Abstract: An apparatus is capable of supporting an intra-BS handover of a Mobile Station (MS) that can distinguish a Relay Station (RS) and a Base Station (BS) in a multi-hop relay broadband wireless communication system. A handover of an MS in a multi-hop relay wireless communication system includes receiving a neighbor advertisement message. When a handover command message that initiates a handover to a target node is received, information on a target node is acquired, and an upper BS of the target node is identified. When the identified upper BS of the target node is the same as an upper BS of the serving node, control information that has been previously used in a serving node is used in the target node, and communication with the target node is performed.