By Saif Khalid

Al Jazeera

November 15, 2017

Activists have called for stronger action to stop the "ongoing genocide" against Rohingya Muslims after US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said he was against "broad-based economic sanctions" against Myanmar.

At a joint press conference with Myanmar's de-facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi in the capital Naypyitaw on Wednesday, Tillerson said he favoured individual sanctions against military officials based on "credible and reliable information" of their involvement in atrocities.

Responding to Tillerson's call for an independent investigation, Tun Khin - president of Burmese Rohingya Organisation based in the UK - asked how it will be carried out when the military is refusing to allow a fact-finding mission on the ground.

"Rohingya people are facing genocide in the 21st century. This is the time to act. What the US and the international community is doing is not enough," said Tun Khin.

According to a report published on Tuesday by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and Fortify Rights, there is "mounting evidence" of genocide against the Rohingya in Myanmar.

"These crimes thrive on impunity and inaction," said Matthew Smith, chief executive officer of Fortify Rights in a statement. "Condemnations aren’t enough. Without urgent international action towards accountability, more mass killings are likely."

Tun Khin called for targeted sanctions against Myanmar's military, which has driven out about 600,000 Rohingya from western Rakhine state into neighbouring Bangladesh since August.

"Every day Rohingyas are being killed and their houses burnt. It's two-and-a-half months since the military offensive began and still atrocities are continuing," he said.

"We demand that Myanmar be referred to the ICC [the International Criminal Court] and the UN peace-keeping force be deployed to protect the lives of Rohingya. We also need a UN-mandated global arms embargo on the country."

Human rights activists have also lambasted a report by Myanmar's army that said no Rohingya civilians were killed in the military crackdown launched in the wake of deadly attacks on soldiers by an armed Rohingya group.

Ro Nay San Lwin, a Rohingya activist based in Germany, said the army will never admit its crimes against the Rohingya - which troops have been committing for the past 39 years.

"They have committed many crimes against other minorities as well such as Karen, Kachin and Shan," said Ro Nay San Lwin.

Myanmar's army has transferred Major-General Maung Maung Soe, who was behind the crackdown against the Rohingya, to another post.

But Ro Nay San Lwin said this was just a "public relations exercise".

"This was done to show that they [the military] are taking actions ahead of Tillerson's visit."

By Afrose Jahan Chaity

Al Jazeera

October 25, 2017

Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh - Eighteen-year-old Rohingya refugee Amir Mia is carrying his deceased grandfather's body through the Balukhali expansion camp in the Bangladeshi port city of Cox's Bazar. He is taking his grandfather to be buried in a graveyard that was created after the recent influx of Rohingya refugees, fleeing violence by the Myanmar army that the UN has described as ethnic cleansing, began on August 25. 

He was elderly and died of age-related diseases, he explains as he winds his way through the camp's narrow, muddy lanes.

As various waves of Rohingya refugees have fled Myanmar over the past few decades, filling the camps, which have in turn expanded, camp residents have buried their dead wherever they could find the space. Without any land being set aside for graveyards by the Bangladeshi government, the refugees have identified their own sites. 

The small graveyard in which Amir is burying his grandfather already looks overcrowded. The graves are packed closely together, temporary bamboo fences separating one from another. 

In the neighbouring Kutupalong registered camp, 16-year-old Mohammad Alam, who was born in Bangladesh after his parents fled Myanmar in the 1990s, explains that his father is the leader of one block of the camp and a gravedigger who is responsible for digging graves for the residents of his block.

The graveyards have become overcrowded, Mohammad explains, with three or four bodies being placed in each grave after the recent influx of refugees.

"Unlike life, death is an inevitable truth and here no one can be buried peacefully as we must dig old graves to make new ones," Mohammad elaborates as he stands at a tea stall beside one of the new graveyards in the Kutupalong expansion camp.

He has seen people burying their dead in front of their houses, he adds. "New refugees don't know about this place. They don't know where to go or what to do. I have seen a family burying a dead body just beside their newly built house.

"A few days later, the rain had washed the sign of the grave away and more new refugees came and built their tent over that grave."

