UN welcomes Sri Lanka's plan to ease refugee returns from India

The United Nations on August 22, 2026, welcomed Sri Lanka's decision to simplify immigration procedures to expedite the voluntary return of refugees from India who left the country without valid documents during its decades-long civil war. The Sri Lankan government earlier this month made special arrangements to streamline the process. Sri Lankan refugees began arriving in Tamil Nadu in large numbers after ethnic violence began in 1983, followed by nearly three decades of armed conflict between government forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Around 18,000 of them returned home between 2002 and 2022.