Sheikh Hasina appeals for help in talking to Myanmar for taking Rohingya refugees back

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Friday said there should be pressure on Myanmar to take back the Rohingya refugees. Bangladesh had accepted the Rohingyas in the country as a humanitarian gesture, but now Myanmar must arrange to take them back, Hasina said.

“I request you to help us interact with Myanmar to take the Rohingyas back,” she said in Shantiniketan today in the presence of India Prime Minister Narendra Modi and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee at the inauguration of Banga Bhawan.

The three leaders are in West Bengal’s Shantiniketan for the inauguration of Banga Bhawan, a library and museum of the Bangladesh War of Liberation. They also attended the convocation ceremony of Viswa Bharati University.

There are 11 lakh Rohingya refugees in various camps of Bangladesh, who had to flee from Myanmar to escape violence and brutality. Hasina said Bangladesh had to offer them shelter because they were oppressed and forced to flee, but the country could not continue to do so.

A number of Rohingyas have also taken shelter in West Bengal, and the Central government in New Delhi is not particularly happy about it. The Central government in September 2017 said in an affidavit before the Supreme Court that the presence of the Rohingya people in India posed a “national security threat”. There were approximately 40,000 Rohingyas in India around that time.