Jason Szep and Stuart Grudgings

Reuters

July 17, 2013

The beatings were accompanied by threats: If his family didn't produce the money, Myanmar refugee Abdul Sabur would be sold into slavery on a fishing boat, his captors shouted, lashing him with bamboo sticks.

It had been more than two months since Sabur and his wife set sail from Myanmar with 118 other Rohingya Muslims to escape violence and persecution. Twelve died on the disastrous voyage. The survivors were imprisoned in India and then handed over to people smugglers in southern Thailand.

As the smugglers beat Sabur in their jungle hide-out, they kept a phone line open so that his relatives could hear his screams and speed up payment of $1,800 to secure his release.

"Every time there was a delay or problem with the payment they would hurt us again," said Sabur, a tall fisherman from Myanmar's western Rakhine state.

He was part of the swelling flood of Rohingya who have fled Myanmar by sea this past year, in one of the biggest movements of boat people since the Vietnam War ended.

Their fast-growing exodus is a sign of Muslim desperation in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, also known as Burma. Ethnic and religious tensions simmered during 49 years of military rule. But under the reformist government that took power in March 2011, Myanmar has endured its worst communal bloodshed in generations.

A Reuters investigation, based on interviews with people smugglers and more than two dozen survivors of boat voyages, reveals how some Thai naval security forces work systematically with smugglers to profit from the surge in fleeing Rohingya. The lucrative smuggling network transports the Rohingya mainly into neighboring Malaysia, a Muslim-majority country they view as a haven from persecution.

Once in the smugglers' hands, Rohingya men are often beaten until they come up with the money for their passage. Those who can't pay are handed over to traffickers, who sometimes sell the men as indentured servants on farms or into slavery on Thai fishing boats. There, they become part of the country's $8 billion seafood-export business, which supplies consumers in the United States,Japan and Europe.

Some Rohingya women are sold as brides, Reuters found. Other Rohingya languish in overcrowded Thai and Malaysian immigration detention centers.

Reuters reconstructed one deadly journey by 120 Rohingya, tracing their dealings with smugglers through interviews with the passengers and their families. They included Sabur and his 46-year-old mother-in-law Sabmeraz; Rahim, a 22-year-old rice farmer, and his friend Abdul Hamid, 27; and Abdul Rahim, 27, a shopkeeper.

While the death toll on their boat was unusually high, the accounts of mistreatment by authorities and smugglers were similar to those of survivors from other boats interviewed by Reuters.

The Rohingya exodus, and the state measures that fuel it, undermine Myanmar's carefully crafted image of ethnic reconciliation and stability that helped persuade the United States and Europe to suspend most sanctions.

At least 800 people, mostly Rohingya, have died at sea after their boats broke down or capsized in the past year, says the Arakan Project, an advocacy group that has studied Rohingya migration since 2006. The escalating death toll prompted the United Nations this year to call that part of the Indian Ocean one of world's "deadliest stretches of water."

EXTENDED FAMILIES

For more than a decade, Rohingya men have set sail in search of work in neighboring countries. A one-way voyage typically costs about 200,000 kyat, or $205, a small fortune by local standards. The extended Rohingya families who raise the sum regard it as an investment; many survive off money sent from relatives overseas.

The number boarding boats from Myanmar and neighboring Bangladesh reached 34,626 people from June 2012 to May of this year - more than four times the previous year, says the Arakan Project. Almost all are Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar. Unprecedented numbers of women and children are making these dangerous voyages.

A sophisticated smuggling industry is developing around them, drawing in other refugees across South Asia. Ramshackle fishing boats are being replaced by cargo ships crewed by smugglers and teeming with passengers. In June alone, six such ships disgorged hundreds of Rohingya and other refugees on remote Thai islands controlled by smugglers, the Arakan Project said.

Sabur and the others who sailed on the doomed 35-foot fishing boat came from Rakhine, a rugged coastal state where Rohingya claim a centuries-old lineage. The government calls them illegal "Bengali" migrants from Bangladesh who arrived during British rule in the 19th century. Most of the 1.1 million Rohingya of Rakhine state are denied citizenship and refused passports.

Machete-wielding Rakhine Buddhists destroyed Sabur's village last October, forcing him to abandon his home south of Sittwe, capital of Rakhine state. Last year's communal unrest in Rakhine made 140,000 homeless, most of them Rohingya. Myanmar's government says 192 people died; Rohingya activists put the toll as high as 748.

Before the violence, the Rohingya were the poorest people in the second-poorest state of Southeast Asia's poorest country. Today, despite Myanmar's historic reforms, they are worse off.

Tens of thousands live in squalid, disease-ridden displacement camps on the outskirts of Sittwe. Armed checkpoints prevent them from returning to the paddy fields and markets on which their livelihoods depend. Rohingya families in some areas have been banned from having more than two children.

Sabur's 33-member extended family spent several months wandering between camps before the family patriarch, an Islamic teacher in Malaysia named Arif Ali, helped them buy a fishing boat. They planned to sail straight to Malaysia to avoid Thailand's notorious smugglers.

Dozens of other paying passengers signed up for the voyage, along with an inexperienced captain who steered them to disaster.

"DYING, ONE BY ONE"

The small fishing boat set off from Myengu Island near Sittwe on February 15. The first two days went smoothly. Passengers huddled in groups, eating rice, dried fish and potatoes cooked in small pots over firewood. Space was so tight no one could stretch their legs while sleeping, said Rahim, the rice farmer, who like many Rohingya Muslims goes by one name.

Rahim's last few months had been horrific. A Rakhine mob killed his older brother in October and burned his family's rice farm to the ground. He spent two months in jail and was never told why. "The charge seemed to be that I was a young man," he said. Rakhine state authorities have acknowledged arresting Rohingya men deemed a threat to security.

High seas and gusting winds nearly swamped the boat on the third day. The captain seemed to panic, survivors said. Fearing the ship would capsize, he dumped five bags of rice and two water tanks overboard — half their supplies.

It steadied, but it was soon clear they had another problem - the captain admitted he was lost. By February 24, after more than a week at sea, supplies of water, food and fuel were gone.

"People started dying, one by one," said Sabmeraz, the grandmother.

The Islamic janaza funeral prayer was whispered over the washed and shrouded corpses of four women and two children who died first. Among them: Sabmeraz's daughter and two young grandchildren.

