Bangladesh's minister hopes for early repatriation of Rohingyas to Myanmar

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Bangladesh Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu has expressed hope that the repatriation of Rohingya refugees from his country to Myanmar will start "very soon".

Myanmar had in November last year agreed to take back tens of thousands of Rohingyas who fled to Bangladesh following a military crackdown. "There is an agreement between the Myanmar and Bangladesh governments. We hope the repatriation will start very soon. Although there is no time frame but those who have recently crossed over to Bangladesh, they have been scrutinised and Myanmar has agreed to take them back," Inu told reporters here last night. He lauded Bangladesh Prime minister Sheikh Hasina's leadership for the way it tackled the Rohingya crisis.

Any refugee crisis is a stress on the economy, but the Bangladesh government has passed the test, he said. Over 6,00,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Myanmar's violence-hit Rakhine state to neighbouring Bangladesh since August 2017 when the military intensified crackdown on their alleged militant outfits.

Asked about the updation of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam, Inu said there had been no incident of violence in bordering districts of Bangladesh which might have forced migration to India in the last 40 years.

"There has been no major incident of violence in the last 40 years that might have forced migration from bordering districts of Bangladesh to Assam or Tripura. Also, there are no family connections (relatives) in those areas," Inu said.

The NRC of 1951 is being updated in Assam under the supervision of the Supreme Court to identify original residents of the state in order to check illegal migration. On the issue of terrorism, Inu said Bangladesh had adopted a zero-tolerance policy towards terrorism and Dhaka would not allow its soil to be used for terror acts against any country.

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