Mass killing and torching houses continued in Arakan State

Pauktaw, Arakan State: In Arakan State, there are one sided of mass killing  and torching of Rohingya houses have been going on, but the government just articulately double-dealing  to international community,  said a leader from the locality.
On October 28, the second day of Eid-ul- Azha (Qurbani) festival day of Muslims,  Rakhine mob, about 2,000, came to attack the Kayri Pyin (Sikki Para) village of Pauktaw Township, at about 5:00 pm. But, the Rakhine mob was driven out by the Rohingya villagers, Soon after, the Rakhine mob accompanied by Buddhist monks came again to the village with lethal weapons and attacked the Rohingya village.  This is the second time that the Rakhine mobs attacked the Pauktaw Township since June, this year. It has 1,200 houses. The Rakhine people did not care of religious festival of Rohingya community. Detail is not yet escalated as the houses are still burning, said a local elder from the village on condition of anonymity.

“The Rakhine mob has been trying to attack this village since October 26, but the concerned authority did not take any action.”
“From the beginning of the violence in Arakan State, the concerned authorities did not set up the Law and Order for Rakhine people, therefore, the Rakhine people and Rakhine Buddhist monks are openly and vigilantly terrorizing against the Rohingya Muslims”. .
The riots are uncontrollable because government policy is to spread Burmanization and Buddization in Rohingya community by the support of Rakhine people. Rakhine community needs of extermination of the Rohingya in regard to install its own independent state after driving all Rohingya people from Arakan soil, said another Rohingya leader.
“So, all Muslim Rohingyas have been targeted for their agenda and facing the worst genocidal attacks in the history. .Miserably, it is very regrettable that the world mechanism body UN has not yet paved a workable solution to end the crises, as well as, it has forwarded such matters of ethnic cleansing onto the terror government.”
“Besides, we are also surprised with many reports still express as ‘clashes’ and did not clearly state that who have been attacked by whom,“ said a Rohingya leader.
On October 27, in the evening, about 53 boats landed at Ohntaw (Bariza Para) mostly from Kyaukpyu town which were driven out on October 25, after negotiation was approached by the Aid staff of UN and Turkey with the security forces, according to a man from Akyab.
“However, the rest 12 boats load of about 2,000 Rohingyas landed on the shore of Tae Chaung of Akyab, which were driven out from Ward-No.3 and 4- of Pauktaw town on October 23. They are still surrounded by the Nasaka forces and are facing starvation and various abuses. They have no shelter, food, sanitations and medicines.”
“The Nasaka forces extorted and looted cash about 3 million Kyat from Kyaukpyu people and about 2 million Kyat from Pauktaw people and also looted their gold ornaments and some of them were also severely beaten up for saying that ‘Rakhines burnt  down Rohingyas’ houses’. “
The incident happened in Pauktaw today was not announced from any voice media.  The attack was done in Pauktaw by calling Rakhine extremists from other towns. This is a systematic plan of State Government along with RNDP, ALP, and other social welfare organizations by taking understanding with Central Government, said a local elder from Maungdaw.
“The riots will not be stopped until and unless taking action against the members who are behind the riots.”
“In Maungdaw Townships, many Rakhine youths are being brought from other towns and they had already been equipped. Knowing this information, the villagers of Maungdaw Township are living in panic.”
Yesterday, two helicopters of Turkey reached at Akyab, the capital of Arakan State from Ragoon with rations for refugees, said a man from Akyab.

Myanmar is inhumanly behaving towards the Rohingya Muslims

I do not agree with the views of international media and their various news articles, for the last few months, on the conflicts between Rakhine Buddhists and minority Rohingya Muslims. It is true that Rohingyas are majority in Maungdaw and Buthidaung while they are not more than 10% in Mrauk Oo , Minbya, Kyauk Phyu, Myae Bon and Pauk Taw. As such the claim by certain media groups that the Rohingyas that has been oppressed for many decades could attack the overwhelming majority Rakhines who have full support of state apparatus, is totally absurd and is very unfortunate for the suffering Rohingyas. One should ask himself and use commonsense before publishing such destructive news articles. 

 

such destructive news articles.

                                                                                                                                   
More than 5000 Rakhine extremist & Buddhists Monk killed more than 300 Rohingyas in Mrauk Oo,Minbya and Kyauk Phyu.