"We thought we would all die," Sabmeraz recalled.

Many gulped sea water, making them even weaker. Some drank their own urine. The sick relieved themselves where they lay. Floorboards became slick with vomit and feces. Some people appeared wild-eyed before losing consciousness "like they had gone mad," said Abdul Hamid.

On the morning of the 12th day, the shopkeeper Abdul Rahim wrapped his two-year-old daughter, Mozia, in cloth, performed funeral rites and slipped her tiny body into the sea. The next morning he did the same for his wife, Muju.

His father, Furkan, had warned Abdul Rahim not to take the two children - Mozia and her five-year-old sister, Morja. The family had been better off than most Rohingya. They owned a popular hardware store in Sittwe district. After it was reduced to rubble in the June violence, they moved into a camp.

On the night Abdul Rahim was leaving, Furkan recalls pleading with him on the jetty: "If you want to go, you can go. But leave our grandchildren with us."

Abdul Rahim refused. "I've lost everything, my house, my job," he recalls replying. "What else can I do?"

On February 28, hours after Abdul Rahim's wife died, the refugees spotted a Singapore-owned tugboat, the Star Jakarta. It was pulling an empty Indian-owned barge, the Ganpati, en route to Mumbai from Myanmar. The refugee men shouted but the slow-moving barge didn't stop.

But as the Ganpati moved by, a dozen Rohingya men jumped into the sea with a rope. They swam to the barge, fixed the rope and towed their boat close behind so people could board. By evening, 108 of them were on the barge.

Mohammed Salim, a soccer-loving grocery clerk, and a young woman, both in their 20s, were too weak to move. Close to death, they were cut adrift; the boat took on water and submerged in the rough seas.

"He was our hope," said Salim's father, Mohammad Kassim, 71, who emptied his savings to pay the 500,000 kyat ($515) cost of the journey.

Of the 12 who died on the boat, 11 were women and children.

MISTAKEN FOR PIRATES

What happened next shows how the problems of reform-era Myanmar are rapidly becoming Asia's.

The tugboat captain mistook the Rohingya for pirates and radioed for help, said Bhavna Dayal, a spokeswoman for Punj Lloyd Group, the Indian company that owns the barge. Within hours, an Indian Coast Guard ship arrived. Officers fired into the air and ordered the Rohingya to the floor.

Rahim, the rice farmer, said he and five others were beaten with a rubber baton. With the help of some Hindi picked up from Bollywood films, they explained they were fleeing the strife in Rakhine state. After that, everyone received food, water and first aid, he said.

Another Indian Coast Guard ship, the Aruna Asaf Ali, arrived. It took the women and children to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, an Indian archipelago a short voyage to the south, before returning for the men.

In Diglipur, the largest town in North Andaman Island, immigration authorities separated the men from women and children, putting them all in cells. Guards beat them at will, Rahim said, and rummaged through their belongings for money. He lost 60,000 kyat ($62) and hid his remaining 60,000 kyat in a crack in a wall.

Rupinder Singh, the police superintendent in Diglipur, denied anyone was beaten or robbed.

After about a month, the Rohingya were moved to a bigger detention center near the state capital Port Blair. They joined about 300 other Muslims, mostly Rohingya from Myanmar, who had been rescued at sea. The men went on a one-day hunger strike, demanding to be sent to Malaysia.

The protest seemed to work. Indian authorities brought all 420 of them into international waters and transferred them to a double-decker ferry, said the Rohingya passengers.

"They told us this ship would take us straight to Malaysia," said Sabur.

It was run, however, by Thailand-based smugglers, he said.

Commander P.V.S. Satish, speaking for the Indian Navy and the Indian Coast Guard, said there was "absolutely no truth" to the allegation that the Navy handed the Rohingya to smugglers.

After four days at sea, the Rohingya approached Thailand's southern Satun province around April 18. They were split into smaller boats. Some were taken to small islands, others to the mainland. The smugglers explained they needed to recoup the 10 million kyat ($10,300) they had paid for renting the ferry.

ECONOMICS OF TRAFFICKING

Thailand portrays itself as an accidental destination for Malaysia-bound Rohingya: They wash ashore and then flee or get detained.

In truth, Thailand is a smuggler's paradise, and the stateless Rohingya are big business. Smugglers seek them out, aware their relatives will pay to move them on. This can blur the lines between smuggling and trafficking.

Smuggling, done with the consent of those involved, differs from trafficking, the business of trapping people by force or deception into labor or prostitution. The distinction is critical.

An annual U.S. State Department report, monitoring global efforts to combat modern slavery, has for the last four years kept Thailand on a so-called Tier 2 Watch List, a notch above the worst offenders, such as North Korea. A drop to Tier 3 can trigger sanctions, including the blocking of World Bank aid.

A veteran smuggler in Thailand described the economics of the trade in a rare interview. Each adult Rohingya is valued at up to $2,000, yielding smugglers a net profit of 10,000 baht ($320) after bribes and other costs, the smuggler said. In addition to the Royal Thai Navy, the seas are patrolled by the Thai Marine Police and by local militias under the control of military commanders.

"Ten years ago, the money went directly to the brokers. Now it goes to all these officials as well," said the smuggler, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

A broker in Myanmar typically sends a passenger list with a departure date to a counterpart in Thailand, the smuggler said. Thai navy or militia commanders are then notified to intercept boats and sometimes guide them to pre-arranged spots, said the smuggler.

The Thai naval forces usually earn about 2,000 baht ($65) per Rohingya for spotting a boat or turning a blind eye, said the smuggler, who works in the southern Thai region of Phang Nga and deals directly with the navy and police.

Police receive 5,000 baht ($160) per Rohingya, or about 500,000 baht ($16,100) for a boat of 100, the smuggler said.

Another smuggler, himself a Rohingya based in Kuala Lumpur, said Thai naval forces help guide boatloads to arranged spots. He said his group maintains close phone contact with local commanders. He estimated his group has smuggled up to 4,000 people into Malaysia in the past six months.

Relatives in Malaysia must make an initial deposit of 3,000 ringgit ($950) into Malaysian bank accounts, he said, followed by a second payment for the same amount once the refugees reach the country.

Naval ships do not always work with the smugglers. Some follow Thailand's official "help on" policy, whereby Rohingya boats are supplied with fuel and provisions on condition they sail onward.

