UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said on Wednesday it was still not safe for Rohingya refugees to return to Myanmar, nearly five years after a crackdown sparked their mass exodus. in neighboring Bangladesh.
“Unfortunately, the current situation on the other side of the border means that conditions are not right for returns,” Bachelet told reporters in Dhaka.
Around 750,000 Rohingyas fled army abuses in Myanmar and sought asylum in neighboring Bangladesh in 2017, where more than 100,000 refugees from previous violence were already there.
The Rohingyas, mostly Muslims, survive, crammed into unsanitary camps sheltered by shacks made of tarpaulins, sheet metal and bamboo. They refuse to return to Myanmar, which is predominantly Buddhist, until they are granted citizenship rights.
“Repatriation should always be carried out in a voluntary and dignified manner, only when safe and sustainable conditions exist in Myanmar,” Bachelet added.
Myanmar has been ruled by a military junta since its civilian government was ousted last year.
“Anti-Rohingya rhetoric”
The presence of this huge refugee population is a burden for Bangladesh, which has asked Bachelet for help to repatriate the Rohingyas to Myanmar “as quickly as possible”.
Ms Bachelet said she was concerned about “the growing anti-Rohingya rhetoric” and that the community could be used as a “scapegoat”.
The day before, she recalled that the Rohingyas she had met during her visit to the Cox Bazar camps in southern Bangladesh were themselves eager to be able to return to Myanmar, but on condition that their citizenship rights be recognised.
The High Commissioner was also concerned to hear refugees complaining about community security conditions in the camps after a series of killings and rising crime. Dozens of murders, kidnappings and police raids targeting drug trafficking networks have taken place there.
Two leaders of the Rohingya community were recently shot dead in one of these camps. These killings are attributed to a group of Rohingya insurgents operating both in Rakhine State (western Myanmar) and in camps in Bangladesh.
Ms. Bachelet also urged the international community on Tuesday to continue supporting the Rohingyas despite increased international attention to more recent crisis situations.
“Serious allegations”
She added that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been hit hard by the Rohingya, with food prices soaring and the costs of supporting a population dependent on humanitarian aid rising.
“I therefore insist that the international community not abandon the Rohingyas, that it continue to support them and that it even examine the possibility of stepping up its aid, given the consequences of the war,” he said. she pleaded.
On Monday, she met with civil society groups in Bangladesh who raised serious concerns about human rights abuses in the country.
These include the hundreds of cases of enforced disappearances and thousands of extrajudicial killings allegedly committed by the security forces under the government of Sheikh Hasina, Prime Minister of Bangladesh.
“I have expressed my deep concern about these serious allegations to government ministers and have underlined the need for an impartial, independent and transparent investigation into these allegations,” Ms Bachelet told reporters.
In December, the United States imposed sanctions on an elite anti-terrorism and anti-crime group, the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), and seven senior security officials, including the national police chief, for gross violations of human rights.
Rights advocates say the situation has since improved, with extrajudicial executions and disappearances having all but stopped.
The government denies such allegations.