Many Rohingya Organizations around the world are demanding UN intervention to provide UN security forces because they are helpless and do not possess any mean to defend themselves from this well-coordinated plan of genocide launched against them. But the Bhuddist Rakhine and Myanmar government do not agree to any international intervention. They will not even allow international humanitarian organizations because they are afraid of the face of real culprits will be exposed to the worlds society. This clearly shows who is under attack and who are attacking. Buddhist monks in Myanmar declared the sympathizers of Rohingyas would be considered as "national traitors," according to a report by a humanitarian group.

Can someone imagine how Buddhist monks are supporting the plan of exterminating whole Rohingya ethnic community from Arakan? If national security forces do not support Rakhine Community how is it possible for them to do so? Surprisingly, there is no single picture or video which shows Rakhine Buddhist died or their temple was burned while there are thousands of videos and pictures to substantiate their claims of Rohingyas that they have been raped, killed, looted and houses, properties and mosques are being burned down by Rakhine Extremist.

The president has been very clear that the Arakan issue should not be seen as a religious matter but if anyone is trying to establish it as a religious issue it's definitely the monks," if he doesn’t addresses the issue as religious why he allows all Myanmar Monks to demonstrate against the Islam. There is no doubt that Thein Sein government has involved complicity in this heinous crime against Rohingyas as he is the one only president of a country in this modern days who openly called for the segregation of two communities that have lived side by side for centuries. The RNDP and the president Thein Sein are the most active players of this crime of ethnic cleansing. International community must raise their voices against them without further delay. Otherwise the world will witness the worst genocide of the history in Asia.

In an attempt to calm the situation, Myanmar President Thein Sein announced for a state of emergency in several areas and said the confrontations have nothing to do with religious differences but he fully involves in cleansing the Rohingyas and he is still going forward on with his plan that Rohingyas should be kept in refugee camp until resettlement to a third country. It seems that this is a master plan to cleanse Rohingya Arakan, eventually from the whole country.

Few days ago, riot ensued in Bangladesh. It was also pre-planned conspiracy jointly launched by Bangladesh and Myanmar governments. Prime minister of Bangladesh promised that her government would give compensation to the lost properties in the Bangladesh during the riot while Myanmar Government embarked on mass arbitrary arrest of Rohingyas.

A media reported as: ‘Last week’s clashes once again highlight the plight of the Rohingya as a minority that has been discriminated against for a very long time. The systematic persecution of this group has been ell organized and its brutality has reached all facets of life. This group had been targeted decades ago with a systematic policy of elimination”.

It must be stopped. Sending extra troops and fortifying security in the Rakhine region is not enough to stop the violence. Without addressing the root cause of the current situation, the problem will continue and so will be the bloodshed’.

Rakhine extremist & Buddhists Monk are burned Rohingya Muslims houses and killed their women and children’s.

There was an agreement between Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and Myanmar government to open liaison offices in Myanmar to provide the humanitarian aids for the victims of violence regardless of race and religion but the monks and Buddhists backed by the government protested against the OIC for opening the office in Myanmar. The Buddhists from Rakhine state are blocking the aids for the Rohingya since the Turkish government delegation visited the Refugee camps.

As the situation becomes worse day by day, we would like to request UN, USA, EU, and OIC to advocate for the most oppressed Rohingyas of Myanmar. The world community should give pressure on the Myanmar government to stop the ongoing violence against Rohingya immediately, and restore their citizenship and ethnic rights, and to urgently send an UN enquiry team for the crime against humanity to Arakan State.

I would like to appeal international Community for immediate humanitarian assistance for the displaced Rohingyas who urgently need humanitarian aids, medical supplies and other basic necessities.

the article by Mohamed Ibrahim Frankfurt

Burma’s gov’t must address ‘root causes’ of violence: HRW

Burma’s government urgently needs to provide security and aid for the Rohingyas and Arakanese in the Rakhine State, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said this weekend.

New satellite imagery obtained by HRW showed extensive destruction of homes and other property in a predominantly Rohingya Muslim area of the coastal town of Kyauk Pyu – one of several areas of new violence and displacement, it said.

Human Rights Watch said it identified 811 destroyed structures on the eastern coastal edge of Kyauk Pyu following arson attacks reportedly conducted on Oct. 24, less than 24 hours before the satellite images were captured. The area of destruction measures 35 acres and included 633 buildings and 178 houseboats and floating barges adjacent on the water, all of which were razed, it said in a press statement.

