Rohingya delegation to visit Rakhine on first-ever assessment trip on May 5

A 20-member group of Rohingya refugees will visit Rakhine State of Myanmar on May 5 to see the situation there ahead of the possible repatriation of the first batch of Rohingyas before monsoon this year.

"We have been making such proposals for long. This time, Myanmar side has agreed," a foreign ministry official told The Daily Star today.

This is the first time any Rohingya delegation would go to Rakhine to assess the situation there.

In mid-March, a Myanmar delegation visited Teknaf to check the identities of Rohingyas as there were some issues over the matter between Bangladesh and Myanmar.

In late April, Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen visited Kunming of China for a tripartite meeting involving the representatives of China and Myanmar.

Asked whether the Rohingya delegation's visit was the outcome of that meeting, the foreign ministry official said it was not.

Since the Rohingya influx in 2017, there were at least two attempts at Rohingya repatriation. However, not a single Rohingya has agreed to go back, saying there was no safety and guarantee of citizenship in Myanmar.

Some 10 lakh Rohingyas are living in the camps in Cox's Bazar.