The Thai navy and police denied any involvement in Rohingya smuggling. Manasvi Srisodapol, a Thai Foreign Ministry spokesman, said that there has been no evidence of the navy trafficking or abusing Rohingya for several years.

CAGES AND THREATS

Anti-trafficking campaigners have produced mounting evidence of the widespread use of slave labor from countries such as Myanmar on Thai fishing boats, which face an acute labor shortage.

Fishing companies buy Rohingya men for between 10,000 baht ($320) and 20,000 baht ($640), depending on age and strength, said the smuggler in Phang Nga. He recounted sales of Rohingya in the past year to Indonesian and Singapore fishing firms.

This has made the industry a major source of U.S. concern over Thailand's record on human trafficking. About 8 percent of Thai seafood exports go to supermarkets and restaurants in the United States, the second biggest export market after Japan.

The Thai government has said it is serious about tackling human trafficking, though no government minister has publicly acknowledged that slavery exists in the fishing industry.

Sabur, his wife Monzurah and more than a dozen Rohingya thought slavery might be their fate. The smugglers held them on the Thai island for five weeks. The captors said they would be sold to fisheries, pig farms or plantations if money didn't arrive soon.

"We were too scared to sleep at night," said Monzurah, 19 years old.

Arif Ali, the family patriarch in Kuala Lumpur, managed to raise about $21,000 to secure the release of 19 of his relatives, including his sister Sabmeraz, Sabur, and Monzurah. They were taken on foot across the border into Malaysia in May. But 10 of the family, all men, remained imprisoned on the island as he struggled to raise more funds.

As Ali was interviewed in early June, his cellphone rang and he had a brief, heated conversation. "They call every day," he said. "They say if we call the police they will kill them."

Some women without money are sold as brides for 50,000 baht ($1,600) each, typically to Rohingya men in Malaysia, the Thai smuggler said. Refugees who are caught and detained by Thai authorities also face the risk of abuse.

At a detention center in Phang Nga in southern Thailand, 269 Rohingya men and boys lived in cage-like cells that stank of sweat and urine when a Reuters journalist visited recently. Most had been there six months. Some used crutches because their muscles had atrophied.

"Every day we ask when we can leave this place, but we have no idea if that will ever happen," said Faizal Haq, 14.

They are among about 2,000 Rohingya held in 24 immigration detention centers across Thailand, according to the Thai government.

"To be honest, we really don't know what to do with them," said one immigration official who declined to be named. Myanmar has rejected a Thai request to repatriate them.

Dozens of Rohingya have escaped detention centers. The Thai smuggler said some immigration officials will free Rohingya for a price. Thailand's Foreign Ministry denied immigration officials take payments from smugglers.

PROMISED LAND

When Rahim, Abdul Hamid and the other Rohingya finally arrived in Thailand, smugglers met them in Satun province, which borders Malaysia.

They were herded into pickup trucks and driven to a farm, where they say they saw the smugglers negotiate with Thai police and immigration officials. The smugglers told them to contact relatives in Malaysia who could pay the roughly 6,000 ringgit ($1,800).

"If you run away, the police and immigration will bring you back to us. We paid them to do that," the most senior smuggler told them, the two men recalled.

After 22 days at the farm, Rahim and Hamid escaped. It was near midnight when they darted across a field, cleared a barbed-wire fence and ran into the jungle. They wandered for a day, hungry and lost, before meeting a Burmese man who found them work on a fruit farm in Padang Besar near the Thai-Malaysia border. They still work there today, hoping to save enough money to leave Thailand.

If the smugglers get paid, they usually take the Rohingya across southern Thailand in pickup trucks, 16 at a time, with just enough space to breathe, the smuggler in Thailand said. They are hidden under containers of fish, shrimp or other food, and sent through police checkpoints at 1,000 baht ($32) apiece, the smuggler said. Once close to Malaysia, the final crossing of the border is usually made by foot.

Abdul Rahim, the shopkeeper who lost his wife and toddler, arranged a quick payment to the smugglers from relatives in Kuala Lumpur. He was soon on a boat to Malaysia with his surviving daughter and his sister-in-law, Ruksana. They were dropped off around April 20 at a remote spot in Malaysia's northern Penang island.

For Abdul Rahim and many other Rohingya, Malaysia was the promised land. For most, that hope fades quickly.

At best, they can register with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees and receive a card that gives them minimal legal protection and a chance for a low-paid job such as construction. While Malaysia has won praise for accepting Rohingya refugees, it has not signed the U.N. Refugee Convention that would oblige it to give them fuller rights.

Those picked up by Malaysian authorities face weeks or months in packed detention camps, where several witnesses said beatings and insufficient food were common. The Malaysian government did not comment on conditions in the camps.

The UNHCR has registered 28,000 Rohingya asylum seekers out of nearly 95,000 Myanmar refugees in Malaysia, many of whom have been in the country for years. An estimated 49,000 unregistered asylum seekers can wait months or years for a coveted UNHCR card. The card gives asylum seekers discounted treatment at public hospitals, is recognized by many employers, and gives protection against repatriation.

The vast majority, like Sabur, Abdul Rahim and their families, don't obtain these minimal protections. They evade detention in the camps but live in fear of arrest.

By early July, Sabur had found temporary work in an iron foundry on Kuala Lumpur's outskirts earning about $10 a day. He will likely have to save for years to pay back the money that secured his release.

Abdul Rahim's family now lives in a small, windowless room in a city suburb. His late wife's sister, Ruksana, coughed up blood during one interview, but is afraid to seek medical help without documentation.

By early July, Abdul Rahim had married Ruksana. He was picking up occasional odd jobs through friends but was struggling to pay the $80 a month rent on their shabby room. Despite that, and the loss of his first wife and daughter, he still believes he made the right decision to flee Myanmar.

"I don't regret coming," he said, "but I regret what happened. I think about my wife and daughter all day."

(Stuart Grudgings reported from Kuala Lumpur. Additional reporting by Amy Sawitta Lefevre in Bangkok and Sruthi Gottipati in New Delhi. Editing by Bill Tarrant and Michael Williams)

Bangladesh capital Dhaka has cracked down on migration from neighbouring Myanmar, closing its border, refusing to support asylum seekers and turning back boats.

