Volunteers lend a hand to clean Cox’s Bazar beach

Volunteers from different environmental organisations have started cleaning the waste that washed ashore on Cox's Bazar beach.

They started the work today with the help of the Cox's Bazar district administration and under the supervision of the local department of environment, reports our Cox's Bazar correspondent.

Moazzem Hossain, president of Save the Nature, said around 20 volunteers of the environmental organisation took part in the waste removal activities at Kalatoli and Dorianagar points of the sea beach.

Nazmul Huda, deputy director of the Department of Environment, Cox's Bazar, said the cleanup drive is being done under the supervision of the district administration and it will continue for the next two days.

The local administration has engaged a number of activists from different environmental and voluntary organizations for the sake of protecting the healthy environment of the beach, Nazmul said.

Talking to this correspondent, Kamal Hossain, deputy commissioner of Cox's Bazar, said a five-member committee headed by Mohammed Ashraful Afsar, additional deputy commissioner of the district, has been formed to look into where the waste came from.

The committee has already started its work while the district magistrate is overseeing the efforts regularly, the government official said, adding that the waste removal work will begin again on a large scale from tomorrow.

A huge amount of waste washed ashore along around five km stretch of Cox's Bazar sea beach -- from Dorianagar to Himchhari -- and has been there since Saturday night, raising concern among people.