I began writing about the Rohingya during the 2017 exodus into Bangladesh. My work follows life in the camps, the pressures on host communities, and the unresolved questions of rights, integration and return.
This project brings together that writing and tracks developments in Bangladesh and the wider region.
Why permanence?
Permanence is the question running through this project: what happens when a temporary refuge becomes the place where people grow up, work and build their lives? The years keep passing while a safe route home remains uncertain.
The word describes the length of this displacement. It does not make that condition inevitable, or diminish anyone’s right to return. I use this archive to follow the distance between promises of a solution and the lives people are living now.
What this archive covers
This is a personal documentation project, bringing together selected published essays, my thesis and a dated record of developments. The essays currently collected here run from 2022 to 2025; they are a selection from writing that began in 2017.
Updates and the return tracker link to their sources and distinguish proposals, eligibility and actual movement. “Unconfirmed” means the cited evidence does not settle the question; it does not mean zero.
My later research includes a master’s thesis at Chulalongkorn University on Rohingya integration in Cox’s Bazar.
Help keep the record useful
If you spot an error or have a source worth adding, send a correction or source suggestion. Please include the page, the detail in question and a link or publication date.
More of my writing is at safenroy.com.