'I dug up one grave more than four times'

Fifty-two-year-old Nur Hossain has been living in the Kutupalong registered camp for the past 26 years. He was a farmer back in Myanmar, but in Bangladesh he works in a soup factory in the camp and as a gravedigger. 

He came here in the early 1990s, with his wife and three sons. 

"The Myanmar army killed my brother Komol Hossain in early '90s. They took him to be a slave and two months later, we were informed that he had died. We ... don't know how he died," says Nur.

"They [the Myanmar army] said we don't belong in Myanmar.

"Along with my family members I fled to Bangladesh to save my life ...

"We live like prisoners here - free but not allowed to work outside [the camps]. Even after death, we do not have a specific place [to be buried]," he says.

"I dug up one grave more than four times for burial. One of our oldest graveyards is now somebody's garden."

Nur says death scares him more than anything. "When I dig graves, I always say Allah's name, as [I know] I have to die some day. This fear of death haunts me all the time."

'I don't know whose grave I will share'

Nazu Mia came to Bangladesh when he was an adolescent. He's now in his early 40s, and says he's accepted his fate. "My life spent in a jail [refugee camp]. I will be here until my death and I don't know whose grave I will share in my next life after death," says the gravedigger who lives in the Kutupalong registered camp. 

"We buried dead bodies in the old graveyard which was allocated for the refugees of the '80s. In all graves, more than three dead bodies were buried. Now the situation is worse: people are living over new graves," he explains.

"We have been asked if we need food, shelter and health assistance but no one asked if we need a bigger place for a graveyard or if we need to expand an old one. Even the place that has been allocated for new refugees is very small. In future, we might bury more than 10 dead bodies in a single grave."

"We need more space for graveyards otherwise people will start digging graves in their own houses. It will take a decade to transform houses into tiny personal family graveyards," Nazu says.

"Won't we get a place to rest in peace?"

By Al Jazeera

October 24, 2017

The United States is considering sanctions against Myanmar authorities for its "violent, traumatic abuses" of the majority Muslim Rohingya in restive Rakhine state. 

Washington may use a human rights law to target leaders or groups involved in the violence in the western state, the US Department of State said in a statement on Monday. 

"We express our gravest concern with recent events in Rakhine state and the violent, traumatic abuses Rohingya and other communities have endured," the statement said.

"It is imperative that any individuals or entities responsible for atrocities, including non-state actors and vigilantes, be held accountable."

Since August 25, the Myanmar army has waged a brutal military campaign in Rakhine against the Rohingya. 

More than 600,000 Rohingya have fled the country, most arriving in Bangladesh by foot or by boat, with aid agencies struggling to cope with the influx.

"We are exploring accountability mechanisms available under US law, including Global Magnitsky targeted sanctions," Heather Nauert, State Department spokesperson, said. 

Under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, the president can block or revoke the visas of certain foreign individuals and entities or impose property sanctions on them.

The US government last imposed sanctions on Myanmar in 1997 when it was under a military dictatorship. Following a transition towards democracy, the measures were lifted in October 2016 by then President Barack Obama.

Benjamin Zawacki, an independent Southeast Asia analyst, said while the proposed sanctions are far more appropriate, if imposed, they come a month late. 

"Any preventative element of these sanctions has long passed its sell-by date," he told Al Jazeera, speaking from Thailand's capital, Bangkok.

"The only thing left now is the punitive element, and it remains to be seen whether they will be felt as such by these generals that have been targeted."

The US also announced that it is withdrawing military assistance to Myanmar officers and units operating in northern Rakhine.

Zawacki suggested that an arms embargo would be effective against the military. 

"If there is, in fact, no punitive effect on these generals, they [sanctions] need to be strengthened and widened by way of military force projection," he said. 

Last week, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that the US holds Myanmar's military leadership responsible for its harsh crackdown of the Rohingya. 

The UN describes the Rohingya as the world's most persecuted people.

The minority group has suffered years of discrimination and have been denied citizenship in Myanmar since 1982.

In Monday's statement, the US urged the safe and voluntary return of those who have fled or been displaced in Rakhine, as well as a "credible path to citizenship".

