LARGEST REFUGEE GROUP
Malaysia hosts more than 215,000 refugees and asylum seekers registered with the United Nations refugee agency, including more than 126,000 Rohingya from Myanmar – its largest refugee community.
The UN and rights groups have raised concerns about the repatriations, with monitors fearing any Rohingya could face a new wave of abuses in Myanmar, where they are denied full citizenship.
Rights advocates view Min Aung Hlaing as the primary architect of the 2017 crackdown, which is being weighed by the International Court of Justice as potential genocide.
Myanmar this month pledged „safe and dignified“ returns for its citizens displaced abroad.
Myanmar is also riven by violence, with 50 killed last week in a military airstrike on a marketplace in western Rakhine state.
„This is no time to return anyone forcibly to a country plagued by egregious human rights violations and abuses,“ UN rights chief Volker Turk last week.
Min Aung Hlaing ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, plunging Myanmar into a civil war that has killed more than 100,000 people, according to monitor ACLED.
Since elections that were widely dismissed as a charade, Min Aung Hlaing became civilian leader and launched a drive for regional recognition.
Malaysia will be the fifth nation of the 11-member ASEAN bloc – following Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia – to welcome him since taking up the presidency.
He has also visited China – which previously backed him behind the scenes, according to analysts – as well as India and Russia.