Rohingya, Chin refugees from Myanmar on hunger strike inside foreigner transit camp in Assam

Guwahati: Several Rohingya and Chin refugees from Myanmar, lodged in India's biggest foreigner transit camp in Assam's Goalpara district, are on a hunger strike seeking their release and facilitating resettlement in a third country.  

The detainees, 110 Rohingyas and 31 Chins, started the hunger strike on Monday evening and refused to break the fast on Wednesday despite appeals by jail authorities, sources said.  

Most of them were caught by police and other security agencies in Assam for illegal migration and lodged in the transit camp at Matia in Goalpara district. The camp, opened last year, has facilities to house 3,000 inmates. They were arrested as India is not a signatory of the 1951 UN Refugee Convention or its 1967 Protocols.

Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma recently said police and other agencies launched a drive to nab illegal Rohingya migrants as they pose a threat to national security. 

Fears deportation to conflict-torn Myanmar: 

The protesters say many of them have already spent their jail terms as per Indian law for illegal migrants but are still being detained. They are against deportation to Myanmar due to the ongoing conflict and ethnic cleansing, particularly in Rakhine state. 

Senior officials of prisons and home department in Assam rushed to the camp, situated about 100km West of Guwahati, and talked to the protesters on Tuesday. But they refused to break the hunger strike without an assurance from the government. 

Director of the Rohingya Human Rights Initiative, Sabber Kyaw Min on Wednesday told DH that the Rohingya refugees included 28 women and 28 children. "They are genocide vicitms in Myanmar. Most of them have completed the jail term and India should release them. So they should be allowed to live in the refugee camps and should not be forcefully deported to Myanmar as conflict is still on there. India has provided shelters to many such refugees on humanitarian grounds and we urge the government of India to coordinate with UNHCR to find a durable solution, including third party resettlement for these refugees, who have already suffered too much," Min said.