By Ashley Starr Kinseth

Al Jazeera

October 18, 2017

On the night of August 25, an attack on Myanmarsecurity forces by a handful of Rohingya militants in Northern Rakhine State prompted a brutal government counter-offensive that has, in turn, led to the greatest refugee crisis of the twenty-first century. Since then, more than 500,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh, with some estimating that as many as 15,000 continue to make the dangerous journey each day. In fact, in terms of rate of escalation, this is the greatest mass exodus - and has the makings to become the most significant humanitarian catastrophe - since the 1994 Rwandan genocide, when over 800,000 Hutus and moderate Tutsis were slaughtered over a mere 100-day period. 

To much of the international community, Myanmar's Rohingya crisis appears sudden, with few to no warning signs; indeed, it is only in recent weeks that the word "Rohingya" has begun to crop up in international headlines and to seep into the world's collective consciousness and conscience. Yet as a human rights lawyer who has long followed the Rohingya situation - and was present in Northern Rakhine the morning the violence erupted - I can say there is no question that the crisis unfolding now has been in the making for years, if not decades. Perhaps more importantly, by international legal and historical standards, the crisis bears all the characteristics of a genocide in bloom.

In fact, for those who have followed the situation closely, the use of the word "genocide" should come as no surprise. For generations, the Rohingya have faced an ever-growing list of discriminatory policies and state-sanctioned rights violations designed to cull the unwanted minority's numbers and force them from their ancestral lands: key markers of genocide. 

The oldest among them have seen their citizenship revoked and their children born stateless; they suffer tight restrictions on movement and access to education and healthcare; and the number of children a couple may bear has been legally limited to two. 

The Rohingya also regularly endure extortions for minor "offenses"; they have been barred from gathering in groups of more than five and require permission to hold routine events (like marriages); and have even faced limitations on the materials used to build or repair homes and other buildings (brick and concrete being considered too "permanent" for the unwanted minority). Direct reports from at least one prison also indicate that some prisoners from other parts of the country had been released early on condition that they resettle in Northern Rakhine in order to maximise the Buddhist population and limit Rohingya landholdings.

The Rohingya have also endured periodic crackdowns designed to drive them from their land, dating at least as far back as Operation King Dragon in 1978, with more recent pogroms in 1991 and 2012. Since 2012, smaller spates of violence have erupted, each time accompanied by reports of government and mob-led village raids and burnings, rapes and murders (sometimes two-sided), and ever-increasing restrictions on Rohingya movement and activity. 

Yet the present crisis undoubtedly represents the most extreme and disproportionate onslaught of violence, with widely corroborated horror tales from Rohingya refugees of savagely violent gang rapes, merciless tortures and beheadings, and even babies tossed into fires. 

If not adequately frightening on their own, these facts must be placed in a disconcertingly modern context: for there has never been a more powerful tool for the rapid dissemination of hate speech and racist-nationalist vitriol than Facebook and other social media. From a Western perspective, the dangers are easy to spot; one need only look to social media's role in recent elections and political debates to witness the rate at which false information can spread, and the surprising number of individuals who can fall prey to hateful and dangerous rhetoric, a phenomenon presently blazing across Myanmar society. 

Yet perhaps most disturbingly, historically, one can hardly fail to see the parallels between the current use of social media in Myanmar and that of radio in Rwanda to incite mob violence. The key exception is that social media is by all accounts an even faster, more graphic, immersive, "democratic", and ultimately, dangerous tool for the dissemination of hate speech: perhaps the most significant precursor to genocide.

Still, despite these new realities, the conflict we see now may once have been preventable, if not for the dancing around international law and realpolitiking at which the world's governments have played ever since the term "genocide" first entered the international legal lexicon in the aftermath of the Holocaust. 

In the wake of World War II, the international community of states came together in an unprecedented manner, forming the United Nations, and - as one of its first orders of business - passing the Genocide Convention in 1948, which forbade a series of acts committed with the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group".

The Convention placed heavy weight on the use of the term "genocide" by governments - essentially requiring that, once a party to the Convention recognised that a genocide was occurring in another state, it bore a responsibility to act to stop the atrocities. Unfortunately, the planet's collective memory and joint resolve proved short-lived, as international governments - and particularly the United States - have spent decades performing mind-bending linguistic backflips to avoid public use of the term.

Instead, we see politicians using turns of phrase such as "genocidal acts may have been committed" to circumvent outright use of the word itself - and in turn, to avoid violating what is perhaps international law's most sacred treaty. 

