Banner: Malaysia began sending back around 1,500 Myanmar nationals on Sept. 29, 2026. (Photo: Malaysia Home Ministry)
During a debate on Al Jazeera’s Inside Story this evening (30 September) , Dr Maung Zarni, rights and peace activist and genocide scholar, condemned Malaysian leadership of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, a formerly persecuted dissident, for his inhuman decision to, in effect, mass-deport nearly 1,500 Myanmar nationals including Rohingya genocide survivors to harm’s way in their native Myanmar.
In the program, Rohingya survivor Lucky Karim, now based in Washington DC, drove home the message that forcibly returned Rohingyas have no more homes or villages to return to.
Lucky fled the last largest wave of genocidal assault on her Rohingya community in Rakhine in the fall of 2017 and took refuge across the borders in Bangladesh. She is the Founder of Refugee Women for Peace and Justice.
Anwar says Rohingya refugees have become a burden for Malaysia
The same Myanmar military leadership which Malaysia previously condemned as being a genocidal entity which destroyed 300 villages and genocidally displaced over 750,000 in 2017 is still in charge, albeit its territorial control is confined largely to cities, seaports and airports only.
Besides, a raging civil war in various parts of Myanmar, including Rohingya’s ancestral region of Northern Rakhine awaits those whom Malaysia had just deported. Malaysian academic Professor Phar Kim Beng defended Malaysia’s new policy of forcibly returning stateless Myanmar nationals as a comprehensive scheme with “the best protocol” to ensure their safety. He was, however, unable to say for sure whether the 5,000 Myanmar nationals in Malaysia selected to be deported by Anwar Ibrahim government against their will would face any danger to their lives once back in civil-war-torn Myanmar.
Both Maung Zarni and Lucky Karim argued otherwise: there is no safe protocol against Myanmar military’s daily airstrikes across various regions, and other atrocities. Additionally, Myanmar military government, now with the civilian façade, is engaged in mass conscription of thousands of both men and women to fight wars of repression against various ethnic communities and democratic resistance.
Watch the 20-minutes Inside Story debate here:
Guests: Phar Kim Beng: Director of the Institute of International and ASEAN Studies and Geopolitics Professor at the University of Malaysia.
Lucky Karim: Democracy and human rights Advocate and the Founder of Refugee Women for Peace and Justice.
Maung Zarni: Genocide Scholar and Co-Founder of the scholar-activist network, Forces of Renewal Southeast Asia.
ORSEA’s Maung Zarni with the Foreign Minister of Malaysia Mohamad Hasan, The Hague, 22 Feb. 2024.
FORSEA
Background readings:
The binding principle of non-refoulment for UN Member States.
Customary international law status: Non-refoulement has achieved the status of customary international law, meaning it binds all states regardless of whether they have ratified the 1951 Refugee Convention or other relevant treaties. No reservations are permitted to Article 33, and states cannot suspend its application even during times of war or public emergency.
Malaysia’s Idea of Humanity, Shafiur Rahman, Rohingya Refugee News, 30 Sept. 2026
A day after Kyauktaw airstrike, Malaysia sends Myanmar nationals back on junta warships, ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR), 29 Sept. 2026
Malaysia begins sending home Myanmar refugees, including children, despite safety concerns, Reuters, 29 Sept. 2026
MSF statement on “repatriation” of Myanmar refugees, MALAYSIA 22 Sept. 2026
Regime orders forced conscription of Rohingya in Rakhine State as Arakan Army siege looms, DVB, 13 Aug. 2026
