Anwar govt slammed for double standard as refugees deported amid latest 'aerial massacre' by Myanmar regime

Global rights groups Amnesty International and Asylum Access have condemned Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim's government for proceeding with the first phase of a controversial plan to deport Myanmar refugees, even as the military junta there launches an aerial bombardment campaign in Rakhine state that has killed scores of civilians.

"This is one of the most serious refugee protection failures Malaysia has committed in recent years," said Joshua Ericsson, who heads the local chapter of Amnesty International.

"The government has been warned repeatedly about the risks. It has heard from refugee communities, civil society organisations, UN agencies and international experts. Yet it has chosen to proceed anyway."

It is the second stinging rebuke by a global body against Anwar's sudden reversal of Malaysia's decades-old policy of protecting refugees from Myanmar, most of them Rohingya Muslims, who have recently become the target of an online xenophobic campaign directed at the migrant community that has sought refuge in the country after fleeing violence perpetrated by the Myanmar regime.

Last week, the world's largest doctors' group, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), or Doctors Without Borders, warned Anwar against a plan to deport the first group of 1,400 refugees whom the Myanmar junta has identified as its citizens, saying they are at risk of being sent back to "violent and dangerous conditions from which they fled".

"There is an urgent need for transparency and clarity around the 1,476 refugees who are at risk of being forcibly returned to violent and dangerous conditions from which they fled," MSF said.

It is part of a controversial deal Anwar announced with scant detail, claiming that the Myanmar junta had agreed to take back 5,000 refugees from the country.

Critics say Anwar's announcement was timed to placate those behind a xenophobic campaign against Rohingya refugees and other migrant communities in Malaysia, while reversing a policy of not recognising the junta in Myanmar, which for decades has waged a brutal campaign to expel its Rohingya Muslim citizens from the Rakhine (Arakan) region.

'Aerial massacre'

Starting today, the government will repatriate a total of 1,476 refugees "identified" by the Myanmar regime, under the first phase of what is claimed as a "voluntary repatriation programme" implemented by the home ministry.

The plan appears to be on schedule despite the government stating it would not proceed if refugees' lives were threatened.

It comes as the Myanmar junta carries out what has been described as an "aerial massacre", including an airstrike yesterday on a crowded market in Kyauktaw near Rakhine, which killed at least 49 people and injured 58, many of them women and children.

"The bodies of some of the dead could not be recovered because they were incinerated," news portal The Irrawaddy quoted prominent Rakhine activist Wai Hun Aung as saying.

The latest attack has drawn condemnation from Asean Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR), which has called for Myanmar’s President Min Aung Hlaing to be “stopped and held accountable for crimes against humanity”.

Airstrikes by the junta have killed 982 civilians in 2025, up from 641 in 2024, according to UN figures. Since the 2021 coup, more than 100,000 people have died and five million have been displaced, about half a million of them in Rakhine.

In their joint statement today, Amnesty International and Asylum Access said deporting the refugees violates the principle of non-refoulement, a principle of international law that binds all countries whether or not they have ratified the Refugee Convention.

"We also remain deeply alarmed that this comes at a time when the world is demanding accountability for atrocities committed in Myanmar, including through proceedings before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and efforts before the International Criminal Court (ICC)."

They said the action was in contrast with Malaysia's own call at the United Nations recently, when Foreign Minister Mohamad Hasan said international law should not be applied "only when convenient".

"Yet that appears to be exactly what is happening domestically," the joint statement said.

It recalled Malaysia's past position in calling for accountability over atrocities committed by the Myanmar junta against the Rohingya.

"Today, however, the same government is prepared to roll out the red carpets and host Min Aung Hlaing in Malaysia to facilitate the accelerated return of refugees, despite the fact that he remains the subject of an arrest warrant request at the ICC for alleged crimes against humanity against the Rohingya.

"Malaysia cannot champion accountability at the United Nations while making deals with Min Aung Hlaing to facilitate dangerous returns to Myanmar," it added.