It thus comes as little surprise that the Rohingya crisis has until recently garnered little international attention. In fact, to date, only one world leader - France's newly-minted President Macron - has dared utter the word, vowing on September 20 to work with the Security Council to condemn "this genocide which is unfolding, this ethnic cleansing." 

Unfortunately, the very structure of the UN makes coordinated intervention (like deployment of a peacekeeping mission) highly unlikely, as this would surely be met by a Security Council veto by China. Indeed, such intra-UN constraints help to explain why - though many in the Office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide have long been aware of the Rohingya crisis - the Special Adviser has spoken rarely and hesitantly on the situation. 

This is despite the fact that the Myanmar government has engaged in at least four of the five genocidal acts outlined in the Genocide Convention, including "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; and imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group."

But if not genocide, what might we call the horrific situation unfolding in Northern Rakhine? No doubt the "Rohingya issue" is viewed much differently throughout Myanmar, where most believe the Rohingya to be illegal Bengali migrants of questionable (or at least exceedingly "different") moral character; reproducing at a high and disproportionate rate (factually disproven); and hell-bent on Islamicising the predominantly Buddhist nation. Indeed, I have met many educated Myanmar citizens - from aid workers to fellow human rights lawyers - who carry these views, and who are quick to except the Rohingya from rights that they would otherwise view as inherent to all human beings. It is this pervasive dehumanisation of the Rohingya - backed by military and religious forces that rely on the existence of a despised "other" to maintain some semblance of power amidst Myanmar's precarious democratisation - that have allowed for the Rohingya's continuing persecution.

Admittedly, the atrocities we witness today in Northern Rakhine are not entirely one-sided. Surely, many Rakhine Buddhists also suffer the effects of conflict, and international media should also report on this suffering. Yet having visited many Rohingya and Rakhine villages, and remaining in touch with many Rohingya and Rakhine contacts, I also could not in good conscience equate the two groups' experiences or poverty levels, as many in Myanmar print and social media circles routinely demand of international observers. 

Rakhine Buddhists are surely poorer than most ethnic groups in Myanmar (excepting, perhaps, only the Rohingya), and many do currently suffer alongside the Rohingya in terms of physical and food security. However, it would be false to suggest that as many Rakhine Buddhist villages have been looted and razed, or as many Rakhine Buddhist individuals raped, tortured, slaughtered, or otherwise victimised, as have the Rohingya. And while I know of some Rakhine Buddhists who have also become internally displaced - no doubt under deeply abhorrent circumstances - the fact is they possess the freedom of movement to do so and a greater chance of attaining aid and even alternative livelihoods elsewhere in Myanmar. 

All that said, if Myanmar continues to refuse access to Northern Rakhine by neutral observers, then there will be no way for the international media to provide the balanced reporting frequently demanded by Myanmar's citizenry. Instead, as it stands, we outside observers must rely either on our own direct experience to date - as I have here - or on reports flooding across the border from, one must imagine, the most vulnerable Rohingya. In the meantime, it appears that the international community of states, favouring inaction, has tiptoed around such deeply disturbing refugee accounts for far too long. And from the perspective of an international lawyer, based on the information that is presently available to outsiders, there can only be one word for the Rohingya experience in Myanmar: and that word is genocide.

By Ro Mayyu Ali

Al Jazeera

October 14, 2017

Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh - I was born in the same year you were awarded your coveted Nobel Peace Prize.

It was one of the greatest honours to be bestowed upon someone from our country.

Everyone in Maungdaw, the area in Rakhine State where I am from, was filled with joy, and rejoiced your award as if it were their own.

For the first time since independence, we - the Rohingya - felt as though we were a part of this country. We were proud to call ourselves Myanmarese.

After suffering years of abuse at the hands of the military junta, your peace prize inspired us, a people who have suffered decades of oppression.

Growing up, my grandfather always spoke highly of you. He would choose the biggest goats and cows to slaughter when members of your party, the National League for Democracy, would visit. He would graciously welcome them.

My father and my beloved grandpa wanted me to follow the path you had chosen, and my mother was drawn to you by your powerful voice and activism.

