Friday 14 September 2012

Update news of northern Arakan


Maungdaw,Arakan State: September 8, Noor Khobir (23), son of Noor Hussain was arrested by police officer U Aung Kyaw Kent of Maungdaw police station. The victim belongs to Ward No.5 of Maungdaw Town. Later, he was released after taking Kyat 3000,000. The victim was arrested in the morning while he was going to the market for marketing, according to a close relative of the victim.
On the same day, at about 4:00pm, Mohamed Rofique (35), a labor from Ward No. 3 of Maungdaw Town was arrested by police while he was working at the market and later he was released after taking money.
Besides, Baksha Meah (43), son of Sultan was arrested by Burma’s border security force( Nasaka) of Pawet Chaung Nasaka out-post camp on September 9, at about 3:00 pm while he was sitting in his shop at the market. He is a shopkeeper, hailed from Wak Pyin village of Pawet Chaung village. After looting Kyat 14,000 from his pocket, the Nasaka went back to their camp, said a local shopkeeper.
Moreover, on September 12, in the morning, the police officer U Aung Kyaw Kent (police surveillance) accompanied by some other police men with civilian dress went to Ward No. 5 and arrested Sayed Hussain, son of Abdu Rahaman when he was getting out of his house. However, he was released after paying Kyat 300,000, said a local from the village.
Despite international pressure is going on, the present government is continuing its policy against the Rohingya community. It has been three months since Rohingyas have not been able to leave their houses such as in — Pauktaw, Rathedaung, Maungdaw, Kyauktaw, Min Bya, Paukktaw Pone Nar Kyun and Mrauk- Oo. Rohingyas are dying day by day as they do not have any food. Many people are being arrested, beaten and killed by security forces when they went out from their homes to buy food. They have been kept in their homes, according to an elite Rohingy.
On September 9, some Rohingya villagers of Nyaung Chaung (Khad(ir Bill ) village of Maung Daw tried to meet the commissionmembers at around 4 pm . But, they could not meet the commission members because of threats from Dr. Aye Maung, a member of the commission. He is the Chairman of Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) who has instigated the violence against the Rohingyas and one of the main culprits of atrocities against Rohingyas. He threatened Rohingyas in many ways in front of the security forces. As a result, police Hluntin and Nasaka are encouraged to arrest Rohingya people in future. A culprit becomes a commission member means that commission is a bias, said an elder.
“Urgent UN monitor teams must be allowed into the areas and we need a UN Commission of Inquiry into who perpetrated crimes against humanity to Rohingyas, said a local leader”

Arakan State USDP chief meets Rohingyas in Maungdaw

Maungdaw, Arakan State: U Maung Oo, the chief of Arakan state had met Rohingyas in Maungdaw to discuss recently happen riots in Arakan at Regional Development Association (RDA) office on September 13 at about 3:00pm, according to an elder from Maungdaw. 

“The meeting was organized by RDA and in the meeting, U Maung Oo and two Rohingyas MP- U Aung Zaw Win and U Shwe Maung were attended as special gust from Rangoon and other USDP members from Maungdaw –U Tun Hla Sein, U Soe Win, U Hls Myint and U Jangir. Thirty Rohingyas from maungdaw attended the meeting to discuss about recent situation and real fact and evident.” 

In the meeting, U Maung Oo accused Rohingya community are the first party who created the riots in Maungdaw but in Akyab, the Rakhine community are the first party, according to a Rohingya who attend the meeting. 

A Rohingya youth denied the statement of U Maung Oo. He mentioned that on June 8, the Rakhines and police forces started the problems – shouting and throwing stones - while Rohingyas are peacefully praying in the Mosque. Rohingyas complained concerned authority (police) but security force open fir to the Rohingyas where two Rohingya dead on the spot. The dead bodies were carried by the security force.the Rohingya stated in the meeting. 

“There are 1000 Rohingyas in the jail, living miserable condition and without basic rights which was denied by U Manug Oo as he had reported only 560 Rohingyas are in the Jail,” said the Rohingya youth. 

“Security force and Natala ( new settler) villagers burnt 300 Rohingyas home in Maungdaw south, looted 500 Rohingya houses where they had taken all valuables goods- gold and money – and police seized 300 Rohingyas’ motorbikes,Rakhines and security force looted 300 Rohingyas’ shops from Maungdaw and Maungdaw north ans last more than 200 Rohingyas females were raped.” 

