Select Committee on International Development

Imran Hussain Excerpts

Thursday 18th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Twigg]

That is a very important question. It falls a little outside the remit of our inquiry, so it is not a matter on which we took a lot of evidence or reached conclusions in the report. The hon. Gentleman has raised a very important point, and it may be an issue on which our Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee can work together. Ultimately, if there is to be a point at which the Rohingya feel they can go back, they will need guarantees, and I personally think he is right that peacekeepers could form part of the solution.

[Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)]

I thank the Chair and all members of the International Development Committee for an informative report that goes further than previous reports. Does my hon. Friend agree that there continue to be serious concerns regarding the terms and conditions of repatriation? Where will refugees return to when all their houses and villages have been burned? What human rights protections will people be afforded once they return, and what stops genocide happening again? Surely the British Government must now change their stance, which is more focused on the rights of the Rohingya as opposed to the transition to democracy. The Rohingya must have a voice at the table if we are to achieve democracy.

[Stephen Twigg]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his passionate advocacy of the Rohingya cause. I know that his constituency contains a significant Rohingya diaspora community, on whose behalf he speaks. I agree that the Government’s approach needs to place greater emphasis on the protection of the Rohingya, and indeed other minorities in Burma—that was what we alluded to when we said that there was “over-optimism” about the pace of democratic reform in that country. I also agree that conditions simply are not yet there, and—to put it bluntly—are unlikely to be there in the foreseeable future, to allow any significant voluntary return of the Rohingya to Burma.