INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Guterres stands behind the UN refugee agency (UNRA)'s expression of concern over India repatriating seven Rohingyas to Myanmar, his
spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said yesterday.After reading out an abbreviated version of a statement issued earlier in Geneva by the UNRA,
he said at his daily briefing in answer to a question that Guterres stands behind the agency, which is the UN body dealing with
refugees."The UN refugee agency is greatly concerned for the safety and security of seven Myanmar nationals who were returned from India to
Myanmar on Thursday," its spokesperson Andrej Mahecic said in Geneva.The office of UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Filippo Grandi
requested Indian authorities for access to the seven Rohingyas detained in India since 2012, he said.UNHCR "regrets that the agency did not
receive a response to this request and was unable to secure access for a lawyer from a state legal service.""UNHCR continues to seek
clarification from the authorities on the circumstances under which these individuals were returned to Myanmar," he added.The Supreme Court
had earlier turned down an appeal by a prominent lawyer, Prashant Bhushan, to stop the deportation.India's External Affairs Ministry
spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said that the government had reconfirmed the seven Rohingyas' "willingness to be repatriated" before arranging
their return.Meenakshi Ganguly, the South Asia director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), said in a statement: "Forcing any Rohingya back to
Myanmar now puts them at grave risk of oppression and abuse.""The Indian government has disregarded its long tradition of protecting those
seeking refuge within its borders," she added.According to HRW, 32 Rohingya refugees, including seven minors, are in detention in
Assam."They are mostly believed to be from the Rakhine state in Myanmar and were apprehended in 2014 by the railway police," it said.The
seven, who were deported on Thursday, had come to India before the outbreak of violence in August last year in Rakhine state that led to
more that 700,000 Rohingyas fleeing to Bangladesh, where they now live in squalid camps.Attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, an
organisation led by Pakistan-born Ataullah abu Ammar Jununi, on Myanmarese security posts sparked retaliatory attacks by security forces and
civilian vigilantes.Several thousands of Rohingyas were killed in the attacks and their villages destroyed leading to the exodus.Guterres
has called it a "textbook case of ethnic cleansing" and demanded punishment for those responsible.
