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Get you up to speed: Nearly 1,500 migrants arrive in Myanmar from Malaysia despite UN warnings
Nearly 1,500 Myanmar refugees and migrants were deported from Malaysia and arrived in southern Yangon on Sunday as part of a repatriation programme. The returnees were transported aboard two navy warships and a hospital ship, while Malaysia continues to hold more than 10,300 others in immigration detention centres.
Nearly 1,500 Myanmar refugees were repatriated from Malaysia on Tuesday as part of a broader plan to return 5,000 individuals in stages, amid concerns over their safety and the conditions in Myanmar. The Malaysian government plans to move forward with the repatriation of a second group of more than 3,500 refugees and migrants, despite criticism from human rights groups and a lack of assurance regarding the safety of returnees.
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has announced plans to repatriate a second group of over 3,500 refugees, citing financial, social, and security burdens. Meanwhile, Myanmar’s Min Aung Hlaing is expected to visit Malaysia soon to discuss the controversial repatriation scheme.
What remains unclear — It is unknown how many of the returnees are from the Rohingya community, a group particularly at risk upon their return.
Nearly 1,500 migrants arrive in Myanmar from Malaysia amid UN warnings
News|RefugeesNearly 1,500 migrants arrive in Myanmar from Malaysia despite UN warnings
Malaysia continues mass refugee deportations despite warnings from the UN about unsafe conditions in an active war zone.
Published On 5 Oct 20265 Oct 2026
Nearly 1,500 Myanmar refugees and migrants deported from Malaysia have arrived in their war-ravaged country under an opaque repatriation scheme heavily criticised by human rights groups and the United Nations refugee agency.
The 1,479 returnees, transported from Malaysia on board two navy warships and a hospital ship on Tuesday, arrived in southern Yangon early Sunday, Nay Lin Tun, a regional government minister, said.
They are among 5,000 Myanmar nationals who will be repatriated in stages from Malaysia, where more than 10,300 others are being held in immigration detention centres, according to the country’s Home Ministry.
Malaysia insists all returnees agreed to voluntary repatriation, but rights monitors have raised concerns that Myanmar refugees had little choice and warned that conditions for return remain unsafe.
The UN refugee agency said this past week that its staff were not allowed to meet the Myanmar nationals to confirm whether their decisions to return “were genuinely free and informed”.
Rohingya make up the majority of Myanmar refugees and asylum seekers in Malaysia, but it remains unclear how many members of the persecuted Rohingya are among the returned group.
The deportation was carried out during escalating raids on refugee communities in Malaysia by immigration officials, which led to the detention of more than 50,000 refugees in 2026.
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim announced the repatriations in July against a backdrop of rising xenophobia towards refugees, particularly the Rohingya.
Kuala Lumpur is moving ahead with plans to return a second group of more than 3,500 refugees and migrants, saying they have caused financial, social and security burdens.
While Malaysia is not a party to the UN Refugee Convention and treats refugees as undocumented migrants, it is home to about 215,600 refugees and asylum seekers registered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
This includes more than 126,000 mainly Muslim Rohingya refugees.
Myanmar pledged last month that returns will be “safe and dignified”.
But Yap Lay Sheng, a senior human rights specialist with Fortify Rights, told the AFP news agency: “There’s no telling how the regime would treat returnees.”
Myanmar has been accused of committing genocide against the Rohingya Muslim minority. Earlier this year, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) opened its first genocide case it has heard in full in more than a decade.
The UNHCR and rights groups said returnees could face persecution and forced military conscription in an active war zone. Myanmar has been embroiled in a civil war since the military seized power from the elected government in 2021.
The war has killed more than 100,000 people since the coup, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) project.
Myanmar’s Min Aung Hlaing, the military coup leader who was installed as civilian president in April, is expected to visit Malaysia soon to discuss the repatriation scheme.
October 12, 2024
6:18 am
‘Cheer up, you caught the bad guy,’ says killer Virginia McCullough as she is arrested for murdering her parents
A woman who murdered her parents “in cold blood” before hiding them in makeshift tombs for four years told officers to “cheer up, you caught the bad guy” as she was arrested in her home.
Virginia McCullough, 36, poisoned her father John McCullough, 70, with prescription medication and fatally stabbed her mother Lois McCullough, 71, shortly afterwards in 2019.
She ran up large debts on credit cards in her parents’ names and after their deaths, she continued to spend their pensions until she was finally caught in 2023.
