By John Roberts and Peter Symonds
30 August 2012
Reports
from the US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International,
and from Al Jazeera, have shed further light on the oppressive
conditions facing the Rohingya Muslim population in Burma’s Rakhine
state (also known as Arakan), as well as the communal violence that
broke out in June.
The Rohingya are a distinct ethnic group in
Burma and neighbouring Bangladesh. They have lived in the area for
centuries and are believed to have descended from Arab traders. Both
countries treat them as illegal immigrants, deny them citizenship and
discriminate against them. In times of rising economic stress and social
tension, they become convenient scapegoats for nationalist demagogues.
On
June 3, a Buddhist mob pulled 10 Muslims from a bus in the town of
Toungop and slaughtered them. Local police and soldiers stood by and
watched. The murders were supposedly in retaliation for the rape and
killing of a Buddhist woman in nearby Ramri on May 28, even though three
Muslim men had been arrested for that crime.
Tensions exploded
on June 8 when thousands of Rohingya rioted in Maungdaw after Friday
prayers, destroying the property of Arakan Buddhists and killing an
unknown number of people. Sectarian violence swept through the state
capital of Sittwe and surrounding areas. After Burmese President Thein
Sein declared a state of emergency on June 10, the security forces and
mobs of Arakan thugs went on a rampage against Rohingya communities. In
all, at least 80 people died and 5,000 homes were torched.
An
August 1 HRW report, entitled “‘The Government Could Have Stopped This’:
Sectarian Violence and Ensuing Abuses in Burma’s Arakan State,”
provided details of the atrocities carried out by both sides in the
communal conflict, and by Burmese security forces against the Rohingya.
The
HRW press release stated: “Burmese security forces committed killings,
rape, and mass arrests against Rohingya Muslims after failing to protect
both them and Arakan Buddhists during deadly sectarian violence in
western Burma in June 2012. Government restrictions on humanitarian
access to the Rohingya community have left many of the over 100,000
people displaced and in dire need of food, shelter, and medical care.”
One
example of the security forces’ role in Sittwe occurred on June 12. A
Buddhist mob burned down the houses of up to 10,000 Rohingya Muslims in
the city’s Narzi quarter—the most economically important Muslim area.
Police and the anti-riot paramilitary “opened fire on the Rohingya with
live ammunition” as they attempted to extinguish fires.
HRW and
Amnesty International confirmed that since June, hundreds of Rohingya
men and boys had been arrested and held incommunicado. The government
denied this, but the HRW reported one case in a southern coastal town,
in which 82 fleeing Rohingya were arrested in late June and jailed for a
year for violating immigration laws.
HRW said that since June
thousands of Rohingya had been pushed back into Burma by the Bangladesh
government, in violation of international law. HRW representatives
witnessed Rohingya men, women and children pleading for mercy after
arriving in Bangladesh, only to be forced back to sea in unseaworthy
boats. “It is unknown how many people died in these pushbacks,” a HRW
statement noted.
On August 26, HRW called on the Bangladesh
government to reverse its order that three international aid
groups—Doctors Without Borders, Action Against Hunger and Muslim
Aid—cease their assistance to Rohingya in the Cox’s Bazaar and
surrounding areas.
An Al Jazeera report on August 9
painted a picture of the situation in Sittwe, a city of over 200,000
inhabitants. “Traditional Muslim neighbourhoods... were deserted, locked
up, or living in deep secrecy,” it said. “Most striking was the almost
complete absence of the Rohingya population that once made up nearly
one-third of the city’s population, and the largest portion of its
working class…
“The Rohingya who worked as the city’s
ever-present rickshaw drivers and porters at the jetty and markets are
now gone. There are no signs of Muslims at the airport, the boat
shuttles that ferry passengers to outlying islands, or even the local
buses that run Buthidaung to Maungdaw, two Rohingya-majority (areas).”
The
article reported that Muslim residents “say (there) is a state
sponsored campaign to segregate the population along ethno-sectarian
lines.” The report cited unconfirmed statements by off-duty soldiers
that many more military murders had been committed than those reported.
Asia
HRW director Brad Adams commented: “Burmese security forces failed to
protect the Arakan and Rohingya from each other and then unleashed a
campaign of violence and mass roundups against the Rohingya. The
government claims it is committed to ending ethnic strife and abuse, but
recent events in Arakan State demonstrate that state-sponsored
persecution and discrimination persist.”
These remarks reflect
the broader campaign by the US and its European allies to pressure the
Burma’s military-backed regime to distance itself from China, align more
closely with the West and open up to foreign investment. The “human
rights” issue—including demands for an end to ethnic conflicts in
northern Burma—has been exploited by the US as a convenient means for
extracting concessions.
There has, however, been a muted
international response to the persecution of the Rohingya, except from
governments in Muslim majority countries, seeking to placate public
concern at home.
On August 20, Indonesian President Susilo
Bambang Yudhoyono appointed former Vice President Jusuf Kalla as a
special envoy to Burma to show “solidarity with our Rohingya brothers.” A
meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on August 23
resolved to take the matter to the UN because of “the continued recourse
to violence by the Myanmar [Burmese] authorities against the members of
this minority and their refusal to recognise their right to
citizenship.”
From Washington, however, there has been little
criticism of the Burmese junta. Full diplomatic relations between the
two countries were restored without a hitch. The new US ambassador to
Myanmar Derek Mitchell told the Wall Street Journal he had been surprised that the violence spread rapidly but added: “I don’t think it affects our view on sanctions.”
The
Obama administration has never been concerned about the “human rights”
of the Burmese people. Moreover, in the case of the Rohingya, criticism
of the Burmese government would risk exposing Burmese opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi, who is closely aligned to the West.
Suu Kyi
has been silent on the persecution of the Rohingya. Her National League
for Democracy (NLD) has the same chauvinist attitude as the government,
regarding them as “illegal immigrants.” In her first speech to Burma’s
parliament on July 25, she called for rights for ethnic minorities
without mentioning the Rohingya, who are not official recognised as one
of Burma’s 135 ethnic groups.
To placate international
criticism, President Thein Sein announced a commission of inquiry on
August 17 into the sectarian violence. The 27-member commission has no
Rohingya representatives. Its chairman, Dr Aye Maung, advocates communal
segregation. Another commissioner, Ko Ko Gyi, a member of Suu Kyi’s
NLD, has called for the deportation of the Rohingya.
Source: Here
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