Bhutanese police detained over two dozen Bhutnaese refugees at Phuentsoling along India-Bhutan border as they were trying to enter their homeland to hand over a letter addressed to King Jigme Singye Wangchuk.

Bhutanese monarch Jigme Singye Wangchuk

Bhutanese monarch Jigme Singye Wangchuk (File Photo)
According to reports, Bhutanese police stopped a group of around 100 Bhutanese refugees as soon as they reached Phuentsoling. The police detained refugee leaders for nearly six hours, interrogated them and later took them to nearby Indian territory and dumped them there.

Kantipur daily has quoted Dilli Ram Kattel, vice president of Bhutan-Gorkha National Liberation Front—the organizer of the march—as saying that the Bhutanese authorities interrogated them politely and later brought them to Indian territory and left.

Earlier, Indian police had intervened and stopped over 300 Bhutanese refugees—including women and children— at Mechi bridge along Nepal-India border as they were marching into Indian territory a few weeks back on their way to Bhutan.

Over 100,000 Bhutanese refugees are languishing in seven UNHCR-maintained camps in eastern Nepal for the last 15 years ever since they were forced to leave the country by the Druk regime by introducing what has been described as a discriminatory Citizenship Act.