Rights activists have expressed concerns about reports that Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are being coerced and offered cash incentives by the Bangladesh government to return to Myanmar. Bangladesh “must immediately suspend” the pilot repatriation project for Rohingya refugees to return to Myanmar, a senior U.N. expert said.

“In the past fortnight, [Bangladeshi] government officials threatened several members of our [Rohingya] community with violence if we do not return to Myanmar,” a Rohingya on Bay of Bengal Island Bhasan Char — who fears reprisal and does not want to be identified — told VOA.

In a news release issued June 8 by the office of the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, the special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, Tom Andrews, said reports have surfaced that Bangladeshi authorities are using “deceptive and coercive measures” to compel Rohingya refugees to return to Myanmar.

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“Conditions in Myanmar are anything but conducive for the safe, dignified, sustainable, and voluntary return of Rohingya refugees,” Andrews said in the statement.

“I implore Bangladesh to immediately suspend the repatriation pilot programme.”

Phil Robertson, Asia division deputy director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), noted that Bangladesh is “squeezing the Rohingya camp residents economically, abusing their rights, and making the refugees as miserable and desperate as possible” in the hope they will accept “Myanmar’s woefully unacceptable offer” for repatriation.

After two previous efforts to send the Rohingya back to Myanmar failed in 2018 and 2019, Myanmar and Bangladesh are making another effort to repatriate about 1,100 Rohingya refugees.
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