It said there are no indications of fire damage to the immediate west and east of this zone of destruction. Media accounts and local officials said that many Rohingya in the town fled by sea toward Sittwe, the capital of Arakan State, 200 kilometers to the north.

Violence renewed between Arakan Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims on Oct. 21 and continued all week in at least five townships: Minbya, Mrak-U, Myebon, Rathedaung, and Kyauk Pyu. This was the first time violence had reached Kyauk Pyu and most of these other parts of the state since the sectarian violence and related abuses by state security forces against the Rohingya began in early June. The Rohingya have suffered the brunt of the violence, said HRW.

“Burma’s government urgently needs to provide security for the Rohingya in Arakan State, who are under vicious attack,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Unless the authorities also start addressing the root causes of the violence, it is only likely to get worse.”

The Burmese government initially said that more than 2,800 houses were burned down in the new violence and that 112 people were killed, an estimate it later reduced to 64. Human Rights Watch said it feared the death toll is far higher based on allegations from witnesses fleeing scenes of carnage and the government’s history of underestimating figures that might lead to criticism of the state.

Prior to this most recent outbreak of violence, the local Arakan Buddhist population had largely resumed life and daily activities as usual, said HRW.

The approximately 75,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs), most of them Rohingya, were still taking shelter in at least 40 IDP camps in Sittwe and Kyauktaw townships. The 15 largest camps surround Sittwe.

Sittwe’s estimated population of 200,000 people had been divided evenly between Buddhists and Muslims. Now the Rohingya and non-Rohingya Muslim population of Sittwe has been largely segregated to the IDP camps, and Sittwe is nearly devoid of Muslims, said HRW.

The Burmese government denies citizenship to most Rohingya and the normal rights accorded to citizens.

Aung San Suu Kyi, the Rohingya of Burma and the challenge of faith | Ambassador Akbar Ahmed and Harrison Akins

In this photo taken on Sept. 8, 2012, Muslims gather during a visit by a delegation of American diplomats including U.S. Ambassador to Myanmar Derek Mitchell, unseen, at a refugee camp in Sittwe, Rakhine State, western Myanmar. Three-and-a-half months after some of the bloodiest clashes in a generation between Myanmar’s ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and stateless Muslims known as Rohingya left the western town of Sittwe in flames, nobody is quite sure when -or even if- the Rohingya will be allowed to resume the lives they once lived here. (AP)She came, she saw, she conquered. The photograph of Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi standing proudly with America’s smiling political elite at her Congressional Gold Medal ceremony last month in Washington, D.C., provides a powerful image of this heroine of democracy. She has justifiably caught the world’s attention and earned its love. Arizona Sen. John McCain called her “his personal hero.”

In Suu Kyi’s visit to American University where she received an honorary doctorate during her U.S. visit, we are provided with another powerful image of her, that of a supplicant Buddhist kneeling before a dozen monks to receive their blessing. She has not only become a voice for freedom and political leadership but a voice of Buddhist compassion for the Burmese people and the ethnic minority groups on the periphery who have long suffered under Burma’s oppressive government.

Suu Kyi, the daughter of Burmese founding father Aung San, was known to rely on her Buddhist faith for a sense of inner freedom during her 15 years of captivity after rising to power during the 1988 student uprising. After her release in 2010, she continued her work for democracy, stressing the “loving kindness” of Buddhist teachings for Burma’s democratic transition in place of feelings of hatred and revenge. She was elected to the Burmese Parliament representing the National League for Democracy, and in recent weeks, she has expressed her willingness to continue to serve her nation as the next president of Burma with elections scheduled for 2015.

With Suu Kyi’s near universal appeal and star power, she is in a unique position for both political leadership in Burma as well as a voice of Buddhist compassion and an ally for the oppressed. Buddha stressed that compassion lay at the heart of a Buddha nature and demonstrates one’s respect for the dignity of life.

Yet, Suu Kyi has remained curiously silent on one of the most urgent humanitarian issues facing Burma, the plight of the Rohingya people.

The Rohingya, whom the BBC and many NGOs call “one of the world’s most persecuted minority groups,” are the little known Muslim people of the coastal Arakan state of western Burma. Over the past three decades, the Rohingya have been systematically pushed out of their homes by Burma’s military government and subjected to widespread violence along with the complete negation of their rights and even identity. They have become a stateless minority.

