By Nusrat Sidiq
SRINAGAR, Jammu and Kashmir (AA) - An elderly Rohingya woman refugee died due to ill health on Wednesday in a ‘detention center’ in the Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir region, Rohingya activists said on Friday.
Abdul Rahim, an activist and coordinator for Jammu-based Rohingya, said 75-year-old refugee Lalu Bibi passed away on Wednesday in Jammu’s Hira Nagar sub-jail where she has been held since March 2021.
“She was very ill and was referred to a hospital where she breathed her last,” Rahim told Anadolu.
“The life of Rohingya here has become a curse,” he said.
Bibi was the seventh Rohingya refugee to die in the facility, where nearly 270 refugees remain in indefinite detention.
In July last year, a five-month-old girl also died in the facility after police fired teargas at Rohingya protesting against indefinite detention, and demanding they be either deported to their homeland, Myanmar, or released.
Despite having UNHCR refugee cards, they have been detained across many Indian states.
UNHCR in a recent statement said that there are 676 Rohingya refugees in detention across India and 608 of them have no current court cases or sentences pending.
Fazal Abdali, a lawyer who is part of a legal aid team for Rohingya, said that it is tragic to witness such deaths happening under illegal detention.
“Legally as well as morally and under international law, Rohingya need to be safeguarded as they have taken refuge here but unfortunately it is not happening,” he told Anadolu, adding that indefinite detention is itself a form of torture.
"Even the Indian Supreme Court has ruled that arbitrary detention is an abuse of law and constitutional rights of people," he said.
An estimated 40,000 Rohingyas sought asylum in India. UNHCR India acknowledged the presence of 18,000 Rohingya who are registered as refugees.
About 103 Rohingya Muslims and 30 Christian Chin refugees, all from Myanmar, have been on a hunger strike since Monday to protest their indefinite detention at a camp in northern Indian state of Assam.
The protesters are demanding to be handed over to UNHCR and resettled in a third country.
The deaths are due to poor medical care in the camp, Sabber Kyaw Min, director of the Rohingya Human Rights Initiative, was quoted by Indian media outlet Maktoob as saying.
“They have not done any crime. They fled Myanmar due to genocide and crimes against humanity and came to India,” Kyaw Min told Maktoob, blaming the UNHCR for failing to protect them.
The Myanmar government troops killed an estimated 25,000 Rohingya and forced more than 750,000 others to flee as mass atrocities against the ethnic group were launched in August 2017.