Polic, Hluntin, Nasaka and arny are still harassing Rohingya community while the USDP high level officer visiting Maungdaw and discussing with Rohingya community season, said an elder from Maungdaw. 

In the present of U Maung Oo in Maungdaw, Natala villager with security force tried to loot a house of Rohingya from Nurullah para while the house owner ( a female) cried for help,the villagers rushed to the spot where the security open fired to the villagers ( Rohingyas). In this situation, the USDP officer didn’t do any help to Rohingya. Whenever the officer visted to Maungdaw, he made false promised to Rohingyas to get support from this oppress people .

Rohingya: Allegations and Refutations (Part 4) | Mohammed Sheikh Anwar



Refutation 

Rohingyas are not the problems but problems are in the minds of those people who do not think of Rohingyas equal to them because many of them have darker skin. The then consultant of Myanmar to Hong Kong, Ye Myint Aung (now Myanmar representative to United Nation) described them as “ugly as ogres.” And problems are with those people who do not think of them as Human Beings. Rohingyas have not created any problem in any country where they reside and are given a status. There will be problems for both governments and Rohingyas if they have to stay anywhere illegally without any status. 

Allegation #10 

They are illegal immigrants. Therefore, if the third countries want to take them, we (Burmese) will pay for fuel for trans-oceanic shipment. 

Refutation 

As explained above Rohingyas are no way illegal immigrants. Why should anyone else pay for fuel for the trans-oceanic shipment to carry them to third countries? Why should Rohingyas of Indian descends should leave their homes? How shameless can they be? How quickly can they forget that and Siddharta Gautama Buddha son of Siddhodana Gautama and original people in Arakan were Indians who practiced Hinduism, Buddhism and Animism. These Indians simply have converted into Islam. That doesn’t make them foreigners. 

Why don’t Burmese Regime and Rakhine Extremists don’t recognize Rohingyas? 

Burmese Regime and some extremist Rakhines don't want to recognize the name "Rohingya" not because they want their real identity so as to give them "Nationality" but because once they become successful in branding them as Bengalis, it will become easier for them to drive them out of Arakan land. In fact, now, Burmese pseudo civilian government in cooperation with extremist Rakhines are carrying out genocide against them to root them out of Arakan. Ultimately, Junta's dream of making Arakan into purely Burmanized Bhuddhist region will come true. 

Junta wants neither the people called Rakhines nor the people called Rohingyas. Thus, Junta has been setting up modal villages by bringing Bamars from central Burma. Rakhines are well aware of that. Yet Rakhines want to cleanse Rohingyas because they have become a major barrier for them (Rakhines) in achieving their much awaited dream of having an independent Arakan. For that purpose, extremist Rakhines simultaneously want to fight Junta on one side and Rohingyas on another side. It is a very wrong tactic. History has proven that. Hitler lost in the war because he fought Soviet Union on one side and English and French on another side. 

If the term “Rohingya” existed in the past, why didn’t they (Rohingyas) use it during British Colonial time? Can they use the term? 

In the past, Rohingya didn't feel to call them as Rohingya because the situation and the time had not forced them to call so. In the past, if a Rohingya was asked of what race he or she is, the answer would be Muslims. Till date, they identify themselves as Mussalman (an Indian term for Muslim). It doesn't mean that this people didn't exist before. So, if someone says there is no word as Rohingya in the history of Arakan, then there is no word as Rakhine either. 

There might be one more reason why Muslims in Arakan didn’t claim their name before and during British independence. It might be because they tried to offer an olive branch to fellow Rakhines to develop an integrated political culture, based on the common national aspiration of Arakaneseness, through rapprochement of with the spirit of “Rakhine-Rohingya Twin Brothers.” But Rakhine extremist leaders were not receptive to the proposal. Instead, they claimed that Rakhines and Buddhism are synonymous and Muslims or Rohingyas are outsiders. (Nurul-Islam, 2012) 

Mons were known as Talaings in history. Bama, majority people of Burma, is a Tibeto-Burman group descended from Kanran (ancestors of majority of Arakanese or Rakhines), Phyu and Thet (known as ancestors of many Chins). They were known as Mierma in the earliest Mon’s records. (Harvery, 1925, 2000)Now they are called both Myanmar and Bama. Zomis are known as Chins today and Wungpang or Jingpho are known as Kachins. Shans are known as Tais or vice versa. Even Rakhines call themselves with different names: Rakhine, Rakan, Rakkha, Rakkhita, Arakan (a name of a place) and Maghs as called by others. If all these people can change their names and call themselves with whatever they like, why can’t Muslim Arakanese call them with the name “Rohingya?”? Why don’t those bigotry historians apply the same logic to Rohingyas’ matter? Why double standard? Why so ignorant? 