Many hundreds of thousands have fled to neighboring countries. The Rohingya are surrounded by adherents of the great faiths - Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, and Christianty - all of which emphasis compassion and charity for the needy. Despite these compulsions from their faiths, many Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus and Christians in South Asia have treated the Rohingya with nothing but outright hostility.

The current situation of the Rohingya is a challenge not only for all in the region to adhere to the demands of their faiths but a challenge for Aung San Suu Kyi and the Buddhists of Burma to treat the suffering Rohingya with “loving kindness,” of which they have seen little.

The widely reported violence in July 2012 against the Rohingya by the neighboring Buddhist Rakhine people in which over 1,000 Rohingya were killed and entire villages burned to the ground must be understood in the context of this sustained campaign of oppression against the Rohingya. The violent actions of the Rakhine were committed with the complicity and, at times, participation of the government security forces.

Even the new democratic reforms have not altered the perception of the Rohingya with President Thein Sein stating in July 2012 in the wake of this violence that he would not recognize the Rohingya or their rights and wished to turn over the entire ethnic group to the United Nations’ High Commissioner for Refugees. Buddhist monks, contrary to the teachings of Buddha, staged anti-Rohingya marches in September to declare their support for the president’s proposal. The Burmese government has blocked the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)from opening an aid office to assist displaced Rohingya due to the violence in Arakan state.

While many ethnic minorities in Burma, with non-Burmese peoples comprising over 30 percent of the population, have been the victims of the military junta’s oppressive measures, the Rohingya stand apart in that their very existence is threatened.

When General Ne Win and the military junta came to power in 1962, the central government began to shift away from the inclusive vision of Aung San and towards a nationalist ideology based on the Burmese ethnicity and the Buddhist faith. The Rohingya, as both non-Burmese and Muslim, were now stripped of any legitimacy and erroneously and incorrectly labeled “illegal Bengali immigrants.”

The initial push of the military’s ethnic cleansing campaign came in 1978 under Operation Naga Min with the purpose of scrutinizing everyone in the state as either a citizen or alleged “illegal immigrant.” For the Rohingya people, this resulted in widespread rape, arbitrary arrests, desecration of mosques, destruction of villages, and confiscation of lands. In the wake of this violence, nearly a quarter of a million Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh, many of whom were later repatriated to Burma where they faced further rape, imprisonment, and torture.

In 1991, a second push, known as Operation Pyi Thaya, or Operation Clean and Beautiful Nation, was launched with the same purpose, resulting in another mass exodus of 200,000 Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh, with nearly 300,000 refugees remaining today, many without food or medical assistance from a Muslim population ignoring the demands for compassion in their faith towards their fellow Muslims.

With the passage of the 1982 Citizenship Law, the Rohingya were officially denied Burmese citizenship and effectively ceased to exist legally. With their loss of citizenship, the Rohingya found their lives difficult to lead. They were barred from travelling outside their villages, repairing their decaying places of worship, receiving an education in any language or even marrying and having children without rarely granted government permission, often procured through bribes which few are able to afford. The failure to receive permission for any of these innocuous acts lands the offenders in prison where men are beaten and women routinely raped.

Women who become illegally pregnant are forced to either flee the country or resort to dangerous back-alley abortions, where many die because of their inability to get adequate medical treatment due to the severe travel restrictions.

The Rohingya are also subjected to modern-day slavery, where they are forced to work on infrastructure projects, such as constructing “model villages” to house Burmese settlers intended to displace them. Women are susceptible to forced prostitution by the Burmese security forces.

U.S. House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton applaud after Burmese opposition politician Aung San Suu Kyi finishes her speech during a U.S. Congressional Gold Medal presentation ceremony. (GETTY IMAGES)While many efforts have been made by the Burmese government towards the creation of an open and democratic political system, there is still much more to be done. Suu Kyi, following the example of inclusive leaders like Nelson Mandela, should reach out to the Rohingya people and set a positive precedent for an all-embracing society which welcomes the participation of the Rohingya as well as all the ethnic minorities of Burma. In this way, she will also be living up to the ideals of her Buddhist faith to show compassion towards those who suffer. Where she leads, others will follow.

Only when the systematic violence against the Rohingya ends can a truly democratic Burma be legitimate in the eyes of its own people and the international community.

But the first step is for Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma to acknowledge the Rohingya exist.

