Myanmar says over 3,00,000 Rohingya refugees verified for repatriation as exodus enters ninth year
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- Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs verified 426,545 of 828,824 refugees on Bangladesh's list as of late July, determining 308,797 were former Rakhine residents eligible for return once security in Rakhine stabilizes.
- Myanmar flagged 113,507 refugees as unverifiable and 4,241 as involved in 'terrorist activities,' while rejecting claims that over 1 million were displaced from Rakhine and insisting 540,000 crossed into Bangladesh in 2017 while 200,000 remained in northern Rakhine.
- Myanmar does not recognize the Rohingya as one of its 135 ethnic minorities, labeling them 'Bengalis' to assert they are illegal migrants from Bangladesh — a framing that contradicts UN accusations of ethnic cleansing and genocide.
- The 2018 Myanmar-Bangladesh repatriation agreement has produced no returns, with the 2021 military coup and the Arakan Army's 2023 territorial offensive against the military further destabilizing Rakhine and driving additional refugees toward Bangladesh.
- Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said in late July 2026 that Myanmar agreed to take back 5,000 Rohingya from Malaysia, but Myanmar foreign ministry official Han Win Aang told the AP the program covers only verified Myanmar nationals in detention centers, not Rohingya refugees broadly.
Why it matters: Verification has been Myanmar's precondition for returns since 2018, but no repatriation has actually occurred — and security in Rakhine has worsened since the 2021 coup and the Arakan Army's territorial gains. The 4,241 people flagged as 'terrorists' and 113,507 marked unverifiable are excluded from a pool the UN says should be far larger than Myanmar's own figures.
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