The issue of Rohingya refugees in Malaysia has taken a grim turn for this community, which numbers more than 150,000 people displaced from their homeland in Burma (now Myanmar) across Southeast Asia, and which is the world's largest displaced ethnic group.
Following this week's events, which began when tensions with local communities in northern Malaysia forced around a hundred Rohingya refugees to cross the country to the United Nations office in Kuala Lumpur, where, before they could meet with members of the organisation, they were detained and loaded onto lorries by the police. They were released two days later.
Now, a new report by Reuters states that the Malaysian Prime Minister has agreed with the Myanmar government to receive and resettle 5,000 Rohingya refugees from Malaysia, where they do not have refugee status but are classified as illegal immigrants.
This means that these 5,000 people (men, women, and children) will return to their homeland in Myanmar, from where they were forced to flee due to violent persecution on ethnic, religious, and xenophobic grounds. Myanmar is a predominantly Buddhist country, whilst the Rohingya are a Muslim ethnic group. In Malaysia (a predominantly Muslim country) they were relatively safe, but now all they can do is wait to see what Myanmar's military government will do with them.
Neither the United Nations nor the governments of these countries have issued any statements or provided further details regarding the resettlement process or the safety of these refugees.