All in all, Rohingyas who are of Indo-Aryan descendants (i.e. Indian origins) are hated and could be targeted by many extremist Rakhines, other extremist Burmese and by the tyrannical regime of Burma just because they look different from mainstream mongoloid people and practice a different religion. The Burmese regime that has the strong records of creating racial riots whenever they face crises in the country and divert people’s attention from the problems has done it again. The regime were facing so many problems such as the pressure to stop genocidal war against Kachin, Myitsone damn crisis, electricity crisis, water crisis, labors and farmers’ demonstrations on and on. Now, they started cleansing Rohingyas in the name of protecting sovereignty, religion and Rakhines. As expected, the brainwashed Burmese xenophobic society came in support of the regime. I wonder how they could forget their sufferings under the same regime ruled by same people. Ex-generals and whoever behind the current pseudo civilian government have not changed their mind and tinking ways to the least extent but their dresses. If it continues, there will never be democracy in Burma and the rule of the evils will last for next 300 years. 

Bibliography 

Arakanland.com, 2012. Arakan, The Land of the Father. [Online] Available at: http://www.arakanland.com/custom.html [Accessed 12 August 2012]. 

Buchanan, F., 1799. A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire. SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research, Vol. 1, No., 1, Spring 2003, ISSN 1479-8484, Vol. 1(1), p.55. Available at: http://www.soas.ac.uk/sbbr/editions/file64276.pdf [Accessed 10 August 2012]. 

Harvery, G.E., 1925, 2000. History of Burma. Culcutta, New Dehli: Asian Educational Service. Available at: http://books.google.com.my/books?id=vmIVhKXwrFcC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

IndexMundi.com, 2012. Bangladesh GDP - per capita (PPP). [Online] Available at: http://www.indexmundi.com/bangladesh/gdp_per_capita_(ppp).html [Accessed 12 August 2012]. 

IndexMundi.com, 2012. Burma GDP - per capita (PPP). [Online] Available at: http://www.indexmundi.com/burma/gdp_per_capita_(ppp).html [Accessed 12 August 2012]. 

Nurul-Islam, 2012. Anti-Rohingya Campaigns, Violations of Human Rights. UK. 

San-Kyaw-Tun-(Mahawizza), 2010. Zaa Lok Kay Pho Lay. 1st ed. New York: America-Burma Institute (A.B.I). 

The-Ministry-of-Foreign-Affairs-Myanmar, 2012. About Myanmar : Religion. [Online] Available at: http://www.mofa.gov.mm/aboutmyanmar/religion.html [Accessed 12 August 2012]. 

Mohammed Sheikh Anwar is an activist, studying Bachelor of Arts in Business Studies at Westminster International College in Malaysia.

Suu Kyi: “We need precise laws on citizenship”

Suu Kyi waits to deliver a speech during the last day of the 101st session of the International Labour Conference in Geneva (Reuters)

Democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi emphasised the need for “precise laws on citizenship” and “uncorrupted border vigilance” to address ongoing sectarian strife in Burma’s western Arakan state, at a press conference in Geneva on Thursday.

Speaking at the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) annual conference, she said that “fear of illegal immigration” lay at the heart of the violence between ethnic Arakanese and the stateless Rohingya minority, which has claimed at least twenty-four lives since Friday.

“Of course I am concerned and the most important lesson is the need for rule of law,” she said when asked by reporters. “We need precise laws on citizenship. I think a big problem comes from fear of illegal immigration, I think we need more responsible uncorrupted border vigilance.”

She added that those deemed worthy of citizenship, should get all the legal benefits that entails.

Ongoing ethnic strife in Burma’s western state has thrown a global spotlight on the discrimination faced by the Muslim minority the Rohingya – considered “illegal Bengali immigrants” by the government and denied citizenship, even though many of them have lived in Burma for generations.

Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) have come under growing pressure to outline their position on the Rohingya – seen as a hot-button political issue that risks alienating many of its supporters.

An outburst of anti-Rohingya sentiments have raged across social and mainstream media in recent weeks, while foreign and exile news outlets have faced accusations of “bias” for their coverage of the conflict.

