DHAKA AGREES TO TWO-YEAR PLAN FOR RETURN OF ROHINGYA

But the displaced in Bangladesh, who were left out of the talks, remain sceptical about improved conditions

Bangladesh will set up transit camps to send Rohingyas to two centres in Myanmar

Bangladesh yesterday said that within two years it would have sent back many of the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims who fled from Myanmar to escape violence.

But the repatriation plan, which Myanmar said would begin on Tuesday, was greeted with scepticism from NGOs, which said it did not adequately address safety, livelihoods and permanent resettlement.

The neighbours met yesterday. The Bangladeshi foreign ministry said the return effort would treat families as units, with Myanmar providing temporary shelter for those returning before rebuilding houses for them.

Bangladesh would set up five transit camps to send Rohingyas to two reception centres on the Myanmar side of the border, the ministry said.

“Myanmar has reiterated its commitment to stop the outflow of Myanmar residents to Bangladesh,” it said.

Dhaka also called for repatriating orphans and “children born out of unwarranted incidence”, a reference to cases of rape resulting in pregnancy, the foreign ministry said.

The rape of Rohingya women by Myanmar’s security forces was widespread, say women at the displacement camps. The military denies it was involved in sexual assaults.

The crisis in Myanmar erupted after Rohingya insurgent attacks on security posts on August 25 in Rakhine state triggered a fierce military response that the UN denounced as ethnic cleansing. About 650,000 people fled the violence.

The Myanmar military said its security forces mounted only legitimate counter-insurgency clearance operations.

The meeting in Myanmar’s capital, Naypyidaw, was the first for a joint group set up to agree on the details of the November repatriation deal.

Ko Ko Naing, director general of the Myanmar ministry of social welfare’s relief and resettlement department, said Myanmar had signed the agreement with Bangladesh. Myanmar government spokesman Zaw Htay last week said that those returning could apply for citizenship “after they pass the verification process”.

Myint Kyaing, permanent secretary at the Myanmar ministry of labour, immigration and population, this month said that Myanmar would begin to process at least 150 people a day through each of the two camps by Tuesday.

Left out of the talks between Myanmar and Bangladesh were the fears of the refugees themselves, “as if they are an inert mass of people who will go where and when they are told”, said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

“Where are considerations for protection of the Rohingya from Myanmar security forces who months ago were raping and killing them?” Mr Robertson asked. “How come the talks ignore the deprivation of rights of people held in indefinite detention, which is what these so-called temporary accommodations may become?”

A group of refugees at the Kutupalong Rohingya camp had doubt about the two temporary settlement camps in Myanmar. Mohammad Farouk, 20, who fled to Bangladesh from Maungdaw after the August 25 attacks, said exchanging one camp for another made little difference, except “the camps in Myanmar will be worse, because we will be confined and there will be a risk to our lives”.

Another resident of the Kutupalong camp compared the new camps to ones set up near the Rakhine state capital of Sittwe after previous bouts of violence“where people are living like prisoners”.

“First, ask the military to give those Rohingya their homes and property back, then talk to us about returning,” he said.

Some said the type of violence they saw towards their community in Myanmar made it hard for them to trust the military.

“Even if I don’t get food or anything else here, at least there is safety. I won’t feel safe if I go back to Myanmar,” said Rashid Ahmed, 33.

Noor Alam, 37, who went to Kutupalong five months ago, said: “They don’t even call us Rohingya. Until they consider us citizens we won’t go back.”

Camp conditions in Bangladesh are dire, but more than 520,000 Rohingya children are at even greater risk before the cyclone season that generally begins in April, the UN children’s fund said yesterday.

“Hundreds of thousands of children are already living in horrific conditions and they will face an even greater risk of disease, flooding, landslides and further displacement,” said Edouard Beigbeder, Unicef representative in Bangladesh.

Nearly a million Rohingya live in Bangladesh, including those who came after earlier displacements.