Refugee in Cambodia asks to return home
One of the first four refugees resettled in Cambodia under a deal with Australia has requested to return to his native Rakhine State – the latest controversy to smack the much-ridiculed refugee arrangement.
“He has requested to give up his [refugee] status and return to his homeland,” said Lieutenant General Khieu Sopheak, the spokesperson for the Cambodian Interior Ministry. “In my mind it is because he is homesick, he is alone and he is young.”
The Rohingya man, along with three Iranians, was transferred to Phnom Penh from an immigration detention centre on the Pacific Island of Nauru in June through a voluntary resettlement plan under which Australia paid US$38 million to Cambodia.