In 2010, when you were finally released by the military from house arrest, we rejoiced. But seven years on, we, the Rohingya, remain victims of a brutal and genocidal state. This time, at your hands.

Since your general election victory in 2015, you pushed out Muslim representatives from your party. It was the first sign of your political cowardice.

A few months later, your administration launched "clearance operations" in northern Rakhine State. During those months, countless civilians were killed and women were gang-raped.

Despite widespread international condemnation, you denied the crimes.

You even refused to refer to us as "Rohingya", an accurate term that represents the ethnicity of my people - a people who have been living in Rakhine for centuries.

Since the start of the violence on August 25, more than 500,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh.

Over 1,000 Rohingya villagers have been killed, 15,000 homes have been burned down, and those that have remained are trapped in fear and desperation.

On September 1, my parents and I were forced to leave our home.

After three days and two nights, we reached Bangladesh after crossing the Naf river on a small rowing boat. We later found shelter at the Kutupalong refugee camp.

I just received information that my home was burned to the ground. While many will say it was the army or vigilantes that burned it down, I feel as if it is you - Aung San Suu Kyi - that is to blame.

Not only did you burn down my home, you also burned my books.

I had always dreamed of becoming an author, studying English at Sittwe University, but as you know, the Rohingya are banned from enrolling or studying there, so I sought inspiration from books and articles.

You burned Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom. You burned Mahatma Gandhi's Autobiography. You burned Leymah Gbowee's Mighty Be Our Power. And you burned your own book, Freedom from Fear.

You are the one who is responsible for setting my hopes and dreams on fire.

And now, as we stand here in Bangladesh as refugees, my father has a question for you: "Why have you never visited the Rohingya, whether in Rakhine State or those forced to Cox's Bazar after everything that has happened?"

Do you even care about our situation?

What hurts most is not that we, the Rohingya, are the world's most persecuted community. What breaks my heart is knowing that we're the most persecuted community in your - Aung San Suu Kyi's - Myanmar.

You've chosen your path, that's clear for everyone to see. Now your name will be synonymous for the millions of Rohingya displaced around the world with the countless tyrants and dictators that have come before you.

Ro Mayyu Ali spoke to Al Jazeera's Faisal Edroos who can be followed on Twitter at @FaisalEdroos

By Al Jazeera

October 9, 2017

Rescue operation under way after boat overcrowded with people fleeing Myanmar violence sinks on its way to Bangladesh.

At least 12 Rohingya refugees, mostly children, drowned when their boat capsized on the way to Bangladesh, police said on Monday, the latest victims of violence in Myanmar that has forced more than half a million people from their homes.

Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) official Abdul Jalil told AFP news agency at least 12 bodies had been recovered after an all-night rescue operation, saying "they include 10 children, an elderly woman and a man".

At least 13 Rohingya, including three women and two children, were rescued after scouring the estuary of the Naf river, Jalil said.

Area coastguard commander Alauddin Nayan said the boat sank in the mouth of the Naf river near Shah Porir Dwip, on the southern tip of Bangladesh, with nearly 100 people on board.

"It capsized near Galachar (a coastal village in Bangladesh) with nearly 100 people," Nayan told AFP.

More than half a million Rohingya have emptied out of northern Rakhine and into Bangladesh since August 25, carrying stories of mass killings, gang rapes, and razing of whole villages.

Myanmar has denied allegations of ethnic cleansing, saying the military offensive was a "clearance operation" to flush out Rohingya fighters who had staged attacks on border posts in August.

More than six weeks after the violence erupted, Rohingya continue to arrive in Bangladesh.

Sunday's incident is the latest in a series of deadly boat disasters involving Rohingya refugees.

Most recently, on September 28, a boat carrying about 80 refugees overturned. Seventeen survived, while 23 were confirmed dead and the remainder declared missing.

Myanmar considers the Rohingya illegal immigrants from Bangladesh despite the ethnic minority living there for generations.

By Annette Ekin

Al Jazeera

September 30, 2017

Myanmar's army killed many of the women they raped. Survivors in refugee camps in Bangladesh say they want justice.

Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh - Twenty-year-old Ayesha Begum sat on a plastic mat inside her family's bamboo and tarpaulin shelter in the sprawling makeshift refugee settlement of Balukhali.

