Myanmar agrees to repatriate 300,000 Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh

Myanmar has agreed to repatriate 300,000 Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh and 5,000 from Malaysia, according to an announcement attributed to Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.

The source did not specify when the agreement was reached or when the returns would begin. It was also unclear whether Anwar personally confirmed both repatriation figures.

More than 126,000 Rohingya refugees registered with the United Nations refugee agency live in Malaysia. Malaysian authorities recently detained more than 100 Rohingya outside the agency’s Kuala Lumpur office but released them after confirming they held valid registration documents.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled Myanmar during a 2017 military operation that is now the subject of a genocide case before the International Court of Justice.

Human rights organizations have questioned whether repatriation can succeed without guarantees protecting the refugees’ safety and rights in Myanmar.

About 1.1 million Rohingya fled Myanmar for Bangladesh following genocidal persecution by their own government.