WHO Cox’s Bazar: Rohingya emergency crisis - Situation Report: November 2023

Overview

Coordination and Leadership

As part of the WHO’s efforts to create a culture of accountability and address Sexual Misconduct, the Country Office conducted the mandatory Annual SEAH Risk Assessment. The assessment revealed the potential SEAH/SM risks arising from the gaps or weaknesses in the Country Office’s preparedness and capabilities. A mitigation action plan was devised to address these issues and improve SEAH/SM prevention in operations. This involves increasing community involvement in prevention and reporting and providing better mechanisms for supporting, reporting, and giving feedback to victims and survivors. The mitigation actions will be incorporated into PSEAH’s action plan for the next two years. The Risk Register will also be revised by the compliance team to include SEAH risks. 

The Country Office has produced and printed various IEC materials for PRS awareness. The IEC materials have been delivered by the vendors and the distribution plan for their dissemination at WCO and WSO is being finalized. These messages aim to inform and educate WHO staff and collaborators on the policy and procedures to prevent and address SEA by WHO or its partners. They also seek to enable the affected populations, such as refugees and the host communities, to report any concern or suspicion of SEA, and to access the available support services for survivors. 

Strategic operational planning: The PRS Monitoring, and Evaluation Framework has been designed to track the progress of PRS-related interventions. We collaborated with CXB PSEA Network Coordination members to develop the PSEA Network joint action plan 2024. This work plan will be submitted to the UN City Coordination meeting for its approval. It aims to establish a clear and consistent framework for the prevention and response of SEA in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. PSEA Capacity building: The WSO/Human Resource team participated in the PSEA Training with PSEA Network Coordination and INTERPOL Soteria, to enhance HR capacity on safe recruitment and cross-sector cooperation to avoid hiring SEA offenders across organizations.