Akbar Ahmed is the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University and former Pakistani High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Ireland. Harrison Akins, an Ibn Khaldun Chair research fellow at American, is assisting Ahmed with his forthcoming book, “The Thistle and the Drone: How America’s War on Terror became a Global War on Tribal Islam .”

A history of ‘complete repression’ in Arakan state | Joseph Allchin

People displaced by the recent violence in the Kyukphyu township sit together after arriving to Thaechaung refugee camp, outside of Sittwe on 28 October 2012. (Reuters)

Ethnic cleansing does not have to, by definition, emanate from a government.

However after nearly 50 years of military rule, the apparatus of the state is entrenched in the fabric of Burmese society and as the pogrom continues in Arakan state, the back story provides unnerving evidence that systematic official behavior has lead to the current crisis.

What has occurred in western Burma has been described as a sectarian conflict between two communities who simply hate each other. This prognosis is demonstrably false and a look at the situation in Arakan provides ample evidence that there is a systematic pattern, which in most cases would amount to crimes against humanity.

One element of this picture is the improbability of a ‘sectarian conflict’. Arakan state has a population of almost 4 million, making the Muslim or Rohingya population only about or less than quarter of the inhabitants, thus making a two-sided conflict highly illogical.

Further, the minority population has been controlled by the state to the extent that they are unable to travel between towns, renovate a mosque or even have a child or marry without a permit from the military.

The control of this population has long been perpetuated not just by uniformed military or Nasaka (border guard) personnel but also by quasi-civilian militias, as has been the case in much of the country. Indeed in Burma the ruling party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) grew out of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA).

This organisation had perhaps its most notorious hour in 2003, when it attacked Aung San Suu Kyi’s convoy in central Burma. The authorities naturally tried to portray it as a clash between two rival political groups. However, only one side, the National League for Democracy (NLD), suffered 70 deaths and only one side’s supporters were arrested – also the NLD.

In the wake of the Depayin massacre, the US embassy dispatched a cable back to Washington entitled: “MOSQUE RAZED, PARAMILITARIES TRAINED.”

In the cable, one of the militia’s discussed was, “the USDA-affiliated ‘Power Ranger’ militia” that was receiving “rudimentary riot-control and military training.” One of its other jobs was to hold up the Americans in case of an invasion, while the government was “training a paramilitary ‘Peoples Militia’ in Arakan state to assist in putting down any general uprising.”

“Rohingya Muslims specifically, suffer from an aggravated, systematic, institutionalised form of persecution”

According to the cable, “Local officials on July 22 (2003) reportedly tore down a mosque in Sittwe, 70 miles SE of the Bangladeshi border, and arrested seven Muslims, one of whom subsequently died in custody.”

The dispatch goes on to explain that the mosque was demolished because the worshippers “made unauthorized improvements to the structure, resulting in the decision by local authorities to tear down the whole building.”

The embassy concludes that, “We frequently hear stories of pro-SPDC ‘fake monks’ allegedly inciting violence against Muslims to deflect anti-regime ire.”

Dr Kyaw Yin Hlaing, who is now on the commission to investigate June’s violence in Arakan state, also notes this type of tactic being used. In 2008, he wrote in a US legal journal that:

“Before former intelligence chief General Khin Nyunt was dismissed and his intelligence agency disbanded, the junta could almost always uncover opposition groups that were planning to organise protests. In 1997, for instance, the junta became aware of monks’ plans to protest a regional commander’s improper renovation of a famous Buddha statue in Mandalay. Before the monks could launch the protest, a rumour emerged that a Buddhist woman had been raped by a Muslim businessman. The government diverted their attention from the regional commander to the Muslim businessman, eventually causing an anti-Muslim riot.”

He concludes that: “intelligence agents have often instigated anti-Muslim riots in order to prevent angry monks from engaging in anti-government activities.”

Given the uncanny resemblance of this case and the details surrounding late May’s ‘spark incident’, one must ask questions about the current government and the legitimacy of the reform process.

Khin Nyunt was not only adept at preventing anti-government actions, he was also good at neutralising ethnic insurgent groups and casually referred to the entire nation of India as “kalars” – a pejorative term used in Burma to describe Muslims and individuals of South Asian descent.

Government policy then was described as “pervasive and sometimes aggressive religious discrimination that favours Burma’s Buddhist majority.”

