Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – The children sitting cross-legged on the floor are a mix of ages but are all enrolled in one class out of necessity. Coming from Rohingya families, they are not allowed to access formal education and must rely upon the generosity of donors to support informal learning centres, such as the one they attend in a quiet neighbourhood in Kuala Lumpur. On one recent morning, they were busy learning the Quran, but lessons also cover a standard range of academic subjects.
They and their families are also not eligible to access the healthcare system, and their parents are not allowed to work and must rely on informal employment, such as at car washes, in restaurant kitchens and at courier services. Still, life for the estimated 125,000 Rohingya who now call Malaysia home is better than the lives they left behind in Myanmar. We are more safe than in Myanmar,” Riyadh told Al Jazeera.
However, on Tuesday, the Malaysian government began the repatriation of an initial group of nearly 1,500 Rohingya to Myanmar. The operation has drawn renewed attention to the plight of the Rohingya people, regarded as one of the world’s most persecuted minorities. The Muslim ethnic group is essentially stateless because they are not recognised as citizens by Myanmar.
The repatriation has been criticised by the United Nations and international rights groups given the longstanding persecution of the Rohingya in their home state of Rakhine in western Myanmar. In 2017, the Myanmar military launched a brutal crackdown, forcing more than 700,000 Rohingya to flee, mostly to neighbouring Bangladesh. The military campaign, which involved widespread destruction of Rohingya properties and the killing of thousands of people, is widely condemned as tantamount to a genocide.
A case of genocide brought by The Gambia is under way at the International Court of Justice at The Hague. The verdict is expected next month or in November. The Malaysian government insisted that all those returning are volunteers and their safety and wellbeing are guaranteed.
Critics of Kuala Lumpur’s policy said an ongoing civil war in Myanmar makes such guarantees meaningless. Myanmar descended into civil war after the military conducted a coup in 2021 and removed the democratically elected government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. Malaysia’s government, led by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, has pledged to return 5,000 Myanmar nationals in what many see as a reversal of the country’s longstanding policy of leniency towards the presence of the Rohingya.
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