Bangladesh/Myanmar: The Dangers of a Rohingya Insurgency Crisis Group Asia Report N°348, 18 June 2025 Page 11 Group that the “informal” November agreement was mainly a vehicle for Dil Mohammed to position himself as a refugee leader “above the armed groups”. The official downplayed the significance of the agreement and expressed confidence that Dil Mohammed would soon lose influence.67 If fighting among armed groups were to resume in the camps, the harm could be greater than prior to the truce because of how these outfits have inflated their ranks and increased their firepower over the past six months. B. Bangladesh’s Position Bangladesh’s main objective when it comes to Myanmar is repatriation of Rohingya refugees, who now number well over one million. Political upheaval on both sides of the border has not altered this goal. Since taking office in early August 2024, following Sheikh Hasina’s overthrow, Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus’s administration has acknowledged the need to engage the Arakan Army, given the group’s control of the border.68 In November 2024, it appointed a former UN official, Khalilur Rahman, as high representative for Rohingya affairs and “other priority issues”. In February, he held talks with counterparts from the Arakan Army’s political wing.69 The interim government has proposed establishing a humanitarian corridor into Rakhine State and lobbied the UN successfully to convene a “high-level conference” on the Rohingya in late September, on the sidelines of the General Assembly, with the aim of drawing up solutions to the crisis. Dhaka has also permitted the UN to biometrically identify new Rohingya arrivals, and Yunus has spoken several times of the need to establish a “safe zone” for the Rohingya in northern Rakhine State. Bangladesh has even continued dialogue with Myanmar’s military regime on the issue of refugee returns; at a meeting in Bangkok in early April, Naypyitaw told Dhaka it had verified 180,000 Rohingya for repatriation.70 All these moves suggest a desire to work with international partners to resolve the refugee crisis through negotiation and dialogue. But this approach appears to be at odds with much of what is happening on the ground, both within the refugee camps and along the border, where Rohingya armed groups and their affiliates receive a degree of succour from Bangladeshi security agencies. It remains unclear whether Dhaka is deliberately pursuing a two-pronged strategy or a self-contradictory one due to lack of oversight. In Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh’s security agencies continue to exert close control of the refugee camps and maintain ties with both Rohingya armed groups and the Arakan Army. Rohingya refugees, the Arakan Army and many analysts insist these agencies were behind the RSO’s revival from late 2022. They say these agencies were keen to displace ARSA from the camps after it fell out of favour and allowed (if not support- 67 Crisis Group interview, senior RSO official, March 2025. See, for example, “8,000 more Rohingyas fled to Bangladesh: Foreign adviser”, The Business Standard, 3 September 2024; and “Rohingya crisis: Can the interim government’s ‘new strategy’ break the deadlock?”, bdnews24.com, 23 December 2024. 69 Crisis Group interviews, sources with knowledge of the meetings, February-March 2025. 70 The interim government hailed this pledge as a breakthrough, but Myanmar’s military regime does not control the areas to which the Rohingya would return. 68