While the US embassy noted in a cable in 2005 that the UNHCR head at the time Jean-François Durieux described “the situation in northern Arakan as ‘shocking,’ with the GOB [government of Burma] in constant denial of the true situation. Although Muslims have some religious freedom in Rangoon, the GOB has a policy of ‘complete repression’ of Rohingyas in northern Arakan. He noted that Buddhist temples are ‘springing up everywhere,’ although he estimates the Buddhist population as only one percent of the population [in northern Arakan].”

If there is any doubt that there is systematic repression against the population, the US embassy noted that, “The military has effectively sealed the Rohingyas off from the world and keeps them at the bare subsistence level – it is an internment camp.” They further correctly forecasted that, “We should not assume that any future democratic government will accord these people their basic human rights.”

Needless to say however despite this and the accumulated evidence, the US government has lifted punitive measures against the government.

The lack of civil rights is overshadowed moreover by the basic human indicators that have been thrust on the population by the government, as the US embassy noted: “Infant mortality is four times the national average (71 per 1000 births); 64% of children under five are chronically malnourished and stunted growth is common.” Infant mortality then is roughly equivalent to that of Ethiopia, which is chronically affected by drought, and 80% of the population is illiterate with one teacher for every 79 students.

If this were not systematic, the discrepancies with other regions of the country would not be so severe. The government has been more than able to prevent freedom of movement for the roughly 850,000 Rohingya still in existence in the area, it would then seem that with one of the largest armed forces in Asia controlling the movement of mobs would be easy.

According to jurist Guy Horton writing in 2005, “the Rohingya Muslims specifically, suffer from an aggravated, systematic, institutionalised form of persecution designed to destroy them through exclusion, rather than assimilation.”

Whilst according to the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:

“…any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

Given that Thein Sein has attempted to off load the entire population onto the UNHCR, it is evident that he too is in favour of removing the population. With the well-documented government abuses against the population, there is not much of a case to suggest that what is occurring now in Arakan state is anything less than genocide.

-The opinions and views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect DVB’s editorial policy.

Making Rohingya statelessness | Nay San Lwin

Burmese government records of Rohingya In his article, “A friend’s appeal to Burma”, published on 19 June 2012, Benedict Rogers noted that the first President of Burma, Sao Shwe Thaike, a Shan, said that “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”. “The people living in Buthidaung and Maungdaw Townships are Rohingya, ethnic of Burma” said Burma’s first prime minister U Nu in a pubic speech on 25 September 1954 at 8 pm. “The Rohingya has the equal status of nationality with Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Mon, Rakhine and Shan” said the prime minister and minister for defense U Ba Swe at public gatherings in Buthidaung and Maungdaw Townships on 3 and 4 November 1959. “The people living in Mayu Frontier is ethnic Rohingya” included in the announcement of Frontiers Administration office under Prime Minister Office on 20 November 1961. Mayu Frontier is composed of Buthidaung, Maungdaw and Rathedaung Townships.

Broadcasting from radio program in the Rohingya language was relayed three times a week from the indigenous language programme of the official Burma Broadcasting Service in Rangoon, from 15 May 1961 to 30 October 1965. Myanma Encyclopedia Vol.9, page 89-90, published in 1964, concludes that population of 500,000 living in Mayu Frontier of Northern Arakan State 75% is Rohingya. “The majority people live in Buthidaung, Maungdaw and Rathedaung Townships are ethnic Rohingya and the minorities are Rakhine, Daingnet, Mro and Khami” wrote in Tatmataw Khit Yay journal Vol.12, No.6 printed on 18 July 1961 and Vol. 12, No.9 printed on 8 August 1961.

In his speech on 8 July 1961, the Army Deputy Commander-in-Chief Brigadier General Aung Gyi said, “The people living in Mayu Frontier are Rohingya. Pakistan (now Bangladesh) is located in west of Mayu Frontier and Muslims are living there. The people living in west are called Pakistani and the people living here are called Rohingya. This is not the only border that has same people on both sides, border with China, India and Thailand also have the same phenomenon. For example: Lisu, Ei-Kaw, La-Wa live in Kachin State and same people live in China. Also Shan people can be found in China as Tai. The ethnics Mon, Karen and Malay are also living in Thailand. In India-Burma border Chin, Li-Shaw and Naga are living. These people are living in Burma as ethnics and living in India as well”.

