Myanmar’s Border Guard Police (BGP) has started to carry out surprise raids in Rohingya villages in Maungdaw Township since past few weeks.

During the raids, the BGP beat the Rohingya people, loot the valuable properties from their homes and extort money from them on arbitrary accusations. The raids have been being conducted as the punitive actions by the authorities as the Rohingya people refuse to accept the ‘Green Cards, Application of Citizenship Consideration/Verification.’

[Application of Citizenship Consideration/Verification known as Green Card (not to be mistaken with anything equivalent to US’ Green Card) is a temporary stay permit with two-year validity for the people whose applications for citizenship being verified. The Myanmar authorities are issuing the cards to the Rohingyas by force accusing them of being illegal immigrants (on their own land).]

The Border Guard Police under the commandment area (နယ္ေျမ) Base 5 in ‘Ngakura (Nagpura) village, northern Maungdaw, is conducting surprise raids in the Rohingya villages in the regions day and night. The police accuse them of the innocent villagers of possessing Bangla mobile phones and beat them for ransom money.

“The BGP under commandment area 5 raid our homes almost every day. Of them, there is a seven-member-BGP Squad. They conduct raids in Dudan (Ludain) village day and night. They beat and torture people to extort money from them.

And they have accused following innocent people having Bangala phones in Dudan village. They have tortured them and extorted money from them since July 15 although they have not found anything illegal in their homes during the raids.

No.	Name	Father	Age	Amount Extorted	Date	Remarks
1	Osman	Aamir Hussein	25	Kyat 200,000	July 15
2	Sayed Ahmed	Mohammed Amin	30	Kyat 200,000	July 15
3	Irfan	Mohammed Shariff	24	Kyat 300,000	August 9
4	Mustafa	Noor Ahmed	42	Kyat 300,000	August 29
5	Kabir Ahmed	Mohammed Hassan	28	Kyat 100,000	August 29	Kyat 300,000 extorted on July 5 too
6	Mohammed Ullah	Habiullah	26	Kyat 300,000	August 29	Robbed from Cash Counter of his shop.

They beat and inhumanely torture people upon the encounters. They are doing it possibly in the absence of the knowledge of their higher officers,” said a local Rohingya in the region.

They also take away the motor cycles belong to Rohingyas by force and return them only when they are broken. One of the seven-member BGP Squad is extremely brutal. He says “when I can torture you, *Kulars, using my own hands and legs, I get extreme pleasures,” according to the local Rohingya.

Similarly, the Border Guard Police under the command area (နယ္ေျမ) 7 in northern Maungdaw raid surrounding Rohingya villages and arbitrarily arrest the people for ransom.

“On July 26 night, BGP from Commandment Area 7 raided Rohingya villages such as Wachcha, Saindar (Thandar) and Laambaguna (Zawmadat) in southern Maungdaw.

During the raid in Zawmadat village, around 3:00AM, they found out three guests were staying at the house of Mr. Ziyabul Hoque, 30. All the three guests obtained the guest-permits to stay his home from the village administration. Yet, the BGP arrested them and took them to their detention cell in their camp in Alay Than Kyaw (Haishshu Rata), Commandment Area 7.

The police released them the next morning having extorted ransom money from respectively,” said a local in southern Maungdaw. The details of the victims are given below.

No.	Name	Father’s Name	Age	Victim’s Address	Amount Extorted	Remarks
1	Mv Atik Ullah	Ali Akhbar	50	Thandar village	Kyat 30,000
2	Sultan	Lal Meah	60	Thandar village	Kyat 30,000
3	Mv Noor Mohammed		35	Alay Than Kyaw village	Kyat 100,000
4	Foyaz	Zafar Ahmed	60	Wachcha village	BGP Robbed an Expensive RADO Watch and Some New Clothes from his home

It has been reported that the raids have been being conducted under the direction of the BGP Commander Brig-Gen Tin Ko Ko based in the BGP Headquarter 1 in Maungdaw. These atrocities are being committed in their attempts to force the local Rohingyas to accept the Green Cards.

Maungdaw, Arakan State -A Rohingya man arbitrarily charged for killing the In-Charge of his village jumped off the van and fled as the Myanmar Border Guard Police (BGP) was taking him back to the detention in Maungdaw Township last Monday evening. 

The victim is identified to be Irshadullah from Nyaung Chaung (Khadir Bil) village in Maungdaw Township. He was arbitrarily accused of assassinating the village In-Charge (who was also a Rohingya) on January 26, 2015 when the authorities failed to find out the unknown killer. (Read the Related Report: HERE)

“Mr. Irshadullah was accused of killing Mr. Zakir, the village in-charge of Khadir Bil, without any evidences and subsequently arrested by the BGP in January. He has been detained and tortured in the BGP’s cell in 4-Mile-Area in Maungdaw since then.

On Monday morning, the BGP took 25 detainees including him to the Maungdaw Township Court for the hearing of their cases. Later in the evening, the BGP was taking them back to the detention by a ‘Tiba’ Van after the court-hearings. As they reached at ‘Myothu Gyi (Hainda Fara)’ village, he jumped off the van and ran away to save himself from the cruel treatments in the cell and getting imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit,” said a local in Maungdaw.

When he jumped off, one of his hands was cuffed and another part of the handcuffs was held by a BGP personnel. Therefore, as he jumped off, the BGP personnel, too, fell off the van and got slightly injured on his head, according to an eyewitness.

Later, trucks load of BGP personnel arrived at Myothu Gyi village to search for him. Although they besieged the village and thoroughly looked for him but he was nowhere there to be found. Rumours say that he has already fled to Bangladesh.

“We fear that other unrelated/innocent people might be arrested by BGP in relation to this incidence. They don’t follow any law as they are armed-forces. So, they can do anything,” said an elderly Rohingya.