Surakatun and her family have been eating boiled leaves and rice for the past three days.

It's a normal lunch at the unofficial refugee camp in Kutupalong - once the pots are empty, that's it.

"My husband is old now so if I don't go out and beg we go hungry," she said.

Like everyone in the camp, Surakatun is a Rohingya who has fled violence in Myanmar - she would rather endure this harsh existence than go back there.

"If you see your daughter being dragged in front of you and being violated sexually would you bear that? Would you allow that to happen?" she said.

In June and October last year, violence broke out between Buddhists and the Muslim minority Rohingya in Myanmar's Rakhine state.

According to the United Nations, the fighting displaced 140,000 people.

Myanmar President Thein Sein rejects that the violence in Rakhine state was fuelled by religion or ethnicity - he says his government is trying to help the communities there coexist in harmony.

The Rohingya have lived in Myanmar for 200 years, but Thein Sein's government does not recognise them as citizens.

They are regarded as Bangladeshi immigrants, but authorities in Dhaka do not recognise them either.

Jing Song, UNHCR Bangladesh spokeswoman, says Rohingya are denied the basic rights afforded to citizens.

"When you are living in the country, the rights are given by the country, by your government," she said.

"Where you are stateless it means you don't have access to the basic rights like the rights to employment, the rights to education, the rights to medical care - you have lots of restrictions."

Thirty thousand Rohingya get aid agency assistance in official refugee camps.

However, the government refuses to recognise the remaining 200,000 who fend for themselves in one of the many "unofficial" camps.

To discourage the Rohingya from coming, last year the Bangladeshi government banned aid agencies in the camp and started turning away boats

"We are repeatedly urging the government to open border to people who are coming to seek safe haven - we all know what is happening in the Rakhine state," Jing Song said.

"There could be economic reasons but also the fundamental reason is lack of access to basic rights so it is an international standard to open the border, not to push back people."

People inside the camp don't get any official support when it comes to food, health, or shelter and they desperately need it.

Houses are covered with garbage bags, so when the monsoon rains come they flood very easily.

There are only a handful of toilets to service a population of 50,000 people.

Despite the government crackdown, Rohingya keep coming - newly arrived refugees Zakir, and his 20-year-old daughter Yasmin live in the camp.

Before fleeing Myanmar four months ago, Yasmin was working as a language teacher for the UNHCR when violence broke out.

"The UNHCR people were being targeted and blacklisted and already many of them had been arrested," Zakir said.

"The authorities have gone to the homes of the UNHCR workers to look for them, so I was afraid my daughter would get arrested because she worked for UNHCR."

As one of the poorest nations on earth, Bangladesh can barely look after its existing population, let alone others from neighbouring countries.

Each day last year, 23,000 people were forced to flee their homes, twice as many compared with a decade ago.

Adil Kham, a human rights advocate, says legislation cannot stop the movement of people.

"Human history is the history of migration - people migrate and the laws can't stop that," he said.

Like Bangladesh, India has reason to be worried about a potential influx of asylum seekers - it's already home to one third of the world's poor.

To counter this, India is building a fence along the border and hopes to eventually have the entire 4,000 km frontier walled off.

People still find ways to get across, bribing border guards or sneaking across in the dark.

The fence has also created a new problem - over the past decade, killings have been widespread on the borderline.

"This is the bloodiest border I think in this world context," Adil Khan said.

"It is more bloody than Palestine-Israel border and I think it is more bloody than the Mexico-USA border, so it is the bloodiest border and we can call it the killing fields."

In the past, the Bangladesh government has criticised India for its decision to try to fence off the entire border.

Now, Bangladesh has decided to build a fence too, but this one will be along the border it shares with Myanmar.

"Fencing the people, it's like putting people in a kind of prison," Adil Khan said.

"This is not a solution, the solution is how you can have a more friendly relationship with the people."

Rohingya asylum seeker Zakir is now trying to bring his wife and the nine children he left behind in Myanmar to Bangladesh.

"I am afraid. I am really concerned, they are all young children," Zakir said.

"Our house is on the west side of the hills so they have to walk across those hills to come to Bangladesh, it takes at least four hours to cross."

He isn't sure if the Bangladesh government will have built its fence by the time he has enough money to get them across.

But in his eyes, no physical barrier changes the resolve of someone so desperate.

"No matter how difficult it is at the border, people will still cross because they are desperate," Zakir said.

"No matter how difficult the route is, they have to save their lives."

(Video Credit: ABC Australia)

Dana MacLean

IRIN News

July 17, 2013

Photo: David Longstreath/IRIN Not all monks preach pacifism

Associated Press of Pakistan

July 16, 2013

UNITED NATIONS: A U.N. expert Tuesday welcomed the abolition of Myanmar’s notorious border security force, known as Nasaka, and called for an investigation of human rights abuses committed by its members against the Rohingya Muslim population in Rakhine state. I have received allegations of the most serious of human rights violations involving Nasaka, particularly against the local Rohingya population, including extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrest and detention, and torture in detention, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar, Tomas Ojea Quintana, said in a statement.I have no doubt that the violations committed over the years with complete impunity have undermined the rule of law in Rakhine state, and had serious consequences for the peaceful coexistence of communities there.

Ojea Quintana stressed that the abolition of Nasaka should not mean that credible allegations of widespread human rights violations by its members should be ignored, and called on the Government to hold the perpetrators to account.

Furthermore, whatever force takes the place of Nasaka, it is vital that the issue of impunity is addressed, he said. If the new force is not held accountable for its conduct, then the Government will not have addressed the underlying problem.

The expert had previously called on the Government to suspend all Nasaka’s operations in Rakhine state and introduce reforms to the border security force, noting that its current activities discriminated against vulnerable and marginalized groups in Myanmar.

The vast majority of the 800,000 Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine are without citizenship and are stateless, making them extremely vulnerable to human rights violations.

Ojea Quintana also urged reforms of the discriminatory laws and regulations which Nasaka used to extort money from the local Rohingya population, including with regard to marriage permits, freedom of movement, registration of newborn children, and access to education and employment.

Reform of discriminatory laws needs to accompany institutional reform, in line with the country’s national reform efforts, he said. 

How the Government deals with the situation in Rakhine state is a good indicator of the depth and commitment of its efforts at the national level to bring democracy, respect for human rights and national reconciliation to the people of Myanmar. 

