. They are also encouraging people to move their homes and are trying to recruit more volunteers. ‘It’s a race against time,’ says Nipin Gangadharan, country director of Action Against Hunger in Bangladesh