Myanmar’s National Unity Government (NUG) now in exile and spearheading a revolt to unseat the military government has recently announced that it would take back all Rohingyas living in refugee camps in Bangladesh. It will draft a new constitution and pass laws to ensure citizenship and fundamental rights of all ethnic groups fighting the military run union government. It has also pledged to revoke the controversial 1982 law that has stripped Rohingyas of citizenship and national verification card, inviting them to join the shadow government. The promised new laws would give citizenship to all Rohingyas born in Myanmar or anywhere as children of Myanmar citizens.
It sounds unbelievable given the persecution of the Rohingyas by very people who acted hand in hand with the Myanmar military in driving them out of their ancestral homeland. The shadow National Unity government has been formed by ousted parliamentarians of the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi in early April about two months after the military take over. Ironically Suu Kyi had defended the military against charges of war crimes in the International Court of Justice. But it failed to save her. She is now facing trial on fabricated charges along with many of her party leaders. Myanmar people are now stirring a civil disobedience movement and an armed struggle to unseat the junta government but the NUG leaders are facing a question on Rohingya repatriation at every place they are courting to secure international recognition.
At a recent hearing in US Congress, a NUG representative failed to clearly answer whether it would repatriate Rohingyas which is now a big issue at the international level. It appears that such questions have unnerved the exiled leadership and may have worked to change their outlook on the Rohingya issue. The military junta had also pledged to take back all Rohingyas, now around 12 lakhs living at Cox’s Bazar refugee camps, immediately after the takeover but not much is being heard about it now. Making a pledge by the NUG will not convince people. To make its word reliable NUG would surely need to take more credible steps. We want to see repatriation and not using the persecuted people as pawns at national and international bargains.
