GENEVA: The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) urged Malaysia on Tuesday to stop deporting refugees back to Myanmar, saying it had received reports of hundreds of such cases over the past two months.

The deportations, which included former navy officers seeking asylum, expose those sent away to danger and are a violation of the international law on non-refoulement, according to UNHCR, referring to a law that protects refugees or asylum seekers from being deported.

“In the last two months alone, hundreds of Myanmar nationals are reported to have been sent back against their will by the authorities,” UNHCR spokesperson Shabia Mantoo told a Geneva press briefing.

“People cannot be returned to places where they face threats to their life and liberty and face harm and danger.”

UNHCR, the UN’s refugee agency, said it had received “multiple disturbing reports” of refoulement — the forcible return of refugees and asylum seekers — since April.

The latest incident involving an asylum seeker being sent back to conflict-torn Myanmar occurred on Oct 21, Mantoo added, despite intervention by the UNHCR with authorities.

She had no further information on what happened to the deportees upon arrival.

Myanmar’s junta spokesman and Malaysia’s home and foreign ministries did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Myanmar’s embassy in Malaysia previously said in a post on Facebook that 150 Myanmar nationals were deported by plane on Oct 6 in cooperation with Malaysian immigration authorities. It did not mention that the group included former navy officers.

Myanmar has been gripped by fighting since the army overthrew an elected government early last year. Resistance movements, some armed, have emerged across the country, which the military has countered with lethal force.

The junta has arrested thousands of people, including Nobel laureate and deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, along with many bureaucrats, students, journalists and others in an attempt to smother dissent.

So far, more than 150,000 refugees and asylum seekers, including many ethnic Rohingya Muslims, have fled to neighbouring Malaysia.

In the last two months, hundreds of Myanmar nationals are reported to have been sent back against their will by the authorities, UNHCR said.

“UNHCR continues to call on Malaysia to immediately stop the forced returns of Myanmar nationals seeking safety from serious harm. Sending them back to Myanmar exposes them to harm and danger,” the spokeswoman said.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since a military coup last year, with swathes of the southeast Asian nation engulfed by fighting.

More than 2,300 people have been killed in the military’s crackdown on dissent since the coup, which rights groups say includes razing villages, mass extrajudicial killings and air strikes on civilians. The junta blames anti-coup fighters for the deaths of almost 3,900 civilians.

“The situation in Myanmar is forcing people to flee to seek safety within the country and across borders. UNHCR appeals to the Malaysian authorities to abide by their international legal obligations and ensure the full respect for the rights of people in need of international protection,” said Mantoo.

“We reiterate our call on states in the region to continue offering protection to Myanmar nationals fleeing for safety. This also includes ending the practice of indefinite detention of asylum-seekers and refugees from Myanmar.”

Published in Dawn, October 26th, 2022