One Facebook page called the “Kalar beheading gang”, which has over 500 ‘likes’, has an illustration of a grim reaper with an Islamic symbol on its robe on a blood-spattered background and explicit images purporting to be of victims of the unrest.

“Recent events in western Burmahave created a hurricane of hate in the online sphere,” Nicholas Farrelly, a research fellow at the Australian National University, told AFP.

Rohingya groups have urged Suu Kyi to speak out on their behalf, which analysts say places her in a “delicate” position. The ongoing violence is likely to overshadow her first trip to Europe since being incarcerated by the military junta in 1989.

In her address to the 101st ILO conference, she also renewed calls for responsible foreign investment in Burma, especially in the extractive industries.

“We accept that investments must bring profits, but we would like these profits to be shared between companies and our people,” said Suu Kyi speaking to a packed auditorium.

She urged foreign companies hoping to partner with the state-owned Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE) to demand better governance.

“MOGE lacks transparency and accountability at present,” she said. “The government must apply internationally recognised standards such as the International Monetary Fund’s guidelines on fiscal transparency. Other countries can help by urging their companies not to partner with MOGE without agreeing to such standards.”

She welcomed the ILO decision to lift punitive measures against Burma in recognition of the steps taken to tackle the use of forced labour. The former pariah state will receive increased technical assistance as they push ahead with their plan of action to eliminate forced labour by 2015.

The ILO’s decision is widely seen as an indicator for the further removal of sanctions against Burma. However, the move has been criticized as premature by some organisations, including the Arakan Project, which recently released a new report documenting systematic abuses carried out by the Burmese military towards the Rohingya minority group.

The group warned that there has been “little progress” since the Burmese government signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the ILO in March this year. While a reduction in the use of forced labour has been seen in certain townships of Northern Arakan state, it is has been coupled with a rise in arbitrary taxes and increased exploitation in other areas.

“It was a bit disappointing to see how quick and easy this decision has been taken, without really considering that forced labour is still very prevalent. I feel that it’s a bit too early,” Chris Lewa, Director of the Arakan Project toldDVB. “The need to monitor progress carefully will be important.”

The issue of forced labour inNorthern Arakanstate is inextricably linked to the legal status of the Rohingya, which leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, added Lewa.

Aung San Suu Kyi is set to travel to Norway next to collect her 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, before visiting her former home in the United Kingdom and then France.

Burmese icon now faces the Rohingya question

UNITED NATIONS – When Aung San Suu Kyi was last in New York she was single, sharing a small apartment in midtown Manhattan with an exiled Burmese singer and walking six minutes each day to a bureaucratic job she hated at the United Nations. 

That was in 1969. The 24-year-old daughter of the founding father of an independent Burma, still unsure what to do with her life, lived in relative anonymity for three years, until she left with no regrets to marry an Englishman, according to Peter Popham’s biography of her. 

Next week the Burmese democracy icon, now a 67-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner and member of parliament, will be back in New York for the first time in decades to attend meetings at her former employer. During a 17-day U.S. tour, she will be feted in Fort Wayne, on both coasts and awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, America’s highest civilian honor. 

Still, as she transitions from icon to practical politician, Suu Kyi’s silent treatment of the minority Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar has begun to blemish her reputation as a champion of human rights. No longer confined to house arrest, she now must gauge whether to compromise some principles in order to retain popular support. 

“She could have been Gandhi, but she sacrificed her moral authority,” said Robert Lieberman, a physics professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, who spent two years making an undercover documentary on Myanmar. “The Burmese are very prejudiced against the Rohingya, and she is running in 2015. Politics are a dirty business.”

While beloved by voters – her image is a fixture in Burmese shop windows and homes – the majority of the population reviles the stateless Rohingyas, who are deprived of citizenship in Myanmar. The next nationwide vote in 2015 will take place a quarter of a century after the military dictatorship refused to recognize the victory of Suu Kyi’s party in 1990 elections. 

At home and abroad, Suu Kyi remains a symbol of Myanmar’s stoic non-violent struggle against the five-decade rule of generals who kept her under house arrest for 15 years. As the former military junta allowed a political opening, she showed her willingness to engage by entering parliament after her party’s successful showing in April by-elections, running for a seat in parliament that came open between regular elections. 

For the first time this year, Suu Kyi has been able to travel freely overseas without fear of being banned from re- entry, dropping by Oslo to pick up her Nobel Peace Prize – 21 years after it was bestowed on her. 

