YANGON • Myanmar officials on Sunday said the country is ready to receive more than 2,000 Rohingya Muslims sheltering in Bangladesh on Thursday, the first group from 5,000 people to be moved under a deal struck between the neighbours last month.
But more than 20 individuals on a list of potential returnees submitted by Bangladesh have told Reuters they will refuse to go back to northern Rakhine state from where they fled. Bangladesh has said it will not force anyone to do so.
The United Nations also says conditions are not yet safe for their return, in part because Myanmar Buddhists have been protesting against the repatriation.
The UN's refugee agency said late on Sunday that Rohingya refugees should be allowed to go and see the conditions in Myanmar before they decide to go back.
"It depends on the other country, whether this will actually happen or not," said Mr Win Myat Aye, Myanmar's Minister for Social Welfare and Resettlement, referring to Bangladesh. "But we must be ready from our side. We have done that."
Mr Abul Kalam, Bangladesh Relief and Repatriation Commissioner, said he was hopeful the process could begin on Thursday, adding: "The return will be voluntary. Nobody will be forced."
The countries have agreed on mid-November for the start of repatriating some of the more than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims who fled a sweeping army crackdown in Myanmar last year.
The Rohingya say soldiers and local Buddhists massacred families, burned hundreds of villages, and carried out gang rapes. UN-mandated investigators have accused the army of "genocidal intent".
Myanmar denies almost all of the allegation, saying security forces were battling terrorists. Attacks by insurgents calling themselves the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army preceded the crackdown.
Myanmar does acknowledge the killing of 10 Rohingya by security forces in Inn Dinn village. Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo were sentenced to seven years in prison earlier this year for allegedly breaking the country's Official Secrets Act after reporting on the massacre.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has called for Myanmar to allow Rohingya refugees to visit their places of origin or resettlement sites to make their own "independent assessment".
Returnees would only be allowed to travel within Maungdaw township, one of the three they fled, and only if they accepted National Verification Cards, an identity document.
REUTERS
