FM leaves for Myanmar today

Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali will leave Dhaka for Myanmar on the early morning of today to discuss the Rohingya repatriation issue with his Myanmar counterpart U Myint Thu and Union Minister for Myanmar State Counsellor's Office Kyaw Tint Swe.
He will lead a team comprising Foreign Secretary
M Shahidul Haque, Bangladesh's High Commissioner in Myanmar and a 15-member team of Joint Working Group to see the Rakhaine States situation on ground.
"It is a two-day visit. We will hand over new list of Rohingyas to them," a senior official of the Foreign Ministry told the Daily Observer on Wednesday.
According to the plan, we will visit the Rakhaine State to see what steps Myanmar has taken so far for creating conducive environment for safe return of Rohingyas, the official said.
Bangladesh and Myanmar signed a bilateral instrument "Arrangement on return of displaced persons from Rakhine State" on behalf of the respective governments in Myanmar's capital Naypyidaw to repatriate Rohingya refuges.
A Joint Working Group (JWG) was also formed to start repatriating Rohingya refugees by January 23, 2018 but unfortunately Myanmar failed to fulfill its commitment.
"We'll go to Northern Rakhine to see what steps were taken to create a conducive environment," earlier, Foreign Secretary M Shahidul Haque told reporters.
He said the Foreign Minister is going to Myanmar to see the preparations for accommodation facilities, particularly installation of pre-fabricated houses for repatriation of Rohingya refugees.
In July Md Shahidul Haque proposed the Myanmar authority that Bangladesh would visit the Rakhine state to see the situation before the beginning of the repatriation of Rohingyas from Bangladesh they endorsed.
The JWG, which is responsible for overseeing the repatriation of the refugees, held two meetings but Myanmar authority set conditions on identifying the citizenship issue.
In mid-February, Bangladesh handed over a list of 8,032 refugees it deemed eligible for repatriation in the first phase. But Myanmar so far has managed to verify only around 1,000 of these Rohingyas.
"Bangladesh obtained world leaders sympathy on the issue but the major key players including China, Russia, India and Japan is saying that they will help Bangladesh to implement it but Bangladesh should take initiative to solve the issue bi-laterally, this is the most challenging area of agreement," a senior diplomat said preferring anonymity.