The Rangoon University Rohingya Students Association was one of the many ethnic student associations that functioned from 1959 to 1961 under the registration numbers 113/99 December 1959 and 7/60 September 1960 respectively. In High School Geography textbook, printed in 1978, where scattered living regions of national races of Burma is shown on page 86, Northern Arakan is marked as ‘Rohingya region’.

Rohingya elites/MPs before and after independence of Burma

After the separation of Burma from India in 1935, the “Di-Archy” system was replaced by a ruling system called “91 Taa-na” (Departments administration). In that system there were 132 seats in the governing body and a total of 132 members were elected from various communal backgrounds. In this election, Mr. Ghani Markan, a Rohingya MP from Buthidaung and Maungdaw constituency, was elected. Point to be noted here that Mr. Ghani Markan was from the Community of “Burmese national” category and they (Rohingya) represented the Burmese national and not the Indian or any other group.

The General Election for Constituent Assembly in 1947 was organized just before the independence, mainly by the participation of General Aung San. This time, Buthidaung and Maungdaw had two separate constituencies. U Abdul Ghaffar for Buthidaung and U Sultan Ahmed for Maungdaw were elected.

U Abul Bashar for Buthidaung, U Sultan Ahmed and Daw Aye Nyunt for Maungdaw and U Abdul Ghaffar for Upper house were elected in 1951 election. U Ezhar Miah and U Abul Bashar for Buthidaung, U Sultan Ahmed and U Abul Khair for Maungdaw, U Sultan Mahmood for Buthidaung North and U Abdul Ghaffar for Upper house were elected in 1956. U Sultan Mahmood and U Abul Bashar for Buthidaung, U Rashid and U Abul Khair for Maungdaw and U Abdu Suban for Upper house were elected in 1961. By then the Rohingya community were involved more actively in politics. For the first time, one of the Rohingya elected member became a cabinet minister of Prime Minister U Nu’s government. He was U Sultan Mahmood, and in charge for the ministry of Education and Health. U Abdul Ghaffar and U Abul Bashar, elected members of Buthidaung became the Parliamentary Secretaries.

Even in the era of U Ne Win, the Rohingya exercised voting and representing rights in the Pyithu Hluttaw (National Assembly) Election and in the election of different levels of Pyithu (National) Council. Likewise, many Rohingya dignitaries were endorsed in the Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) and some of them held higher positions as well. U Abul Hussein and Dr. Abdur Rahim were elected in 1974 from Buthidaung and Maungdaw.

Rohingya have been subjected to the discriminatory measure initiated in 1978 by the then BSPP and local authority of Rakhine community. They started to take the initiative to deprive the fundamental rights of Rohingya community and since then the Rohingya were marginalized from the Pyithu Hluttaw Election. U Tun Aung Kyaw aka Abdul Hai, was the only Rohingya representative elected in 1978 election from Maungdaw, but none from Buthidaung. The Rohingya were excluded from participating in the Pyithu Hluttaw elections in 1982 and 1986. However, some Rohingya were seen at lower levels of Pyithu Council of the BSPP.

In 1990 multi party general election, Rohingya exercised the voting and representing rights again. U Kyaw Min, U Tin Maung, U Chit Lwin and U Fazal Ahmed from National Democratic Party for Human Rights (NDPH) were elected from Buthidaung and Maungdaw constituencies. Later U Kyaw Min became a member of Committee Representing People’s Parliament (CRPP).

Making Rohingya stateless

Rohingya people used to have National Registration Cards (NRC) like everyone else in the country. Upon introduction of discriminatory policies on Rohingya by Ne Win in 1970s, the NRCs were taken away by various measures. Numerous check-points were set up to block Rohingya’s travel and to confiscate their IDs. Nagamin (the Dragon) operation in 1977-78 was skillfully crafted to drive out all Rohingya from Burma. It produced about 250,000 refugees that fled to neighboring Bangladesh. However, most of the fleeing refugees were returned to their original dwelling places, so the plan was not quite successful for the Burmese regime. Although systematic discriminatory policies were in place and IDs and other government issued documents were seized by the government, Rohingya remained as citizens of Burma until 1982. The Citizenship Act promulgated in 1982 is the official document that striped off the citizenship of Rohingya.