Reporters Without Borders has written an open letter to Burmese President Thein Sein, who begins a two-day visit to France tomorrow, calling for an investigation into the former military government’s crimes against the media since 1962.

Reporters Without Borders

President U Thein Sein Republic of the Union of Myanmar

16 July 2012

Dear President Thein Sein,

On the eve of your first visit to Paris since you became the Republic of Myanmar’s president, Reporters Without Borders would like to draw your attention to the former military government’s crimes against professional journalists, bloggers and cyber-activists who provide news and information. The aim of this letter is to request the creation of a Commission of Enquiry dedicated to combatting impunity for crimes against news providers since 1962.

Two years have passed since the creation of a national commission for human rights and the first reforms opening the way to freedom of the media and information, and we now are approaching the 25th anniversary of the 8 August 1988 massacre. Our organization, which defends and promotes freedom of information, is concerned about the lack of significant efforts to address impunity for the systematic crimes and violations against news providers during the years of repression.

Our organization, which was on a blacklist preventing it from working directly in Burma for more than 20 years, is not able to provide an exhaustive list of the crimes committed during this period, but we have kept a record of cases of journalists who were killed by the junta’s henchmen because of their work or who died as a result of the treatment they received from the junta in prison.

The authorities in Rangoon announced at a press conference on 14 May 1991 that Ne Win, a correspondent for the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun who had been jailed since 24 October 1990, had died in hospital from cirrhosis of the liver. The army had accused him of being an opposition supporter but he had never been formally charged or tried. A month later, on 11 June 1991, Ba Thaw, a newspaper cartoonist also known as Maung Thaw Ka, reportedly died in prison. The authorities said he had died of a heart attack.

Seven years later, in August 1998, Saw Win, editor of the daily Botahtaung, died of a heart attack in Tharrawady prison. Relatives said he had not been receiving the medical treatment he needed. He had been sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment in 1990.

In September 1999, Thar Win, a photographer with the government newspaper Kyemon, died at an intelligence agency detention centre. Shortly before his arrest, his newspaper had published a photograph of Gen. Khin Nyunt, the junta’s strongman, alongside a report headlined “The world’s biggest crook.” The authorities claimed that Thar Win had also died of cirrhosis of the liver.

Photographer Tin Maung Oo, who often worked for the National League for Democracy (NLD), was struck hard on the head by the junta’s thugs as he was trying to take pictures of an attack on Aung San Suu Kyi’s motorcade in Depayin on 30 May 2003. He died on the spot.

Kenji Nagai, a Japanese photographer and video reporter working for the Japanese news agency APF, was shot dead by a soldier at close range while in a crowd of demonstrators on a Rangoon street with his camera in his hand on 27 September 2007, during the Saffron Revolution.

His death was unique inasmuch as it was the only one, possibly therefore the last one, to have been recorded on film for the entire international community to see. A Japanese embassy physician later confirmed that the bullet that killed him had hit his heart after entering through the chest, proving that he had been shot head on.

Fellow Japanese journalist Tsutomu Haringey, a colleague of Nagai’s, told Reporters Without Borders that he and other journalists tried to recover Nagai’s video camera “in order to pay a last tribute to his courageous work.” Another video, shot by Burmese journalists and broadcast by the Japanese media in 2007, showed that a soldier took Nagai’s Sony camera from his body. Six years later, Nagai’s family are still waiting for answers, and for justice to be done.

We urge you to create a Commission of Enquiry dedicated to combatting impunity for crimes against news providers since 1962 because we know that Burma is now starting a new page in its history and we believe that the process of democratization begun by your government will not be complete without an official effort to render justice for the victims of the military junta’s crimes.

The commission’s main task should be to investigate and, as best as possible, to establish the circumstances in which these six journalists died from 1991 to 2007. In addition to their deaths, journalists, media workers and bloggers were subjected to many other abuses by the junta, including arrest, violence, torture and hundreds of years in jail sentences handed down by courts on the military’s orders.

This commission’s goal should also be recognition of all the crimes against Burmese and foreign journalists and news providers since the start of the military regime, to be achieved by means of thorough documentation in which we are ready to participate.

By undertaking to not let these murders go unpunished and to bring those responsible to justice, you would be taking a historic step towards national reconciliation and guaranteeing all human rights in Burma.

We hope our request will meet your approval and we look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

Christophe Deloire

Reporters Without Borders secretary-general

In the run-up to President Thein Sein’s visit, Reporters Without Borders has also taken action on the relationship between freedom of information and the issue of violence against Burma’s Rohingya community, which is one of the world’s most persecuted minorities, according to the UN.

Reporters Without Borders co-signed an open letter, published yesterday, urging French President François Hollande to ask his Burmese counterpart to guarantee “freedom of the media and information in coverage of the conflicts in Arakan and conflits involving the Rohingyas, as this is crucial for preventing the violence from continuing behind closed doors.”

Today, Reporters Without Borders will participate in a news conference on violations of freedom of information that obstruct coverage of the violence, such as the ban on the sale of the latest issue of Time Magazine because it had a cover story about the Burmese nationalist monk Ashin Wirathu called “The Face of Buddhist Terror.”

Burma rose 18 places in the 2013 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index and is now ranked 151st out of 179 countries.

Photos : DVB Burmese

RB News

July 16, 2013

Maungdaw, Arakan – A Rohingya youth from Kanpu village, Aley Than Kyaw hamlet was arrested yesterday and forced to pay extortion 1.5 million kyat by SB (Special Branch) police Aung Kyaw Zin.

Yesterday at about 4 pm a Rohingya youth, Noor Alam S/o Nurul Hoque, 23-years-old was arrested while coming back from the market. He bought the medicine from the market for his father but the SB police Aung Kyaw Zin accused him that he sells the medicine without license.

Aung Kyaw Zin has been arresting the innocent Rohingyas and is extorting the money since long time. Every shopkeepers need to pay him Kyat 1,000 per week. The shopkeeper will be beaten inhumanely if fails to do so.

Noor Alam was locked up in the building where Aung Kyaw Zin’s office is located. He was asked to pay extortion money Kyat 1.5 million. As he refused to pay the amount, he was severely beaten the whole night.

