Reuters, Yangon :
Myanmar officials visited camps for Rohingya Muslim refugees in Bangladesh on Wednesday in an effort to kickstart a process to repatriate hundreds of thousands who fled an army crackdown last year.
More than 700,000 Rohingya refugees crossed into Bangladesh from western Myanmar, U.N. agencies say, after Rohingya insurgent attacks on Myanmar security forces in August 2017 triggered a sweeping military response.
Officials said after meetings in Dhaka on Tuesday returns would begin next month, but the U.N. refugee agency said conditions in Rakhine state were “not yet conducive for returns”.
The agency had completed the second phase of assessment in Rakhine, but its access remained “limited”, UNHCR spokesman Andrej Mahecic said in Geneva on Wednesday.
Rohingya and other Muslims in three townships suffer hardship and economic vulnerability due to restrictions on their movement and the prevailing sentiment is “fear and mistrust”, he said.
A group of about 60 Rohingya community leaders met a delegation of about a dozen Myanmar officials in the Kutupalong camp, the largest refugee settlement in the world in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazaar district, said two Rohingya men who were present.
Myanmar says it has been ready to accept back the refugees since January, and has built camps near the border to receive them.
Myint Thu, permanent secretary at Myanmar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and leader of the Myanmar delegation, said Myanmar had verified about 5,000 names of refugees and that repatriation would begin with a first batch of 2,000 returnees in mid-November.
“We are here to meet with the people from the camps so that I can explain what we have prepared for their return and then I can listen to their voices,” he told reporters in Cox’s Bazaar.
Bangladesh handed over an additional list of more than 22,000 Rohingya refugees to be verified by Myanmar, Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Abul Kalam told Reuters.
Rohingya leaders said after Wednesday’s meeting that they were unconvinced about the proposed repatriation.
Myanmar officials visited camps for Rohingya Muslim refugees in Bangladesh on Wednesday in an effort to kickstart a process to repatriate hundreds of thousands who fled an army crackdown last year.
More than 700,000 Rohingya refugees crossed into Bangladesh from western Myanmar, U.N. agencies say, after Rohingya insurgent attacks on Myanmar security forces in August 2017 triggered a sweeping military response.
Officials said after meetings in Dhaka on Tuesday returns would begin next month, but the U.N. refugee agency said conditions in Rakhine state were “not yet conducive for returns”.
The agency had completed the second phase of assessment in Rakhine, but its access remained “limited”, UNHCR spokesman Andrej Mahecic said in Geneva on Wednesday.
Rohingya and other Muslims in three townships suffer hardship and economic vulnerability due to restrictions on their movement and the prevailing sentiment is “fear and mistrust”, he said.
A group of about 60 Rohingya community leaders met a delegation of about a dozen Myanmar officials in the Kutupalong camp, the largest refugee settlement in the world in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazaar district, said two Rohingya men who were present.
Myanmar says it has been ready to accept back the refugees since January, and has built camps near the border to receive them.
Myint Thu, permanent secretary at Myanmar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and leader of the Myanmar delegation, said Myanmar had verified about 5,000 names of refugees and that repatriation would begin with a first batch of 2,000 returnees in mid-November.
“We are here to meet with the people from the camps so that I can explain what we have prepared for their return and then I can listen to their voices,” he told reporters in Cox’s Bazaar.
Bangladesh handed over an additional list of more than 22,000 Rohingya refugees to be verified by Myanmar, Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Abul Kalam told Reuters.
Rohingya leaders said after Wednesday’s meeting that they were unconvinced about the proposed repatriation.
