ROHINGYA REPATRIATION Myanmar to assure Rohingyas of safety on return

The Myanmar authorities have agreed on Friday to deepen their engagement with Rohingya communities in makeshift camps in Cox’s Bazar to convince them about the steps undertaken so far to receive the forcibly displaced people to Rakhine State.
The Myanmar side conveyed their readiness for sending teams to Rohingya camps in Cox’s Bazar soon for deeper engagement with the prospective returnees with a view to motivating them to go back to Rakhine State, a senior Bangladesh government official said over telephone from Nay Pyi Taw after a meeting of the joint working group of the two countries on Rohingya repatriation. 
In the meeting, Bangladesh highlighted the need for deeper engagement for building confidence of the displaced residents sheltered in Cox’s Bazar on Myanmar authorities, said the official, adding that the first attempt for repatriation failed on 15 November 2018 due to lack of trust of Rohingya people on the Myanmar authorities. 
Bangladesh laid stress on early start of physical repatriation and urged Myanmar to remove all barriers against commencement of repatriation. 
The Bangladesh side emphasised concrete steps for creating conducive environment in Rakhine State including removal of legal and administrative barriers to ensure basic rights of the returnees including freedom of movement, guaranteeing their safety and security, and positive steps towards a well-defined time-bound pathway to citizenship that would encourage the Myanmar residents to return voluntarily, according to a press release of the foreign ministry. 
Bangladesh also highlighted the need for allowing greater engagement of international community including ASEAN and other interested partners in improving ground situation in the Rakhine state and proposed appropriate mechanism for coordination of actions among those actors to create greater confidence. 
Bangladesh also emphasised the need for sharing verifiable information on ground situation in Rakhine so that prospective returnees can take informed decision. 
Both sides agreed to speed up verification process. 
Referring to dispute on eligibility of more than two thousand prospective returnees from the first batch of verification, Bangladesh proposed to host the first meeting of the dispute settlement mechanism soon, to which Myanmar agreed. 
It was the fourth meeting of the Joint Working Group, on the Repatriation of displaced Myanmar residents.
Foreign ministry secretary for Asian affairs Mahbub Uz-Zaman lead the 15-member Bangladesh delegation while Myanmar delegation was led by foreign ministry permanent secretary Myint Thu.
The Myanmar side cleared about over 7,000 Rohingyas from two lists of about 30,500 provided by Bangladesh since February 2018. 
More than 7,00,000 Rohingyas, mostly women, children and aged people, entered Bangladesh fleeing unbridled murder, arson and rape during ‘security operations’ by Myanmar military in Rakhine, what the United Nations denounced as ethnic cleansing and genocide, beginning from August 25, 2017.
The ongoing Rohingya influx took the number of undocumented Myanmar nationals and registered refugees in Bangladesh to about 11,16,000, according to estimates by UN agencies and Bangladesh foreign ministry.
 

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net