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Refugee Protection Under the Constitution of Bangladesh: The Rohingya Refugees in Context

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The Constitutional Law of Bangladesh

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Abstract

This chapter critically examines the scope of refugee protection in the Constitution of Bangladesh and applies that framework to the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh to see if the constitutional provisions are adequate to ensure the three important aspects of protection: (1) refugee status, (2) refugee rights, and (3) solution to the refugeehood by consolidating the permanent methods with a particular emphasis on local integration. Finally, it provides some recommendations to overcome the challenges associated with ensuring the constitutional means of refugee protection in Bangladesh. The significance of this chapter lies in unveiling a Constitution’s propensity to refugee protection in contradiction to insular national politics and other associated impasses which often gainsay the legitimate claim of these vulnerable groups of human being.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees 1951 189 UNTS 137, art 1 (A) (2).

  2. 2.

    Frances Nicholson and Judith Kumin, A Guide to International Refugee Protection and Building State Asylum Systems: Handbook for Parliamentarians No 27 (Inter-Parliamentary Union and UNHCR 2017) 34, 261.

  3. 3.

    Executive Committee of the High Commissioner’s Programme, Conclusion on International Cooperation and Burden and Responsibility Sharing in Mass Influx Situations No. 100 (LV) – 2004 (2004) <https://www.refworld.org/docid/41751fd82.html> accessed 27 December 2021.

  4. 4.

    Paul Lermack, ‘The Constitution Is the Social Contract So It Must Be a Contract … Right? A Critique of Originalism as Interpretive Method’ (2007) 33 (4) William Mitchell Law Review 1426–27.

  5. 5.

    Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Social Contract Theory <https://iep.utm.edu/soc-cont/> accessed 28 December 2021.

  6. 6.

    ibid.

  7. 7.

    John Locke, Second Treatise on Government (Peardon ed., Liberal Arts Press 1952).

  8. 8.

    Lermack (n 4) 1403–43.

  9. 9.

    Nicholson and Kumin (n 2) 28.

  10. 10.

    ibid. 29.

  11. 11.

    ibid.

  12. 12.

    ibid.

  13. 13.

    UNHCR, ‘Refugee Status Determination’ <https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-status-determination.html> accessed 26 December 2021.

  14. 14.

    ibid.

  15. 15.

    Bernadette Ludwig, Wiping the Refugee Dust from My Feet: Advantages and Burdens of Refugee Status and the Refugee Label (John Wiley & Sons Ltd. 2016) 5.

  16. 16.

    Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees 1951 (entered into force April 22, 1954) 189 UNTS 150, art 2.

  17. 17.

    Hilary Evans Cameron, ‘Refugee Status Determinations and the Limits of Memory’ (2010) 22 (4) International Journal of Refugee Law 469–511.

  18. 18.

    For example, artistic and patent rights (art 14).

  19. 19.

    Nicholson and Kumin (n 2) 228.

  20. 20.

    ibid. 229.

  21. 21.

    (2005) II ADC 371.

  22. 22.

    Kamal Hossain and Sharif Bhuiyan, ‘Bangladesh’ in Simon Chesterman et al. (eds), The Oxford Handbook of International Law in Asia and the Pacific (OUP 2019) 604.

  23. 23.

    Writ Petition No 10504 of 2016.

  24. 24.

    Borhan Uddin Khan and Muhammad Mahabubur Rahman, Country Fiche - Bangladesh: Global Asylum Governance and the European Union’s Role (2020) 23 <https://www.asileproject.eu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Country-Fiche_Bangladesh_Final_Pub.pdf> accessed 29 December 2021.

  25. 25.

    OHCHR, Human Rights by Country: Bangladesh (2018) <www.ohchr.org> accessed 29 December 2021.

  26. 26.

    Staff Correspondent, ‘Forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals’ The Daily Star, Dhaka, 27 September 2017 <https://www.thedailystar.net/city/forcibly-displaced-myanmar-nationals-1469374> accessed 29 December 2021.

  27. 27.

    UNHCR, Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status (1992) [157–160].

  28. 28.

    Meenakshi Ganguly, ‘An Island Jail in the Middle of the Sea’ Human Rights Watch, 7 June 2021 <https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/06/07/island-jail-middle-sea/bangladeshs-relocation-rohingya-refugees-bhasan-char> accessed 29 December 2021.

  29. 29.

    Noor Nanji, ‘UN Secretary-General urges end to Rohingya violence’ The National, 14 September 2017 <https://www.thenational.ae/world/un-secretary-general-urges-end-to-rohingya-violence-1.628293> accessed 1 January 2022.

  30. 30.

    Louis De Raedt v Union of India [1981] AIR SC 1886 [12].

  31. 31.

    Ali Salih Khalaf v Taj Mahal Hotel [2014] 4 Indian Law Journal 20 [9].

  32. 32.

    Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK) v Government of Bangladesh (1999) BLD 488.

  33. 33.

    Writ Petition No 10504 of 2016.

  34. 34.

    M Sanjeeb Hossain, ‘Bangladesh’s Judicial Encounter with the 1951 Refugee Convention’ (2021) 67 Forced Migration Review 59–61.

  35. 35.

    (2003) 55 DLR 318.

  36. 36.

    (1994) 46 DLR (AD) 192.

  37. 37.

    (1999) 4 MLR (HC) 358.

  38. 38.

    (1999) BLD 488.

  39. 39.

    (2016) Writ Petition 10,127/2015.

  40. 40.

    Nicholson and Kumin (n 2) 15.

  41. 41.

