KUALA LUMPUR, May 18 — Putrajaya’s refusal to accept Rohingya refugees now unlike Bosnian Muslim or Palestinian asylum seekers then is likely because of the former’s close proximity to Malaysia and the huge numbers fleeing Myanmar, analysts said yesterday.

Dr Oh Ei Sun, a senior fellow at S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, said Bosnia in southeastern Europe is located much further away from Malaysia compared to neighbouring Myanmar, pointing out also that the Bosnian Muslims seeking refuge here were far fewer than the Rohingya fleeing to Malaysia.

“With the Palestinians and Bosnians, the situations were totally different. They are from faraway and in small numbers, so humanitarian gestures in welcoming a number of them are almost harmless both domestically and internationally,” Oh said in an email interview with Malay Mail Online.