World’s biggest refugee camps ranked: Bangladesh prepares to host 800,000 Rohingya as crisis deepens

Bangladesh has announced plans to build a refugee camp that could accommodate around 800,000 Rohingya Muslims pouring over the border from Myanmar.

The camp would be the largest in the world and has raised concerns about the risks of concentrating vulnerable people, such as the spread of disease.

Around 550,000 Rohingya have fled communal bloodshed in Myanmar since the latest violence began in August 25.

While some have joined the roughly 33,000 fellow Rohingya living in the official camps of Kutupalong and Nayapara since the 1990s, most have set up alongside hundreds of thousands more already living in makeshift camps and villages outside those settlements.

The UN’s refugee agency estimates there are an unprecedented 65.5 million refugees in the world today, split between urban centres or informal settlements, and more formal camps.

Here are some of the largest of these camps, based on UN figures.