    Guideline for Informal Education Program (GIEP) For Children of Forcibly Displaced Myanmar Nationals (FDMN) in Bangladesh <https://www.globalpartnership.org/sites/default/files/2019-05-bangladesh-informal-education-program-rohingya.pdf> accessed 1 January 2022.

  42. 42.

    ibid.

  43. 43.

    Alice Cuddy, ‘Myanmar coup: What is happening and why’ BBC News (1 April 2021) <https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-55902070> accessed 30 December 2021.

  44. 44.

    Jobair Alam, ‘The Current Rohingya Crisis in Myanmar in Historical Perspective’ (2019) 39 (1) Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 18.

  45. 45.

    Maya Than and Tin Mung Mung Than, ‘ASEAN Enlargement and Myanmar’ in Mya Than and Carolyn Gates (eds), ASEAN Enlargement: Impacts and Implications (Institute of Southeast Asian Studies 2001) 249–61.

  46. 46.

    Jobair Alam, ‘The Rohingya Minority of Myanmar: Surveying Their Status and Protection in International Law’ (2018) 25 International Journal on Minority and Group Rights 157–182, 177.

  47. 47.

    Jess Crisp, ‘The Local Integration and Local Settlement of Refugees: A Conceptual and Historical Analysis’, Working Paper No 102 of 2004 (Evaluation and Policy Analysis Unit).

  48. 48.

    Executive Committee of the High Commissioner’s Programme, ‘Conclusion on Local Integration No 104 (LVI) – 2005’A/AC.96/1021.

  49. 49.

    UNHCR, Registration of The Marriages and Divorces of Refugees (2019) < unhcr_note_on_refugee_marriage_and_divorce_fv.pdf > accessed 30 May 2022.

  50. 50.

    Writ Petition No 18162 of 2017.

  51. 51.

    Ministry of Law Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, Administrative Circular No. bichar-7/2n-75/2016–909 (25 October 2017).

  52. 52.

    The Foreigners Act, 1946, s 14.

  53. 53.

    NGOAB, Framework for NGO’s (2018) <http://www.ngoab.gov.bd/sites/default/files/files/ngoab.portal.gov.bd/notices/e2857aa2_dea6_4749_97c3_79241e30207d/Notice-180001.pdf> accessed 28 April 2021.

  54. 54.

    ISCG, Standard Operating Procedure: Cash for Work Programming <https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/cwg_sop.pdf> accessed 27 April 2021.

  55. 55.

    ibid.

  56. 56.

    Alam (n 46).

  57. 57.

    Nicholson and Kumin (n 2) 234–35.

  58. 58.

    Adv Zulhas Uddin Ahmed v Bangladesh (2010) 15 MLR (HCD) [18]; Dr Mohiuddin Farooque (BELA) v Bangladesh 55 DLR (HCD) 69 [23].

  59. 59.

    Jobair Alam, ‘The Status and Rights of the Rohingya as Refugees under International Refugee Law: Challenges for a Durable Solution’, (2021) 19 (2) Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 128–41.

References

Books

  • Locke, John. 1952. Second Treatise on Government. Peardon ed. New York: Liberal Arts Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ludwig, Bernadette. 2016. Wiping the Refugee Dust from My Feet: Advantages and Burdens of Refugee Status and the Refugee Label. John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nicholson, Frances and Judith Kumin, A Guide to International Refugee Protection and Building State Asylum Systems: Handbook for Parliamentarians No 27 (Inter-Parliamentary Union and UNHCR 2017).

    Google Scholar 

  • UNHCR. 1992. Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status.

    Google Scholar 

Chapters in Edited books

  • Hossain, Kamal, and Sharif Bhuiyan. 2019. Bangladesh. In The Oxford Handbook of International Law in Asia and the Pacific, ed. Simon Chesterman, Hisashi Owada, and Ben Sau, 604. Oxford: OUP.

    Google Scholar 

  • Than, Maya, and Tin Maung Maung Than. 2001. ASEAN Enlargement and Myanmar. In ASEAN Enlargement: Impacts and Implications, ed. Mya Than and Carolyn Gates, 249. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

Articles

  • Alam, Jobair. 2018. The Rohingya Minority of Myanmar: Surveying Their Status and Protection in International Law. International Journal on Minority and Group Rights 25: 157.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———, ‘The Current Rohingya Crisis in Myanmar in Historical Perspective’ (2019) 39 (1) Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 18, 1, 25.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2021. The Status and Rights of the Rohingya as Refugees under International Refugee Law: Challenges for a Durable Solution. Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 19 (2): 128.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cameron, H. Evans. 2010. Refugee Status Determinations and the Limits of Memory. International Journal of Refugee Law 22 (4): 469.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crisp, Jess. The Local Integration and Local Settlement of Refugees: A Conceptual and Historical Analysis. Working Paper No 102 of 2004 (Evaluation and Policy Analysis Unit).

    Google Scholar 

  • Hossain, M. Sanjeeb. 2021. Bangladesh’s Judicial Encounter with the 1951 Refugee Convention. Forced Migration Review 67: 59–61.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lermack, Paul. 2007. The Constitution Is the Social Contract So It Must Be a Contract … Right? A Critique of Originalism as Interpretive Method. William Mitchell Law Review 33 (4): 1426.

    Google Scholar 

Internet Sources

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Law, University of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Jobair Alam

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  1. Jobair Alam
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Correspondence to Jobair Alam .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Emeritus Professor of Law, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    M Rafiqul Islam

  2. Department of Law, University of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Muhammad Ekramul Haque

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Alam, J. (2023). Refugee Protection Under the Constitution of Bangladesh: The Rohingya Refugees in Context. In: Islam, M.R., Haque, M.E. (eds) The Constitutional Law of Bangladesh. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-2579-7_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-2579-7_16

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