She also visited Great Britain, where she had studied at Oxford University and lived in the 1980s with her husband Michael Aris, a Tibetan scholar. In 1999, when Aris was dying, she dared not visit him out of concern she wouldn’t be allowed to return home. 

Wherever Suu Kyi goes, she attracts throngs of supporters seeking a glimpse of their idol and media eager to quiz her. 

Questions on where she stands on the persecution of the Rohingya dogged her in a trip to Europe in June. Her decision to skirt the issue elicited rare criticism. 

“Aung San Suu Kyi has the moral authority to change the terms of debate in Myanmar about the Rohingya towards a rights-respecting, non-discriminatory path, and we certainly hope she will seize the unique opportunity of this U.S. trip to do so,” said Bangkok-based Phil Robertson, who oversees the work of Human Rights Watch in Asia. 

“We hope she can push the government of Myanmar to recognize that the Rohingya deserve citizenship,” he said in an email. 

When Thein Sein makes his first U.N. appearance as Myanmar’s president at the General Assembly on Sept. 27, he, too, will be grilled about the Rohingya. On the same day, 80 miles north of New York in New Haven, Conn., Suu Kyi will be addressing Yale University students. Their paths won’t cross at the U.N., with Suu Kyi leaving New York as the president arrives. 

It will be harder to duck the issue of the Rohingya at media-packed events during her extended stay in the United States which also will include a stop-off on the West Coast. On Sept. 29, she will meet members of the Burmese community – a mixture of economic migrants and political dissidents – in San Francisco. 

Nyunt Than, a 49-year-old software engineer who fled Myanmar in 1992 and settled in the Bay Area in 1996, says he hopes finally to meet his idol in person. As a young activist, he and his friends followed her around wherever she spoke. 

Nyunt Than, who went on to form the Burmese American Democratic Alliance in the U.S., says he wants to visit his homeland at the end of the year, but is concerned the authorities have yet to clear his name from a travel blacklist. 

“My father is still alive, he’s 85, but my mother passed away a few years ago,” Nyunt Than said in a telephone interview. “The sad thing is that even with my financial support my family still struggles.”

Born in a village about 70 miles east of Yangon, Nyunt Than is among the 100,000 people of Burmese descent living in the U.S. He’s able to send money home through unofficial channels, and bought an apartment in the capital for his parents so they could have access to better health care. 

Known to the Burmese as the “The Lady,” Suu Kyi’s grueling schedule may take a toll on her fragile constitution. She’s had fainting spells and bouts of exhaustion this year. 

“We are so happy to have her, but I feel sorry she is coming such a long way because of her health,” Nyunt Than said. 

Still, the Rohingya remain a delicate topic, even for Burmese who left their homeland long ago. When asked about Suu Kyi’s stance on the Rohingya, Nyunt Than stiffens. 

“The international media and some rights groups do not understand the circumstances and the background well enough and got it wrong in their reporting, views and the remarks,” he said. “There is an humanitarian situation and lack of rules of law in the Arakan State in Myanmar, and the current government, activists, and the communities are collectively addressing it.”

Politics aside, Myanmar’s economic potential is the point of focus for investors. Emerging from isolation as sanctions are loosened, Myanmar’s economy may grow as much as 8 percent a year over the next decade, according to the Asian Development Bank. 

Getting Suu Kyi to be more forthcoming may prove difficult. 

Lieberman, who interviewed Suu Kyi at length while filming “They Call it Myanmar,” describes her as quite guarded, even intimidating, on subjects she’s uncomfortable with, especially her private life. When he nudged her to be a little open, she snapped, “I can’t be someone I am not.”

“And no personal questions, by the way.”

US Wants Safe Repatriation of Rohingya to Myanmar

The United States on Thursday urged Bangladesh to keep its border open to Rohingya refugees fleeing Myanmar in the wake of June violence but advocated their safe repatriation as a long-term solution. 

A delegation of the U.S. State Department recently visited the troubled region in Myanmar where violence between Rakhaine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in June left at least 80 people dead. The team later visited refugee camps of Rohingya in Bangladesh's southern Cox's Bazar district. 

U.S. officials said at a news conference in Dhaka that the situation in Myanmar was still grave for the Rohingya people. 

They urged both Myanmar and Bangladesh to work out a long-term solution while stressed the need for providing food and basic healthcare to stateless Rohingya. 