This morning his father, Nurul Hoque went there and found his son Noor Alam bleeding with severe injuries.

The villagers told to RB News that, yet they don’t know how much will be the minimum amount to get release of Noor Alam.

Associated Press

July 16, 2013

LONDON — The president of Myanmar pledged Monday to release all political prisoners in his country by the end of the year as he visited Britain for the first time.

Thein Sein, a former general who retains close ties to the military, has introduced democratic changes after decades of authoritarian rule that had led to international isolation.

He said Monday that thousands of prisoners already have been released from Myanmar’s jails as the country shifts away from military rule, and that a committee is working through the cases of those still behind bars.

“I guarantee to you that by the end of this year, there will be no prisoners of conscience in Myanmar,” he told an audience at Chatham House in London, shortly after meeting with British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Cameron — who had said that Britain welcomed the president’s reforms and looked forward to free and fair elections in 2015 — also raised concerns during the meeting about attacks on minority Rohingya Muslims in the predominantly Buddhist nation. Attacks on the Rohingya have killed hundreds in the past year and uprooted about 140,000 people.

Observers fear the violence presents a threat to Myanmar’s transition to democracy because it could encourage security forces to re-assert control.

“We are also very keen to see greater action in terms of promoting human rights and dealing with regional conflicts,” Cameron said. “We are particularly concerned about what has happened in Rakhine province and the Rohingya Muslims.”

In his remarks at Chatham House, Thein Sein said recent violence in Myanmar has “rightly concerned the world.”

“I promise you that we will take a zero-tolerance approach to any renewed violence and against those who fuel ethnic hatreds,” he added.

Thein Sein’s visit was met by some protests in London outside of Parliament.

Ricken Patel, executive director at human rights campaign group Avaaz, said the attacks on the Rohingya “should be ringing alarm bells” everywhere.

“Cameron has a responsibility to use all his diplomatic leverage to get real, concrete measures from President Thein Sein to protect these groups,” Patel said.

AFP

July 16, 2013

LONDON - Myanmar President Thein Sein said Monday that all political prisoners would be freed by the end of the year and that a ceasefire with ethnic groups was possible within weeks.

The former junta general's comments, made during his first visit to London, appear to be latest stage in reforms that Thein Sein has made since he took office in 2011.

"I guarantee to you that by the end of this year there will be no prisoners of conscience in Myanmar," Thein Sein told an audience at the Chatham House think-tank in London.

"We are aiming for nothing less than a transition from half a century of military rule and authoritarianism to democracy."

He was also optimistic about ending decades of conflict that have raged between the government and more than a dozen ethnic groups since the country formerly known as Burma won independence from Britain in 1948.

"Very possibly over the coming weeks we will have a nationwide ceasefire and the guns will go silent everywhere in Myanmar for the very first time in over 60 years," he said.

"Difficult talks will follow and hard compromises will need to be made. But it must be done."

British Prime Minister David Cameron earlier urged the president to defend human rights when the pair met for talks.

Thein Sein promised to take a "zero tolerance approach" to people who "fuel ethnic hatreds" following attacks against Myanmar's Rohingya Muslim minority in which hundreds of people have been killed.

Welcoming the Myanmar leader on the red carpet outside his 10 Downing Street office, Cameron said he was "very pleased" to see Thein Sein on his "historic visit".

But Cameron, who last year became the first British prime minister to visit Myanmar, added: "As well as the continuation of your reform process, we are also very keen to see greater action in terms of promoting human rights and dealing with regional conflicts.

"We are particularly concerned about what has happened in Rakhine province and the Rohingya Muslims."

Buddhist-Muslim clashes in the western state of Rakhine last year left about 200 people dead, mostly Rohingya Muslims who are denied citizenship by Myanmar.

Further clashes have erupted in recent months.

Around a dozen protesters gathered outside Downing Street during Thein Sein's visit calling for action to protect the Rohingya.

But Cameron followed the international community's line on the need for economic development in particular to support reform in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

"We believe there are many areas for Britain and your country to cooperate together, diplomatically, in terms of trade and investment, the aid and development relationship and also our growing links in terms of our militaries," Cameron said.

The British premier did not specify what the military links were.

Since Thein Sein took the presidency two years ago, the ex-military man has freed hundreds of political prisoners and welcomed democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi and her political party into parliament.

The European Union has scrapped most sanctions except an arms embargo and readmitted Myanmar to its trade preference scheme.

The United States has also lifted most embargoes and foreign companies are now eager to enter the resource-rich nation, with its perceived frontier market of some 60 million potential consumers.

Htay Zaw

RB News

July 16, 2013

Buthidaung, Arakan – A gate called “Bengali Blocking Special Group” has been set up in Quarter No. (5), Buthidaung Township, Arakan State to abuse the Rohingyas. The new group was implemented by Township administration and Quarter administration.

The gate is located on the high way of Buthidaung to Maungdaw in Quarter No. (5), Buthidaung Township. The township administrator is leading and the quarter administrator is doing the operation. This special operation is just to abuse the Rohingyas.

“Township administrator is sitting on the chair and the quarter administrator Maung Hlaing Soe is stopping the cars. He shouts “Come down if there is any Kalar Bengali”. Then asks for Form (4) if there is any Rohingya. He also scolds by using many bad words.” a Rohingya told to RB News. [Form 4 is a documents which required by all Rohingya Muslims to travel from one township to another and Kalar is derogatory term use to address Rohingyas in Myanmar]

The Police force, Immigration and the Fire Brigade also join with the “Bengali Blocking Special Group”. The quarter administrator abuses the Rohingyas physically according to the local residents.

“Maung Hlaing Soe abuses physically. He said “We are doing this on you Kalar according to the instruction of central government. If you Kalar cannot tolerate leave Myanmar”.” the Rohingya continued.

The local residents told that the quarter administrator Maung Hlaing Soe was involved in making violence and he has been extorting money from the people who live in his quarter. Although the people reported his crimes to Chief Minister of Arakan State and Maungdaw district administrator, yet, there is no any action taken against him.

Paul Vrieze

Irrawaddy

July 15, 2013 

RANGOON — Regional security experts say it is possible that some militant Rohingyas have sought support from Indonesian hardline Muslim organizations, but they dismiss claims that an armed Rohingya insurgency is under way in western Burma’s Arakan State.

