DHAKA: Bangladesh has agreed to complete the process of returning Rohingya Muslims to Myanmar within two years after repatriation begins, the south Asian nation said on Tuesday, following a meeting of the neighbors to implement a pact signed last year.
A statement by the Bangladesh foreign ministry did not say when the process would begin. But it said the return effort envisages “considering the family as a unit,” with Myanmar to provide temporary shelter for those returning before rebuilding houses for them.
The statement said Bangladesh would set up five transit camps, which would send Rohingyas to two reception centers on the Myanmar side of the border.
“Myanmar has reiterated its commitment to stop outflow of Myanmar residents to Bangladesh,” it said.
The meeting in Myanmar’s capital Naypyitaw was the first for a joint working group set up to hammer out the details of the November repatriation agreement.
The Myanmar government has not issued its own statement after the meeting and government spokesman Zaw Htay was not immediately available for comment.
Zaw Htay said earlier, however, that returnees would be able to apply for citizenship “after they pass the verification process.”
A Myanmar agency set up to oversee repatriation said in a statement last Thursday that two temporary “repatriation and assessment camps” and one other site to accommodate returnees had been set up.
Myint Kyaing, permanent secretary at Myanmar’s Ministry of Labour, Immigration and Population, said earlier this month Myanmar would be ready to begin processing least 150 people a day through each of the two camps by January 23.
The Rohingya crisis erupted after Rohingya insurgent attacks on security posts on August 25 in the western state of Rakhine triggered a fierce military response that the UN denounced as ethnic cleansing. Some 650,000 people fled the violence.
Myanmar denies ethnic cleansing, saying its security forces had mounted legitimate counter-insurgency clearance operations.
Bangladesh agrees with Myanmar to complete Rohingya return in two years
Bangladesh agrees with Myanmar to complete Rohingya return in two years
Bomb attacks on Thailand petrol stations injure 4: army
- Authorities did not announce any arrests or say who may be behind the attacks
BANGKOK: Assailants detonated bombs at nearly a dozen petrol stations in Thailand’s south early Sunday, injuring four people, the army said, the latest attacks in the insurgency-hit region.
A low-level conflict since 2004 has killed thousands of people as rebels in the Muslim-majority region bordering Malaysia battle for greater autonomy.
Several bombs exploded within a 40-minute period after midnight on Sunday, igniting 11 petrol stations across Thailand’s southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala, an army statement said.
Authorities did not announce any arrests or say who may be behind the attacks.
“It happened almost at the same time. A group of an unknown number of men came and detonated bombs which damaged fuel pumps,” Narathiwat Governor Boonchauy Homyamyen told local media, adding that one police officer was injured in the province.
A firefighter and two petrol station employees were injured in Pattani province, the army said.
All four were admitted to hospitals, none with serious injuries, a Thai army spokesman told AFP.
Thailand’s Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told reporters that security agencies believed the attacks were a “signal” timed with elections for local administrators taking place on Sunday, and “not aimed at insurgency.”
The army’s commander in the south, Narathip Phoynok, told reporters he ordered security measures raised to the “maximum level in all areas” including at road checkpoints and borders.
The nation’s deep south is culturally distinct from the rest of Buddhist-majority Thailand, which took control of the region more than a century ago.
The area is heavily policed by Thai security forces — the usual targets of insurgent attacks.
