Myanmar’s junta has pledged to build 20 villages as part of a plan to repatriate thousands of Muslim Rohingya who fled a crackdown to neighboring Bangladesh, but members of the ethnic group say they don’t trust the regime and won’t accept the offer.
Bangladesh-based Rohingya who were taken to Myanmar’s Rakhine state Friday to see preparations for refugee repatriation said they wouldn’t return without citizenship rights, recognition of their Rohingya identity, and a guarantee that they could resettle in their home villages.
Bangladesh is moving full steam ahead with a China-backed project to begin repatriating Rohingya to Myanmar, a plan that Human Rights Watch warned would put the lives of the persecuted refugees at “grave risk.”
Nearly 130 Rohingya Muslims leaving Myanmar for Malaysia by boat were arrested by the junta’s navy in waters off Mon state on Sunday after brokers revealed information about them to local villagers.
Bangladesh inspectors are investigating the cause of a massive fire at a Cox’s Bazar camp that destroyed about 2,000 makeshift homes and left 12,000 homeless over the weekend, an official said Monday.
Malaysia has deported 114 Muslim Myanmar nationals who will be persecuted by the ruling military when they return, although they are not Rohingya, their lawyer said Thursday.
The United Nations World Food Program announced on Friday that it will cut food aid to Bangladesh’s Rohingya starting in March because of funding shortfalls and despite warnings from its own experts that malnutrition is pervasive in the refugee camps.
About 185 gaunt and bone-tired Rohingya refugees landed on the coast of Pidie regency in Indonesia’s Aceh province Monday, police said, as reports emerged that another boatload of Rohingya may have sunk at sea.
Dozens of “dehydrated and exhausted” Rohingya refugees – all males – landed on the coast of Aceh Besar regency in Indonesia on Christmas Sunday after being at sea for about a month, local officials said.
As many as 20 people have died aboard a boat stranded at sea for days north of Indonesia’s Aceh province and carrying scores of Rohingya refugees