Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what steps are being taken to ensure that the repatriation of Rohingya people from Bangladesh is overseen by an independent UN monitor to help ensure the safety and security of those refugees.

The UK proposed and secured a UN Security Council Presidential Statement on 6 November that urged the Governments of Burma and Bangladesh to ensure the voluntary, safe and dignified return to Burma of Rohingya refugees, and the full participation of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in the repatriation process.

We have repeatedly used our bilateral representations to the Governments of Burma and Bangladesh to call on them to ensure the repatriation process meets these conditions. The British Ambassador to Burma most recently pressed for UNHCR involvement in the repatriation process in his meeting with the Minister for the Office of the State Counsellor on 11 January. The British High Commission in Dhaka regularly raises our concerns about premature returns with the government of Bangladesh.

We share UNHCR's concerns regarding the risk of premature or precipitous returns, and its assessment that conditions in Rakhine are not presently in place to enable safe and sustainable returns.