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Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Rohingya refugees living in overcrowded refugee camps in Bangladesh must return to Myanmar after fleeing waves of violence, Bangladesh’s leader told a visiting UN official on Wednesday.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina made the comments to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Bachelet arrived on Sunday and toured the Rohingya refugee camp in the Cox’s Bazar area, near the Myanmar border.
“The Rohingya are Myanmar nationals and they must be brought back,” Hasina’s press secretary Ihsanul Karim was quoted as saying.
Muslim Rohingya face widespread discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, with most denied citizenship and many other rights. More than 700,000 people fled to Bangladesh starting in late August 2017, when the Myanmar military launched a “clearance operation” against them following an attack by a rebel group. The security situation in Myanmar has deteriorated after the military takeover last year.
Bangladesh currently hosts more than 1 million Rohingya refugees.
The refugees will mark the fifth anniversary of their most recent influx into Bangladesh following a failed attempt to send them home. Earlier this month, during a visit by Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Bangladesh sought Chinese cooperation to repatriate the Rohingya to Myanmar. China brokered a November 2017 agreement with Myanmar aimed at repatriating them.
Hasina and several cabinet ministers had earlier expressed dismay at what they said was Myanmar’s inaction under the deal. The United Nations and Bangladeshi authorities have made at least two attempts to start repatriation, but the refugees have refused to leave, citing security concerns in Myanmar.
When Bachelet visited the camp on Wednesday, refugees urged the United Nations to help improve security inside Myanmar so they could return.
The UN said in a statement that the refugees described “their grievance and suffering” to Bachelet.
“When our rights are respected, we can regain our livelihoods, we can own land, we can feel that we are part of this country,” it quoted the refugees as saying.
It said Bachelet stressed the importance of ensuring that safe and sustainable conditions exist and that any return must take place voluntarily and with dignity.
“The United Nations is doing everything we can to support them. We will continue to do so,” she said. “But we also need to deal with the deep roots of the problem. We need to deal with that and make sure they can return to Myanmar — when there are conditions for a safe and voluntary return.”
In March, the United States said the oppression of Myanmar’s Rohingya amounted to genocide, after authorities confirmed that the Myanmar military had committed mass atrocities against civilians in a broad and systematic campaign against the ethnic minority.
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