FM: Dhaka believes India, China can resolve Rohingya crisis

Repatriation with civil rights and dignity is the eventual solution to the Rohingya crisis, and India’s intensified engagement alongside Chinese mediation as regional powers is crucial to accomplish the complicated task, Foreign Minister Dr Hasan Mahmud said on Sunday.

“Repatriation is the only solution,” he told a seminar on the Rohingya crisis organized by Overseas Correspondents Association of Bangladesh (OCAB) coinciding with its 45th founding anniversary at the National Press Club, reports BSS.

The minister added: “Regional powers like India and China are vital... if we can ensure their enhanced engagement, we believe the crisis can be resolved.”

Hasan said creating facilities for Rohingyas' livelihood inside their camps or their meagre third-country relocation can do little to address the crisis, and these might appear “counterproductive,” stressing focused international and regional pressures for their repatriation.

Foreign ministry officials said only a few hundred Rohingyas were relocated to third countries, including Western nations, while Hasan said such symbolic relocation could send a wrong message to the Rohingyas, who might lose their hope to return to their homeland in Myanmar’s Rakhine State.

The minister said US Assistant Scretary of State Donald Lu during his recent visit gave some suggestions on handling the crisis “but I do not want to disclose them right now”.

Foreign affairs experts and senior journalists who cover the crisis also spoke on the occasion which also marked the revival of the forum of Dhaka-based journalists working for foreign media outlets.

Speaking as the chief guest, Hasan said the Myanmar authorities are willing to start the Rohingya repatriation process to minimize the global pressure being mounted on the country.

Depicting the long-standing Rohingya crisis, the foreign minister said the crisis started after World War Two and deepened after the partition of India in 1947.

After a 2017 military crackdown in Rakhine State, Hasan Mahmud said, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina opened the Bangladesh border for forcibly displaced Rohingyas and she allowed around 700,000 Rohingyas into Bangladesh.

“(Currently) I believe around 1.3 million Rohingyas are staying in the Rohingya camps in Cox’s Bazar,” he said.

The foreign minister said Bangladesh has taken the path of diplomacy to put pressure on Myanmar in repatriating its nationals, while the Gambia filed a case with the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Myanmar.

The Gambia has informed Bangladesh that the case is going in the right direction and a positive result will come soon to this end, he said.

“We hope that the verdict of the case will be delivered in favour of Bangladesh. Once the verdict is declared, more global pressure will be mounted on Myanmar,” he said, adding that when the Rohingya repatriation process was about to start, conflict worsened in Myanmar.

Nearly 700 members of Myanmar's Border Guard Police and soldiers have so far fled to Bangladesh amid intensifying fighting between junta troops and Arakan Army rebels in neighbouring Rakhine state, he said.

About global funding for Rohingyas, Hasan Mahmud said the funding declined last year. “But we hope that the funding for Rohingyas will increase this year due to our efforts. And this fund is spent in a transparent way,” he added.