Dhaka on Thursday called Naypyidaw for early repatriation of all Rohingya Muslims who crossed the border into Bangladesh, including those who entered after recent persecutions of the minority group in neighbouring Myanmar, dpa reported. "Bangladesh is ready to engage with Myanmar to discuss process and modalities of repatriation," Kamrul Ahsan, a senior official at Bangladesh Foreign Ministry, said after a meeting with Myo Myint Than, Myanmar envoy to Bangladesh. Ahsan termed the Rohingya Muslims as "Myanmar citizens" and asked Naypyidaw to urgently address the "root cause" of the problem in the Rakhine state so that the minority Muslims did not need to take shelter across the border. Nearly 50,000 Rohingya Muslims took shelter in Bangladesh after Myanmar launched sweeps in the Rakhine state in October, he said. A foreign ministry statement said more than 300,000 "Myanmar nationals" had been staying in Bangladesh for years. Nearly 29,000 Rohingya documented as refugees have been living in two squalid camps in the Bangladeshi border district of Cox's Bazar, ever since the 1990s, when they were driven out of Myanmar. The others are living as undocumented refugees.