She cradled her one-year-old son in her arms, blowing on his face every so often to give him some relief from the sweltering heat.

"I was raped just 13 days ago," said the Rohingya refugee.

Ayesha, who arrived in Bangladesh less than a week ago, said she was eating dinner with her four sisters-in-law in their village of Tami in Myanmar's Buthidaung Township when army troops attacked the hamlet. Soldiers entered their home and forced the women into a room.

They ripped Ayesha's baby from her arms and kicked him "like a football".

Ayesha said the soldiers stripped the women naked. A soldier held a knife to her throat and began to rape her. Twelve soldiers took turns to rape the women over the course of what she believes was several hours.

"I felt like they would kill me," said Ayesha, her dark eyes alert. "I was afraid my child was dead," she added, running a hand over his head.

Speaking in the presence of her mother, brother, sister and husband, with nothing but bamboo slats and plastic-sheet walls dividing them from their neighbours on either side, Ayesha said it took eight days to walk to Bangladesh.

While fleeing Myanmar, two of her sisters-in-law who had been raped with her died. "They were so weak they died," she said.

For more than a month, the Myanmar army has waged a brutal military campaign in northern Rakhine state against the Rohingya- a Muslim-majority ethnic group to whom the Myanmar government denies citizenship and basic rights - after fighters with a Rohingya armed group carried out attacks on security forces on August 25.

The Myanmar army has carried out a number of such offensives since the 1970s, during which Rohingya have reported rapes, torture, arson and murder. The United Nations has called the latest military offensive ethnic cleansing.

More than 501,800 Rohingya have fled the Buddhist-majority country and crossed into Bangladesh since August 25. Densely populated refugee settlements have mushroomed around the arterial road in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar district that borders Myanmar.

The refugees, the majority of whom are women and children, are in desperate need of humanitarian aid, including shelter, food, sanitation and medical care. Many women and girls were raped and sexually assaulted by Myanmar army soldiers.

Survivors and witnesses have shared accounts of women and girls being raped then locked inside houses that were torched. They have recounted stories of torture, mutilations, being stripped naked and other atrocities and acts of humiliation.

"[Soldiers] entered our house and they took away our sister. She was very beautiful," said Mohsina Begum, 20, also from Tami village. She said soldiers sexually assaulted and attempted to rape her until the village chairman intervened.

While Mohsina and her family were fleeing, they found the body of her 19-year-old sister, but couldn't stop to bury her.

Rajuma's story: 'They ripped my son from me and cut his throat'

Rajuma Begum, 20, survived the August 30 massacre in Tula Toli, believed to have been one of the most brutal incidents of Myanmar army violence. Villagers were taken to a beach by the river where the men were separated from the women and children and then gunned down, hacked to death and bayoneted.

Rajuma was holding her son, Mohammed Saddique, in her arms, when four or five soldiers began taking women away in groups of five to seven.

"They took me along with another four women inside a house," Rajuma recounted, speaking at a school in Kutupalong refugee camp.

"They ripped my son from my arms and threw him [on the ground] and cut his throat," she said, before burying her head in her hands and starting to wail.

"I am thirsty to hear someone calling me 'ma'," Rajuma said between sobs. "I had a younger brother who is 10 years old. I'm sorry to him because they took him and I couldn't save him."

Rajuma was held in a room with three other mothers, one teenage girl and one woman who was about 50 years old. The soldiers raped them all except the older woman. Rajuma was raped by two men for what she said felt like two or three hours.

Afterwards, they beat the women with wooden sticks, then flashed torches on them three times to make sure they were dead. The soldiers locked them inside the house and set fire to it.

It was the heat from the blaze that made Rajuma regain consciousness. She was able to break through the bamboo walls and escape. She hid on a hill for a day and when she came out on the other side encountered three other women from her village and an orphan.

Naked, she dressed herself in clothes abandoned by fleeing Rohingya. When she crossed the border, a Bangladeshi helped her get to Kutapalong where she was treated at a clinic. In Bangladesh, she was reunited with her husband Mohammed Rafiq, 20, who had survived by swimming across the river before the massacre in Tula Toli began.

