Leda Camp is a makeshift camp for refugees who are not registered with the UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees). It is located just north of Teknaf, a port town near the southern tip of Bangladesh, across the Naf River from Rakhine State in Myanmar.
Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar originally settled in an area near here referred to as Tal (meaning "stack" or "gathering place" in Bengali) in 2001. After much pressure from international NGO's, Bangladeshi authorities eventually approved of the camp's relocation to its current site on government land. Islamic Relief, an international humanitarian aid organization, coordinated its construction and development in 2008, but soon thereafter ended its humanitarian efforts due to a lack of governmental support. Muslim Aid, another NGO that ran livelihood assistance projects and helped to provide security within the camp, also ceased its operations as the Bangladesh government continually refused to approve of their programs.
Today, there are close to 2,100 families that reside in Leda Camp, making up a total population of over 17,000 unregistered refugees. Here, as elsewhere, there are no educational systems in place for the Rohingya and finding employment is difficult and extremely risky. Most families rely on collecting and selling firewood. Others are able to find work in construction, on surrounding farms, or pulling rickshaws in nearby towns like Teknaf and Nhila. Children who are lucky enough have fake Bangladeshi papers in order to take classes in local public schools. Others rely on the generosity of teachers within the camp to receive basic lessons in the alleyways between their huts.