By Dina Begum

The People’s Republic of Bangladesh has been sinking for as long as I can remember watching the BBC broadcasting yet another flood, cyclone and disaster in my country of birth. After a while you become desensitised to the women in cotton saris wading through chin-high water with a metal box or water carrier in hand, and the weeping old men who cry with their heads in their hands.

Now it’s 2010, and those images seem less distant as everyone from presidents to celebrities clamber in on plans to save the world from climate change. But as if losing your land to water wasn’t bad enough, it seems a barrier has now been put up to let Bangladeshis know they won’t find refuge in India, especially in times of ecological crisis.

The unintentional irony is not lost on me as networks like PBS and its perennially orange-faced anchormen and women present clips of yet more sinking people against a backdrop of floating straw rooftops. The reports feel caricatured, with atmospheric music and dramatic voiceovers that translate stories of the new homeless living on floating boats. The anchorwoman’s voice is cheerless as she states that Bangladesh has contributed next to nothing to be at the frontline of climate change.

This small country has now become an anecdotal party piece as it disintegrates under the burden of global warming.

I was unaware until recently of the wall that is being built by India on its border with Bangladesh. The 2,500 mile long construct, rivalling the Great Wall of China, seems more in keeping with human rights violations than national security, yet Bangladesh’s neighbour thinks nothing of letting its people drown.

Understandably no country wants a great influx of climate refugees to land on its doorstep, but at the same time decent people don’t want millions of human beings sinking underwater just because they have nowhere else to go.

Bangladesh’s vulnerability to climate change is widely accepted, and the country is offered up as an example of the damage that increased rainfall and rising sea levels can do. Cyclones are set to become much worse with climate change, affecting human health, agriculture and shelter. In the coming decades it is estimated that more than 25 million people will be affected by rising sea levels whilst their neighbouring country fences them off without a second thought. I can’t imagine anyone trying to seek shelter in India, not when the terrifying double-fenced structure of barbed wire stuffing, rising over 12 feet in height, threatens to shred them to pieces.

Of course building strong borders is necessary to ensure the safety of a country and its people, but what of building good relations between countries? It’s a sad fact that India, a country which helped Bangladesh during its war of liberation from Pakistan in 1971, has now decided to barricade itself from the potential responsibilities that come with being a so-called friendly neighbour.