The experts reacted to recent reports on radical Islamic websites stating that a cleric and military commander of the Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) have met with hardline Indonesian civil society organizations to request funding, weapons and military training for an armed struggle.

The RSO members visited a rally of the Forum Umat Islam in central Jakarta on June 19, with the military commander Abu Shafiyah reportedly saying, “We need the Mujahideen from Indonesia to train and supply the Mujahideen in their training camp in Rohingya [sic], especially in bomb making,” according to one English-language radical Muslim blog.

Another website, called Arrahmah.com, posted 28 photos last week purportedly showing 300 “Rohingya Mujahideen” fighters receiving military training at a camp in northern Arakan State.

Sidney Jones, an Indonesia-based security analyst with the International Crisis Group, said it was likely that the supposed RSO members spoke at the Forum Umat Islam rally. “This is not a rumor, hundreds of people were there to hear them speak,” she added.

Jones said the Forum Umat Islam is not a Jihadist terrorist organization but a registered advocacy organization with a radical pro-Islamic agenda, adding that it sometimes engages in attacks on religious minorities in Indonesia.

Such Indonesian groups have thousands of members and have mounted an aggressive public response to the Rohingya issue in order to bolster their popularity in the Muslim-majority country.

The Rohingya, a stateless Muslim minority, have suffered decades of persecution in Burma. During deadly clashes with local Buddhist communities last year, about 140,000 people, mostly Muslims, were forced to flee their homes and 192 people were killed.

Shwe Maung, a ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party member, rejected the claims that the photos showed RSO fighters in his region. “There is not a square meter without Nasaka [border guard] forces in northern Arakan,” said the MP, who represents the Muslim-majority Maungdaw Township in northern Arakan.

Bertil Lintner, a veteran journalist who has written extensively about insurgencies in Burma, said it was “very possible” that the RSO had been seeking support from Islamic militants abroad, adding that the group had worked closely with the fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami party in Bangladesh for years.

Lintner said, however, that the published photos did not show an RSO fighting force in Arakan State. “The pictures are genuine but old and were taken near Ukhia between Cox’s Bazar and Teknaf in Bangladesh. The RSO has never had any armed presence inside Burma,” he wrote in an email.

Lintner said many of the pictured fighters were not from Burma, but from Jamaat-e-Islami’s youth wing, which used the RSO camp for training many years ago. This youth wing has carried out bomb attacks and religiously motivated assassinations in Bangladesh in the past.

The RSO is a militant Rohingya organization founded in the early 1980s after Burma’s military launched violent operations in Arakan State that pushed about 250,000 Rohingyas over the border into Bangladesh.

It was a relatively small insurgency group with a few camps in Bangladesh near the Burma border and did not pose a serious threat to the authorities in Arakan. In 2001, Bangladesh authorities cracked down on the group, and little is known about its activities since.

“As far as we know the RSO still exists with three factions but none have been militarily active for years, and certainly not in Arakan State with the current heavy presence of the Nasaka and the Burmese army,” said Chris Lewa, who heads the Arakan Project, a Rohingya advocacy group.

Bangladesh’s current government, she added, would not support the RSO.

RSO founder Muhammad Yunus, a medical doctor from Arakan, currently leads one RSO faction. He denied that his faction had sought support from radical groups in Indonesia.

“I have no armed activities since long and now I am actively involved in political activities,” Yunus told The Irrawaddy in an email, adding that he had joined the recent Arakan Rohingya Union conference in Saudi Arabia, where some Rohingya representatives reportedly gathered to discuss a political solution to the Arakan crisis.

Abu Tahay, a Rohingya leader and chairman of the Union Nationals Development Party in Burma, dismissed the claims of a militant Rohingya insurgency and said radical Indonesian groups were abusing the Arakan crisis to advance their own domestic goals.

“This is being created by bad persons taking advantage of the Rohingyas’ problems,” he said.

Phil Robertson, Asia deputy director at Human Rights Watch, said Indonesian radical Muslim groups “have been milking the Rohingya issue for everything it’s worth, seeking to use the misery and discrimination faced by the Rohingya as a recruiting tool for their own rights-violating, violent radicalism.”

He warned that Arakanese Buddhist nationalists in turn would use the unconfirmed reports of links between Islamic militants and the Rohingya to further fuel anti-Muslim sentiments in the state.

“Sadly, both the [Indonesian Muslim groups] and the extremist Rakhine [Arakan] response for ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya are two sides of the same coin of hatred and violence. Both should be condemned by the Indonesia and Burma governments,” he said.

Andrew Osborn

Reuters

July 15, 2013

President Thein Sein, the first leader of Myanmar to visit Britain in more than 25 years, held talks with Prime Minister David Cameron on Monday as activists protested against the Asian nation's human rights record.

Sein said in a statement released on his website on Sunday that he had disbanded a security force accused of rights violations against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State in the west of Myanmar, scene of deadly violence between Muslims and majority Buddhists in the past year.

Sein was due to talk trade, aid and democracy with Cameron and his ministers during a two-day visit at a time when Myanmar is opening up its oil, gas and telecoms sectors to foreign investors, with further liberalization likely.

Cameron was under pressure to confront Sein over the treatment of Myanmar's Muslim minority, but faced a tricky balancing act since he has made it clear he wants to expand Britain's trade links with emerging economies such as Myanmar.

Sein, a former military commander, is trying to get the West to help Myanmar's economy recover from decades of military dictatorship, Soviet-style planning and international sanctions.

Western leaders have praised him for ending the house arrest of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, releasing some political prisoners, and allowing the opposition to fight an election.

But they want him to further loosen the military's grip on the mineral-rich state formerly known as Burma before a 2015 presidential election which the British-educated Suu Kyi hopes to contest. Suu Kyi visited Britain last year.

About 30 activists from campaign group Avaaz protested outside the British parliament with a banner reading: "Cameron - Don't let Burma become the next Rwanda", a reference to the 1994 genocide when hundreds of thousands were killed.

Two activists wearing papier mache head moldings of Cameron and Sein hugged each other in front of dozens of stylized cardboard Muslim graves.

"Cameron should never have invited Sein," said Jamal Ahmed, General Secretary of the Burmese Rohingya Organization UK. "Giving him the red carpet treatment knowing about the record level of human rights abuses is wrong."

