DHAKA, Aug 2: Bangladesh has ordered three international charities to stop providing aid to Rohingya refugees who cross the border to flee persecution and violence in Myanmar, an official said on Thursday.

France’s Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and Action Against Hunger (ACF) as well as Britain's Muslim Aid UK have been told to suspend their services in Cox's Bazaar district bordering Myanmar, local administrator Joynul Bari said.

“The charities have been providing aid to tens of thousands of undocumented Rohingya refugees illegally. We asked them to stop all their projects in Cox's Bazaar following directive from the NGO (non-government organisation) Affairs Bureau,” Bari said.

Bari said the charities “were encouraging an influx of Rohingya refugees” from across the border in Myanmar's Rakhine state in the wake of recent sectarian violence that left at least 80 people dead.

The charities have provided health care, skills training, emergency food and drinking water to the refugees living in Cox's Bazaar since the early 1990s.

MSF runs a clinic near one of the Rohingya camps which provides services to 100,000 people.—AFP