KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- Malaysia has begun documenting and screening thousands of detained Myanmar nationals as part of a repatriation program agreed upon with Myanmar, according to Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution.
Saifuddin stated on Thursday that Myanmar has committed to accepting up to 5,000 of its citizens currently residing in Malaysia and an additional, unspecified number from Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. Malaysia has identified approximately 4,000 Myanmar nationals across its 19 detention depots, who will be consolidated at a single site for security screening and documentation. "We will certainly meet the target of 5,000 individuals once this process is complete," Saifuddin told reporters. The foreign ministry is expected to manage the subsequent stages of the repatriation process with Myanmar.
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim indicated on Wednesday that those slated for repatriation were Rohingya refugees. He was cited by the New Straits Times as saying, "People ask why we do not simply send them back. Send them where? Myanmar had refused to accept them before. Now, because of our good relations with Myanmar, they have agreed to take back 5,000 from Malaysia."
However, Saifuddin did not explicitly identify the 5,000 individuals as Rohingya, clarifying that only Myanmar nationals with refugee status were being repatriated. Officials from the foreign ministry were not immediately available for comment.
In Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, a commissioner for refugee, relief and repatriation, stated he was unaware of any repatriation of Rohingya from Bangladesh. Similarly, officials in Naypyitaw, Myanmar's capital, rejected reports that the government would accept Rohingya.
Han Win Aung, director-general of the ASEAN department at Myanmar's Foreign Affairs Ministry, explained that the repatriation program is exclusively focused on verified Myanmar nationals currently held in Malaysian detention centers. Myanmar does not recognize the Rohingya as one of its ethnic minorities, referring to them as "Bengalis" to suggest they are from Bangladesh and are residing in Myanmar illegally.
"This is not about bringing back Bengalis. There are Myanmar nationals who are being held in detention centers in Malaysia for various reasons," Han Win Aung told The Associated Press. "Both sides are still at the stage of coordinating to repatriate only those whose identity as genuine Myanmar citizens has been verified."
He added that the plan follows earlier repatriation operations in 2021 and 2022, during which Myanmar received over 1,100 of its citizens stranded in Malaysia. The exact number of people to be repatriated and the timeline for their transfer remain under discussion.
Malaysia is currently home to approximately 215,600 refugees and asylum seekers registered with the U.N. refugee agency. This population includes about 126,000 Rohingya, constituting one of Southeast Asia's largest refugee communities. Despite this, Malaysia is not a signatory to the U.N. Refugee Convention and classifies refugees as undocumented migrants.