"The military killed seven of my family members. My mother, Sufia Khatun, 50 years old, Rokeya Begum and Rubina Begum, one of them was 18, and the other was 15, both of my sisters were taken by the army and raped and killed. Musa Ali, my brother, 10 years old, I am guessing he died, and my sister-in-law Khalida who was 25 years old, and her son Rojook Ali, who is two a half years old, and my son Mohammed Saddique, who was one year and four months."

Rajuma said: "It's important to know our story, what happened to us as the Rohingya."

Echoes of Rwanda genocide

Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch who investigates war crimes and crimes against humanity, said in an interview the group is collecting data on "what is happening across the border as this ethnic cleansing campaign continues against the Rohingya people" with the intention of prosecuting those responsible for the crimes.

"In my 20 years working at Human Rights Watch, these are some of the most shocking and horrific abuses that I have documented. They really bring back memories of the genocide in Rwanda in terms of the level of hatred and extreme violence shown - especially towards women and children," he said.

"We're seeing pretty widespread rape and sexual assault on women," Bouckaert explained.

"The majority of the women who were raped were killed. There is no doubt about that," he said, adding that "racist hatred" is the motivation behind much of the violence.

"[The] campaign of dehumanisation and racism against the Rohingya is really what is driving this extreme violence, including sexual violence, against the community," he said, referring to how officials have long stigmatised the Rohingya as "terrorists", or too "dirty" for soldiers to rape.

"This campaign of hatred ... really does remind us of what happened with Tutsis in the Rwandan genocide, who were called 'cockroaches' by their government. You know these kinds of campaigns impact directly on the kind of violence that we see."

Bouckaert said the "ultimate intent" of Myanmar's military is to "completely cleanse Burma of the Rohingya population".

"They're not recognised as citizens in their own country, and they're not even recognised as refugees when they flee this brutality. So it's hard to think of a more abandoned people in the world. It's their very identity which is being destroyed."

Mental health implications of sexual violence

Kate White, emergency medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which has on-the-ground clinics in Bangladesh's Rohingya refugee camps, said the sexual violence "is definitely widespread".

Since August 25, MSF had treated at least 23 cases of sexual and gender-based violence. Their services include medical care for physical injuries, sexually transmitted infection prophylactics and menstrual regulation for those who suspect they are pregnant.

Understanding just how widespread this violence has been, said White, is a challenge as those who are willing to come forward and seek care represent "the tip of the iceberg".

In the current crisis, where people are more vulnerable because of broken families and support structures and more households are now headed by women, White said people are forced to choose between collecting food or seeking healthcare. "Right now their priority is survival," she said.

White anticipates the long-term impact of the sexual violence will be on mental health. Many survivors MSF has treated are traumatised after being raped by multiple perpetrators or on multiple occasions while fleeing, said White, who spoke at MSF's Cox's Bazar office.

"I must admit this is some of the worst mental health outcomes that I've seen in terms of sexual violence. In terms of the impact that it's having on them - it's extreme," she said, describing how some survivors are unable to function on a daily basis.

The cultural stigma and shame associated with rape in Rohingya society mean many survivors are unlikely to speak about their experiences, let alone seek help, particularly unmarried girls who fear of being rejected by potential husbands.

Rajuma, the Tula Toli survivor, said her husband knows her story and stands by her. "He gives me the love he used to give," she said.

Yasmine's story: 'I thought I was dying'

In the newer refugee settlement of Palong Khali, further away from the food aid distribution and with few medical care outposts, along slippery mud tracks and surrounded by bright green rice paddies, lives Yasmine, whose name has been changed to protect her privacy. In an unfamiliar place, she said she is too ashamed to speak to anyone about what happened to her.

But she agreed to tell her story after her husband gave his consent.

The 45-year-old comes from Chawprang village in Buthidaung township. She arrived in Bangladesh with her husband and 11 children 19 days ago. The slender woman with a dusty yellow shawl draped over her head and her eyes wet with tears, described how, before the Myanmar army attacked her village, her family had grazed cattle and cultivated rice. Her children sold vegetables, betel leaves and river fish at the market.

"We were leading a good life before this crisis," said Yasmine, whose youngest child is four and eldest 26.

She doesn't remember the exact day troops attacked her village, but in the days leading up to it soldiers, beat villagers and stole their livestock, she said. Then they came one day at noon while she was feeding her three youngest children.

