Tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are demanding to be repatriated to Myanmar so they can leave the squalid camps they have been living in since fleeing a brutal military crackdown in their homeland in 2017.
More than a million Rohingya are crammed into camps in southeastern Bangladesh, the world’s largest refugee camp. Most fled the crackdown by the Myanmar army nearly six years ago, although some have been there longer.
On June 1, the World Food Program cut the monthly food allotment from $10 earlier to $8 per person. By March, the ration cut had been reduced from $12 to $10 due to a reduction in global aid to the refugees.
During Thursday’s demonstrations in the sprawling camps, the mostly Muslim refugees, young and old, waved placards and chanted slogans.
“No more refugee life. No verification. No control. No maintenance. We want a speedy repatriation through the UNHCR data card. We want to return to our motherland,” the signs read.
‘Let’s go back to Myanmar. Don’t try to stop the repatriation,’ the others said.
‘We will go crazy’
Mohammed Rezuwan Khan, a protester, told Anadolu Agency that if things went downhill, they would have no choice but to “steal food to survive”.
“The lives of Rohingyas are mired in a quagmire. Sometimes I feel like we’re going crazy,” he said.
Muhammad Ayaz, 35, who lives in the Teknaf refugee camp, told Anadolu: “We are citizens of Myanmar. We urge the global community to heed our call to return home after repatriation with proper civil rights and protection in Myanmar.”
He said the cuts in food aid by the UN have driven them to starvation. Women and children are the worst victims of the ration cut, he added.
About 1 million Rohingya refugees in refugee camps in Bangladesh are experiencing extreme weather conditions due to the climate crisis.
“Unlike other coastal areas in Bangladesh, the camps don’t have proper shelters,” said one scientist @AJEnglish #CycloneMocha killed nearly 150 in May, 91 of them in camps. pic.twitter.com/7Ya88BfBnv
— AJ+ (@ajplus) June 6, 2023
During a four-day visit to the refugee camps last week, Kelly T Clements, UN Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees, said the refugees depend entirely on humanitarian aid for their basic needs. However, the minimum funding for this aid is no longer available, she said.
Humanitarian organizations have this year appealed for more than $876 million to support the Rohingya in Bangladesh. As of June 2023, the joint response plan to support them was only 24 percent funded.
“What future do we have here?”
Mohammad Jashim, leader of the Rohingya community, said he would like to return to Myanmar but want his citizenship rights guaranteed.
“We are the citizens of Myanmar by birth. We want to return home with all our rights, including citizenship, free movement, livelihoods, safety and security,” he told Reuters news agency, saying the refugees hoped for UN help in this regard.
Myanmar’s military had until recently shown little inclination to take back Rohingya, who for years have been viewed as foreign invaders in Myanmar and have been denied citizenship and subjected to abuse.
Attempts to begin repatriation in 2018 and 2019 failed as the refugees refused to go back for fear of persecution.
A group of 20 Rohingya told Reuters they would not return to Myanmar to be “locked up in camps” after visiting their homeland as part of a pilot project to encourage voluntary repatriation.
A Bangladesh official said the pilot project envisaged about 1,100 refugees to return to Myanmar, but no date had been set.
Densely populated Bangladesh says repatriation of refugees to Myanmar is the only solution to the crisis.
Tom Andrews, UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar, said on Thursday Bangladesh should immediately suspend the pilot repatriation project for Rohingya to return to Myanmar, where they face grave risks to their lives.
Meanwhile, rising crime, harsh living conditions and bleak prospects for returning to Myanmar are driving more Rohingya to leave Bangladesh by boat for countries like Malaysia and Indonesia, risking their lives.
UN data shows that 348 Rohingya died at sea last year.
Local communities in Bangladesh are also increasingly hostile to the Rohingya as funding from international relief agencies for the refugees has declined.
“Our situation is only getting worse. What future do we have here?” refugee Mohammed Taher asked, standing with other demonstrators.