Before the talks, Human Rights Watch urged Cameron to press Sein on justice for crimes against humanity, to release remaining political prisoners and to end repressive laws.

At least 237 people have been killed in Myanmar in religious violence over the past year and about 150,000 people have been displaced. Most of the victims were Muslim and the deadliest incidents happened in Rakhine State, where about 800,000 Rohingya Muslims live, according to the United Nations.

Cameron's office said it would provide details of the talks later. A spokesman said he had planned to raise human rights.

"In all our relationships, nothing is ever off the table," the spokesman said. "This will be an opportunity to discuss political and economic reform in Burma and, yes, as part of that human rights will be discussed."

Rushanara Ali, a lawmaker from the opposition Labor party, said Britain's voice could make a difference.

"It is important not to underestimate the soft power influence that Britain has on the Burmese government. We've got a unique responsibility," she told Reuters.

Cameron visited Myanmar last year, and Sein, who remains close to the military, this year became the first leader of his country since 1966 to visit the White House.

His British trip is thought to be the first since the late General Ne Win, who ruled Burma for 26 years, visited in 1986. Burma became independent from Britain in 1948.

Sein is expected to visit France afterwards.

(Additional reporting by Jemima Kelly and Peter Griffiths; Editing by Alistair Lyon)

Jared Ferrie

Reuters

July 15, 2013

Myanmar's president has disbanded a security force accused of rights violations against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State in the west of the country, scene of deadly violence between Muslims and majority Buddhists in the past year.

"It is hereby announced that Border Area Immigration Control Headquarters has been abolished," President Thein Sein said in a one-line statement dated July 12 but posted on his website on July 14.

The border security force, known as Nasaka, from the initials of its Burmese-language name, consists of officers from the police, military, customs and immigration.

Corruption accusations may have been behind the government's decision, said Zaw Aye Maung, a member of parliament for the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, who said the head of the Nasaka was sentenced late last year on corruption charges.

"I think the situation will get better now that the police are in control," he said.

Human Rights Watch has implicated the force in abuses against Rohingya, including arbitrary arrest and torture.

In a March 6 report, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, Tomas Ojea Quintana, urged the government to suspend the force's operations in Rakhine State.

The force oversaw the Rohingya, a minority Muslim group in Rakhine state most of whom are denied citizenship by the government, which considers them illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

The Rohingya have to get permission to travel from one area to another and even to marry. Human Rights Watch accused Nasaka officers of demanding bribes from Rohingya.

Clashes between Rohingya and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists in June and October last year killed at least 192 people and displaced 140,000. Most victims were Rohingya and the majority of those remain in camps.

Thein Sein was on a visit to Britain on Monday and Amnesty International called on British Prime Minister David Cameron to press him to halt abuses against the Rohingya and give them citizenship.

"We are talking about a festering wound of division in Burma which the government is compounding by refusing to grant Rohingya people citizenship," the group's British director, Kate Allen, said in a statement.

(Reporting By Jared Ferrie; Editing by Alan Raybould and Robert Birsel)

The Jakarta Post

July 15, 2013

In the corner of the room, Muhammad Hanif had just started to eat with his sister, Hasinah, when Jakarta Legal Aid (LBH) legal consultant came to check on them and their fellow Rohingya refugees on the third floor of the LBH office.

Hanif wore a dull white shirt with a plaid sarong covering his thin, dark-skinned body. The eyes of the 38-year-old man from Myanmar seem tired and lost. 

He went to sit on the floor, but the consultant asked him to have a seat on the leather couch. “I don’t know what to do anymore. I just want people to help me and my family to get citizenship,” he said.

The long-standing discrimination and human rights abuses against members of the minority group in Myanmar, which have intensified recently, have caused hundreds of thousands to seek asylum in other countries, including Indonesia.

Hanif, whose parents fled Myanmar in the 1980s, is trying to find a new country to live in and is one of 506 asylum seekers and 135 refugees who have ended up in Indonesia, either directly or through other countries like Malaysia.

Predominantly Muslim Malaysia and Indonesia, unlike Australia and most other countries in the Asia Pacific region, have not ratified the 1951 United Nations Convention on Refugees, which stipulates that refugees from political or other forms of persecution should not be penalized for illegal entry or overstay. 

Australia ratified the convention in 1954 and in 2011 began to increase their humanitarian intake of refugees.

Hanif told The Jakarta Post that his parents had fled Mangdaw, a town in the Rakhine State in the western part of Myanmar three decades ago. In the 1980s, the Myanmar government had refused to acknowledge that the Rohingya ethnic group, believed to have been imported from Bangladesh as farm laborers during the British colonial period, was qualified for citizenship.

“After living 30 years in Malaysia and having many interviews at the UNHCR office there, I realized we didn’t have much hope for citizenship,” he said.

Hanif brought his family to Indonesia, in January. They came in through Medan, North Sumatra, and stayed there for two months before continuing their journey to Jakarta.

Unfortunately, Indonesia treats asylum seekers as illegal immigrants, who are usually sent to detention centers and returned to their country of origin.

“That’s why I decided to take my family to Australia from Indonesia,” Hanif said.

The plan failed. Hanif said his family was deceived by a group of eight men who promised to take them to Australia for Rp 132 million (US$13,200).

“Instead, these men took us to Soekarno-Hatta International Airport and locked us in an empty warehouse after beating us,” he said.

A janitor working near the warehouse found and helped the desperate Rohingya family. Hanif said that it was this man who took them to the UNHCR office in Kebon Sirih, Central Jakarta, to request refugee status.

“The UNHCR staff said that the process could take a long time. They need to verify whether we are really Rohingya or not,” he said.

While waiting for verification, the Rohingya family has lived in many places, including the Sunda Kelapa mosque. Now, LBH Jakarta is voluntarily supporting them.

Febi Yonesta from the Indonesian Civil Society Network for Refugee Protection told the Post that according to the UNHCR data, 8,584 persons of concern have come to Indonesia to seek asylum and refuge since 2008.

Some of these persons of concern live in detention centers, such as those in Medan, Jakarta, Makassar, Manado, Pekanbaru and Kupang. Others live outside the detention centers without any legal protection or access to education, health services or jobs.

“The government needs to create a law to protect refugees who want to seek asylum and to differentiate them from criminals and illegal immigrants,”he said.