Numerous forms of discriminations followed by the enactment of 1982 Citizenship Law and lives of Rohingya had become incomprehensible. Again, another operation was carried out in 1991 by the successive military regime and it produced about 300,000 refugees, but this time about 200,000 remained in Bangladesh, of which, 28,000 are recognized refugees by the UNHCR and the rest are scattered around the country and are not recognized as refugees.

In the meantime, the regime uses different methods to eliminate (force out) the Rohingya population for the region: confiscation of farmland, establishing Buddhist settlement on Rohingya’s land, force labor, restriction on movement, restriction on marriage, harassment, desecration of religious places, arbitrary taxation, extrajudicial killings, rapes, and the list goes on.

The new National Scrutiny Card was introduced in 1989 and Rohingya were not entitled to receive them as they have become non-citizen under the 1982 Citizenship Act. However, the authorities issued Temporary Scrutiny Card to all and promised twice in 2008 constitution referendum and 2010 election that National Scrutiny Card will soon be issued to all the Rohingyas. But the promises made to Rohingya were never honored.

In a recent parliament session, when some MPs raised the issue of Rohingya, the immigration minister U Khin Yee said that “there is no Rohingya in Burma”. The same was echoed by the director general of the population department at a later date. Although many Rohingya were members of National League for Democracy (NLD) in Buthidaung and Maungdaw Townships during 1990 election, now the vice chairman U Tin Oo and other high ranking officials of NLD are openly saying that there is no race called ‘Rohingya’ in Burma, which is an utter disregard for historical facts, human rights and democratic principle. NLD’s discriminatory policy on Rohingya is no less than that of the military regime.

There is no justice for Rohingya in Burma as racism is deeply rooted in Burmese society. Rohingyas are made scapegoats to justify their evil doings by both ultra-nationalist racists and the regime to divert public attention. As history cannot be deleted or altered, the truth needs to be revealed and justice needs to be established. It is the human rights defenders that need to work hard to establish justice and defend the rights of the unjustly persecuted.

Myanmar’s Ethnic Violence: Where Is Suu Kyi?

People collect pieces of metal from the rubble of a neighborhood in Pauktaw township in Rakhine State, Myanmar that was burned in recent violence October 27, 2012 (Soe Zeya Tun/Courtesy Reuters).

Over the past week, violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine State, in the western part of Myanmar, has flared up badly once again. According to reports in local media and the news wires, over the past seven days at least sixty —and as many as one hundred— people have been killed in clashes. The local security forces allegedly have been firing on some crowds, and other reports suggest that the refugee camps set up for Muslims in the area have already become so overcrowded that they can no longer hold new arrivals.

The cause of the new violence is very murky, with reports and rumors suggesting that some local activists, or even the security forces, have been triggering the clashes in order to lead to a crackdown on Muslims. Other reports suggest that some local fights between young men sparked the violence.

But amidst the murkiness and the chaos, a larger question has arisen: Who in Myanmar’s leadership is going to take a serious, progressive approach to solving this ethnic tension? Though President Thein Sein has passed laudable economic and political reforms, his government has been mostly silent on the violence in Rakhine state, refusing to allow the Organization of the Islamic Conference to open offices to help investigate and potentially resolve the violence. It remains unclear whether the security forces are directly involved in the violence, and whether Thein Sein has tried to restrain local commanders, or even has total control over them.

Aung San Suu Kyi has been nearly as quiet, alas. Throughout the violence in Rakhine State, which has gone on for months now, Suu Kyi has said almost nothing, even as other leading members of her party have issued harsh, anti-Muslim statements. During her recent trip to the United States, Suu Kyi mostly dodged questions about the violence, and she has been vilified by some Muslim leaders in Myanmar for her silence.

To be sure, Suu Kyi is trying to make the shift from opposition leader and symbol to parliamentary leader and party leader, and backing rights for Muslims in Rakhine State is not popular among the Burman majority, many of whom back the National League for Democracy (NLD). And yet if Suu Kyi and her party were to be in power, running the government, they would need a real plan to reduce violence in Rakhine State, deal with the power of local commanders on the ground, and restrain the security forces. Thus the violence is not only an issue of rights —which Suu Kyi in the past paid great lip service to— but also of making coherent policy for the future, policy that at least calms the situation in Rakhine State and allows for some greater aid to flow in to refugees. Failing to make any real statement on the crisis seems a poor choice morally for Suu Kyi and the NLD leadership but also a sign of their great gap in policy experience.