Rohingya refugees, who are living in makeshift settlements in Bangladesh’s border town of Cox’s Bazar, said on Saturday that they should not be sent back if their safety and citizenship cannot be guaranteed.
“They will never agree to voluntary repatriation if they are not taken back to their villages and their land returned to them,” a Rohingya leader Mohammad Zubair told media at a camp about the prospects of returning to Myanmar.
He said Bangladesh and Myanmar signed a similar repatriation agreement in 1992, which led to the return of some 200,000 Rohingyas to Rakhine, but unresolved problems, including the issue of citizenship, continue to fester. “Unless we get citizenship in Myanmar, no way the Rohingya will this time return to Rakhine,” Zubair said.
The UN refugee agency yesterday echoed the concerns of the Rohingyas, saying all returns must include the “informed consent of refugees”.
The stateless Rohingyas have been systematically oppressed by Myanmar, which has stripped the minority of citizenship and severely restricts their movement, as well as their access to basic services.
A 1982 law prohibits Rohingya from becoming citizens of Myanmar.
According to the agreement, some 700,000 Rohingyas who have fled to Bangladesh since October 2016 will be considered for repatriation.
But that still leaves hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas-some of whom had fled Myanmar years or decades ago to Bangladesh.
“The repatriation of residents who crossed over to Bangladesh earlier will be considered separately on the conclusion of the present arrangement,” the newly signed deal said.
The new agreement has already drawn criticism at home, with the main opposition party saying “taking steps to repatriate Rohingyas without stopping repression and genocide in their homeland will be tantamount to pushing them to the hell”.
Abdul Jabbar, 65, former community chairman from Tung Bazar Village in Rakhine state, said the military started firing at us as we were fleeing our village when they started the attacks [in August]. My son was killed and two of my daughters were taken away by the military. I have five other children who made it to Bangladesh… I am educated. When I was younger, it was better for us. I was educated by a government teacher.
But education is not so easy for Rohingya any more. I did not get a job, despite being educated, because I was Rohingya. Rather, other non-Rohingya got the job, even though I was better educated.
I heard the news about the repatriation agreement from the radio. We don’t want the 1992 agreement. We want that no violence will happen to us, that people will get an education, that people will freely move and not have to bribe the military to get around. If we do not get more rights, I will die here in Bangladesh.
Nur Kamal, 18, a farmer from Maungdaw Township, said, “I came to the camp in the beginning of October. Our mosques and madrasas were closed by the government in 2012. The government has been pressuring us, and the situation got gradually more difficult. Our religious leaders (clerics) were jailed”.
If a Rohingya is well educated, he cannot get any job like Rakhine people. We cannot live freely. I’m extremely eager to go back to my homeland, but the first and main thing we need is citizenship. If we are not given citizenship, I would die rather than go back.
“We’re afraid this repatriation agreement will be the same as in 1992. We want a different agreement. In the 1992 agreement, you needed to show Myanmar identity papers to return. Most people don’t have Myanmar identification cards. I have one and my grandfather has one, but my father does not. Families will be separated,” said Nur Kamal.
He said, “I will also only go back if we can return to our land. We really miss our land in Myanmar; it is too crowded here in the camps. We are in hardship here. We don’t have fuel to cook food. First, we want citizenship status; that is our main demand. We want all people to be treated equally”.