Dan W. Mozena praised Bangladesh for its years of support to the Rohingya people but urged the country to do more for tens of thousands of undocumented Rohingya in Bangladesh. 

Mozena, who did not visit Myanmar but went with the full delegation to the camps in Bangladesh, said the situation was "grim" among refugees outside the official camps who were deprived of basic needs. 

Some 28,000 Rohingya refugees live in two official camps in Cox's Bazar district, but tens of thousands of others languish outside without proper care or facilities. 

The government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina earlier this year asked three international organizations to stop providing services to undocumented Rohingya to discourage fresh refugees from Myanmar. The government says it needs to take precautions because it has intelligence reports that some Islamic militant groups have targeted the Rohingya refugees for recruitment. 

The U.S. officials were concerned about the situation of Rohingya people in Myanmar, said one of the delegation who visited there, Kelly Clements, deputy assistant secretary for Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration. 

Clements said displacement of Rohingya people was still rampant in the troubled region, where many homes were burned to the ground during the violence. But she praised Myanmar for allowing them "unprecedented access" to see the area. 

She said reconciliation and reintegration of the ethnic groups should top Myanmar's government agenda to resolve the crisis. 

She said both Bangladesh and Myanmar should ensure basic assistance to the people in trouble. 

The U.S. officials also pushed for continuous dialogue between Bangladesh and Myanmar. 

Myanmar considers the Rohingya to be illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and denies them citizenship. Bangladesh says Rohingya have been living in Myanmar for centuries and should be recognized there as citizens. 

In the 1990s, about 250,000 Rohingya Muslims fled to Bangladesh in the face of alleged persecution by the military junta. 

Later, Myanmar took back most of them, leaving some 28,000 in two camps run by the government and the United Nations. 

Bangladesh has been unsuccessfully negotiating with Myanmar for years to send them back and, in the meantime, tens of thousands of others have entered Bangladesh illegally in recent years.

Burmese gov’t should eliminate discrimination: British MPs

British MPs this week said the situation in Rakhine State in Burma is an issue of human rights, justice and desperate humanitarian need, and called for the British government to respond. 
Tun Khin of the Burmese Rohingya Organization UK. Photo: screenshotSpeakers said that reports indicated that some members of the Burmese security services have been directly engaged in violence towards the Rohingya, with allegations of mass killings, mass arrests and looting. 

Responding to the debate, Tun Khin, president of BROUK, said, “The Burmese Government must be held to account for how they are treating the Muslim people. Injustice is being done to the Rohingya people.”

“It has been three months since Rohingya have not been able to leave their homes in Kyauktaw, Min Bya, Puaktaw Pone Nar Kyun and Mrauk Oo,” he said in a statement issued by the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK). 

Many Rohingyas do not have any food and are afraid to leave their homes, he said.

“They have become refugees in their homes,” he said. “Urgent UN monitor teams must be allowed into the area and we need a UN Commission of Inquiry into who perpetrated crimes against humanity against Rohingyas.”

He called on the UK government to withdraw the invitation to President Thein Sein to visit the UK in order to bring home to him the seriousness of the current situation. 

He also asked the British Government “to ensure strong wording in the upcoming UN General Assembly Resolution on Burma, including reform of the 1982 Citizenship Law and the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry into what has taken place in Arakan State.”

Days after the violence started, security forces began targeting predominantly Muslim areas and arrested many Rohingya men and boys, who have not been heard of since, according to a BROUK statement.

MPs said the violence of the summer has brought Burma’s 1982 citizenship law into sharp focus, and noted calls for the Burmese government to repeal that law and to replace it with a new law based on human rights, which recognizes and respects the equal rights of all the Burmese people and is in accordance with international standards.

Jonathan Ashworth, MP, who opened the debate, said that historically, the Burmese government was, perhaps, more sympathetic towards citizenship rights in relation to the Rohingya. 

The first president of Burma said that the “Muslims of Arakan certainly belong to the indigenous races of Burma. If they do not belong to the indigenous races, we also cannot be taken as indigenous races,” he said.

MPs mentioned that if the Burmese government is serious about democratic reform, it should eliminate discriminatory laws, and also urged the Government of Bangladesh to treat the refugees with more compassion and to allow the United Nations and other groups greater access to provide humanitarian aid.

About Me

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Maung daw, Arakan state, Myanmar (Burma)
I am an independent man who voted to humanitarian aid.