Turkey brings hope to Rohingya, says WFP director

"Turkey has stepped up; we need more countries to step up," a UN figure with first-hand experience of the Rohingya crisis has told Anadolu Agency.

Speaking in an interview in Rome this week, World Food Programme Executive Director David Beasley said Turkey brought "some hope" as well as food and support to Rohingya Muslims facing persecution in Myanmar.

Beasley described the situation in Myanmar as "one of the worst disasters in the world" saying the refugees had fled a "brutal massacre".

About 582,000 people have crossed from Myanmar's western state of Rakhine into Bangladesh since Aug. 25 after security forces launched a crackdown in which, according to Rohingya groups, around 400 people were killed.

The Turkish authorities launched aid campaigns in coordination with the Bangladesh government in the border area where vulnerable people are seeking refuge.

Beasley said he had observed first-hand how Turkey put in significant work to return Rohingya lives to normal while visiting refugee camps last month.

He also praised First Lady Emine Erdoğan for visiting the region and giving hope to refugees.

On Sept. 7, Emine Erdoğan, wife of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, visited Rohingya camps in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar district near Myanmar's border, distributing humanitarian aid to refugees and listening to their testimony.

The UN has documented mass gang rapes, killings -- including those of infants and young children -- brutal beatings, and disappearances committed by Myanmar's security personnel. In a report, UN investigators said such violations may have constituted crimes against humanity.

It is "the largest and speediest" movement of a civilian population in Asia since the 1970s, the UN has also said.

On Friday, a UN human rights spokesman told Anadolu Agency Rohingya Muslim refugees wanted to see a peacekeeping force protecting them.

Rupert Colville said there was "an obvious need for the international community, whether it is the UN Security Council, an individual state or so on, to absolutely find a way out of this situation, and the only possible solution is that the Rohingya are allowed to go back home".

He also said there should be a political and security response to violence in Myanmar: "In order to be safe, Rohingya refugees would like to see a peacekeeping operation."