"They declared that you have weapons, surrender your weapons. If the villagers said that they had no weapons, then they started to kill them, started to torture them, started to beat them," she recalled.

Eight soldiers entered her house. They kicked and punched her children aged four, six and eight.

She covers her mouth with her shawl, looks down and speaks in a low voice. When the children were taken out of the house, she said five soldiers of different ages raped her while three waited outside.

"I'm not able to express this completely," she said through tears.

Her youngest child, a girl, wandered over, sat quietly next to her mother, and put her hand on her lap.

"I thought that I was dying," she said. The family fled several days later and paid a boatman to take them across the Naf River to Bangladesh.

"In Myanmar, I can't sleep properly. There is safety in my life, so I feel better here," she said.

'We want justice'

Back in Balukhali camp, Ayesha recounted how after she crossed the Naf River she set about looking for her husband, Asadullah, 25, who was a teacher at an Islamic school in Myanmar. He fled soon after August 25 when soldiers rounded up men from their village, murdered and tortured them. They beat him so badly that his leg is now deformed.

When she arrived in Bangladesh, she saw some villagers she knew and asked them if they had seen her husband. "Then one told another, one told another," she said. "This is how, after three days, I found my husband."

Asadullah said he is filled with anger. "I feel bad inside. I can't do anything to them," he said, adding he believes what happened to them was fate. "That's why I don't complain about what happened to my wife. I love her."

Ayesha said she has "pain inside my heart". For this reason, she added, "I tell this thing that happened to me, to reduce the pain, I speak about it."

In the cramped space, Ayesha spoke frankly, her eyes shining. "We want justice. What I want the people around the world to know is: we want justice," she said.

On the other side of the bamboo and plastic-sheet wall, a woman's voice called out: "We want justice."

By Al Jazeera

September 24, 2017

UN says there are 'immense' challenges as Bangladesh needs assistance to feed and shelter 436,000 Rohingya. 

Bangladesh needs "massive international assistance" to feed and shelter the 436,000 Rohingya who have fled Myanmar in recent weeks, the head of the UN refugee agency said.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said on Sunday there were "immense" challenges after visiting the overflowing camps around Cox's Bazar in southern Bangladesh.

"I was struck by the incredible magnitude of their needs. They need everything - they need food, they need clean water, they need shelter, they need proper healthcare," he told reporters.

Grandi said there had been an "incredible outpouring of local generosity" but that now needed to be "beefed up by massive international assistance, financial and material".

"That's partly why I am here, to help ... the government organise that response," he said.

The UN said on Sunday that 436,000 Rohingya, a stateless Muslim minority, had arrived from Myanmar's Rakhine state since an outbreak of violence there a month ago.

Grandi said the influx had slowed in recent days but it was impossible to tell whether more would come.

He also said his office was providing "technical assistance" to help Bangladesh register the Rohingya, whom Myanmar considers to be "illegal" immigrants.

Bangladesh only recognises a tiny fraction of around 700,000 Rohingya living in camps near the border with Myanmar as refugees, referring to the rest as undocumented Myanmar nationals.

It has "no plan for the time being" to grant refugee status to the newly arrived Rohingya, senior Bangladesh minister Amir Hossain Amu said on Sunday.

"We want Rohingya to return to their own land," said Amu, who chairs a cabinet committee on national security.

Bangladesh has begun providing the new arrivals with identity cards and recording their biometric data, a process that began last week and is expected to take several months to complete.

Many hope that will allow them eventually to return to Myanmar. Civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi said last week that those who had been verified as refugees from her country would be allowed back.

Grandi said he hoped the UN's role would give the registration "the necessary credibility, which is so urgent not just for repatriation but for assistance".

At the moment, UN agencies say it is difficult to ensure aid is distributed evenly because refugees are undocumented and are still moving from one place to another.

Grandi said the scale of the influx - which he called the "fastest and most urgent refugee emergency in the world" - had made it difficult to assess needs quickly.

But he added: "I think that the response is getting more organised".

UNICEF said on Sunday that a plane carrying 100 tonnes of emergency aid from Europe, including water purifying tablets, sanitary items and plastic tarpaulins, had reached Bangladesh.