In body-worn video footage released by police, a handcuffed – and eerily calm – McCullough told officers: “I did know that this would kind of come eventually.
“It’s proper that I serve my punishment.”
She said she had slipped something into her father’s drink then put his body under a bed on the ground floor, and put her mother’s body in an upstairs wardrobe.
McCullough, having been arrested on suspicion of double murder, told an officer: “Cheer up, at least you’ve caught the bad guy.”
She added: “I know I don’t seem 100% evil.”
At the police station, she told officers where a kitchen knife was, which she described as a “murder weapon”, and a hammer which she said “will still have blood on it”.
McCullough, of Pump Hill, Chelmsford, Essex, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday with a minimum term of 36 years at Chelmsford Crown Court, after she admitted to their murders between 17 and 20 June 2019 at an earlier hearing at the same court.
Chelmsford Crown Court heard how she hid their bodies in makeshift tombs at the family home in Great Baddow in Essex, then told persistent lies to cover her tracks.
The court heard she cancelled family arrangements and frequently told doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday or away on lengthy trips.
But concerns over Mr and Mrs McCullough’s welfare were raised in September 2023 by a GP at their registered practice, and Essex County Council’s safeguarding team referred these to police.
The GP had not seen the couple for some time and said Mr McCullough had failed to collect medication and attend scheduled appointments. It was found McCullough had frequently cancelled appointments, using a range of excuses to explain her father’s absence.
Police said a missing persons investigation was initially launched and McCullough lied to officers, claiming her parents were travelling and would be returning in October.
It became a murder investigation, and when officers forced entry to the house in Pump Hill on September 15 2023, McCullough confessed that her parents’ bodies were in the house and that she had killed them.
Nicola Rice, a specialist prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “McCullough callously and viciously killed both of her parents before concealing their bodies in makeshift tombs within their home address.
“She spent the next four years manipulating and lying to family members, medical staff, financial institutions, and the police, spending her parents’ money and accruing large debts in their name.”
She added: “This was a truly disturbing case, which has left behind it a trail of devastation, and I can only hope that the sentence passed today will help those who loved and cared for Lois and John begin to heal.”
To downplay the genocide, the israelis claim there’s only 20,000 people left in north Gaza, says
@MahaGaza
: the real number exceeds 400,000
Man of the right wing Nigel Farage taking more second jobs and freebie helicopter rides
Gosh he’ll soon be a true blue Tory at this rate
Or far far worse
The cost-of-living crisis is far from over, yet the government’s 50% increase to the bus fare cap is a political choice, adding hundreds to annual costs.
To address hardship & the climate crisis, the government must keep the £2 cap & make public transport accessible for all.
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November 23, 2024
8:25 am
Defense alliance NATO chief Mark Rutte has met US President-elect Donald Trump to discuss global security issues, according to a NATO spokesperson.
The meeting took place in Palm Beach, Florida.
During his first term as US president, 2017-2020, Trump pushed for European NATO countries to spend more on defense and described the alliance’s cost-sharing as unfair to the US.
Rutte took over as NATO chief from Norwegian Jens Stoltenberg in November.
Before taking office in January, Trump has nominated Pete Hegseth for the post of defense secretary, which has raised eyebrows among many allies.
Hegseth, 44, has served as an infantry captain in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has no senior military or government officer experience.
November 23, 2024
8:25 am
November 23, 2024
8:17 am
Multiple missiles were fired in an airstrike towards a densely populated part of Lebanon’s capital early on Saturday.
The huge airstrike targeted Beirut’s Basta neighbourhood, and no prior warnings were given by the Israeli military. The largely residential area was struck last month.
At least one violent explosion was heard across the city, Reuters witnesses said, and plumes of smoke could be seen. Scenes of massive destruction at the site were shared online, including a massive crater in the ground.
“Beirut, the capital, woke up to a horrific massacre, as the Israeli enemy’s air force completely destroyed an eight-story residential building with five missiles on Al-Mamoun Street in Basta,” the state-run National News Agency reported.
The health ministry put the initial death toll at four, with 23 wounded. The number is expected to climb in the coming hours as search and rescue efforts continue.
It came after a long day of Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, which have been non-stop since last week.
The cross-border fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group escalated into a full-blown war in mid-September.
Israel has bombed southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs and the eastern Beqaa region, and has sent ground troops across the border. Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets deeper into Israel.
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