Associated Press

July 20, 2013

YANGON, Myanmar — Myanmar’s president on Saturday lifted a state of emergency in the central part of the country put in place after Buddhist-led mobs went on a rampage, killing dozens of Muslims and burning down their shops and homes. Many of the victims were teachers and teenage students from an Islamic school.

The decision to lift the emergency order in the battle-scarred townships of Meikhtila, Mahlaing, Wundwin and Thazi several months ahead of schedule was an indication that “peace and stability” have been restored, said the state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper.

The move came as President Thein Sein was wrapping up a European tour that was aimed in part at cleaning up the image of a country wracked by religious violence. Thein Sein told France 24 TV that allegations of “ethnic cleansing” in the state of Rakhine were not true and were part of a “smear campaign” by outsiders.

The unrest in Meikhtila was sparked by a quarrel at a Muslim-owned gold shop on March 20, but escalated after a group of Muslim men pulled a monk off his motorcycle and burned him to death.

Enraged, Buddhist-led mobs destroyed 12 of the city’s 13 mosques and burned down hundreds of homes before marching to a prestigious Islamic school, where they killed 36 teachers and students as police and local officials looked on.

The violence — which left a total of 44 people dead — went unchecked until a state of emergency was declared March 22.

It imposed a 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. curfew and barred assembly of more than five people. It also allowed local authorities to seek military assistance to help bring the situation under control.

“Lifting the emergency order is an important step, but the critical question is what is the government’s plan to foster reconciliation between Buddhist and Muslim communities in these areas,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director for New York-based Human Rights Watch, noting that 7,000 displaced people are still afraid to return to their homes to start rebuilding their lives.

“Just hoping for the best is not much of a plan,” he said.

Myanmar only recently emerged from a half-century of isolation and brutal military rule.

The struggle to contain tensions between the country’s Muslim and Buddhist communities — which has killed more than 250 people in the last year — is proving another major challenge for Thein Sein’s reformist administration as it attempts to chart a path to democracy.

Many of those targeted have been ethnic Rohingya Muslims, who have lived in Myanmar for generations but are still viewed by many Buddhists as foreign interlopers from Bangladesh. Human Rights Watch accused the government in an April report of an “ethnic cleansing” campaign.

It said officials, community leaders and Buddhist monks organized and encouraged mobs to target the minority group, sometimes with the backing of security forces.

Robertson stood by the report’s findings Saturday, and disputed Thein Sein’s allegations of a smear campaign against the government.

“Thein Sein’s dismissals of ethnic cleansing in Rakhine state have zero credibility,” he said. “Don’t forget this is the man who last year tried to persuade the visiting U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees to take all the Rohingya out of Burma. Thein Sein’s self-appointed investigation commission didn’t even bother to address accountability for the violence in 2012, and he’s continually looked the other way as his security forces have continued their abuses and covered up their atrocities against the Rohingya.”

RB News

July 20, 2013

Maungdaw, Arakan – Since last year, a military camp was built on the beach of Aley Than Kyaw. The military seized about 20 acres of paddy field from Rohingya farmers around the camp without any compensation. Now the military is asking for forced laborers to plough their farms through the village administrator.

The village administrator of Aley Than Kyaw, Maung Thet Naing is a Rakhine from Sittwe. He was appointed as village administrator by Township administrator. As per the law village administrator needs the majority votes of the villagers, but in this case the rule was ignored just to appoint a Rakhine of their favour.

“The village administrator Maung Thet Naing is forcing us to go and plough the farms of military. He is asking one person from each family. Either go or give 3,500 kyat for one day wage of a labourer.” a villager told to RB News.

And the villagers said the village administrator also threatened that they would be harassed if fail to follow his instruction.

The Rohingyas in Aley Than Kyaw are not only forced to work as forced labourers but also 45 villagers need to patrol the village and the military camps every night. 45 Rohingyas divided to 9 groups and they need to patrol the whole night while the security forces sleeping in their camp. Although patrolling and security of the region is the responsibility of security forces, the Rohingya villagers are forced to do so as an ongoing persecution.

José Ramos-Horta

News reached me today that Rohingya fleeing persecution in Myanmar had reached the waters of my country, Timor-Leste (East Timor), and had been turned away.

As soon as I heard, I sought clarification from Timor-Leste's Foreign Affairs Minister, Jose Luis Guterres -- a good, caring human being. We spoke briefly this morning, in Maputo, Mozambique, where we were both attending a Ministerial Meeting of the Portuguese-Speaking Countries. I was attending as the UN Special Envoy for Guinea-Bissau to brief the ministers on developments in Guinea-Bissau.

According to Foreign Minister Guterres, the refugees had not wanted to stay in Timor. Their destination, he said, was Australia.

"Timor-Leste maritime police helped them fix their engine as per their request," he said. "And the refugees asked to be allowed to continue their journey to Australia. The maritime police escorted them to international waters and let them go."

Was this the correct approach? Is it politically and morally defensible? I do not comment.

In 2001 and 2002 when Foreign Minister of Timor-Leste, I was confronted with similar situations of boat people seeking shelter in our country. I argued strongly then and prevailed over some strong objections in letting asylum seekers disembarking in Timor-Leste. In the first instance, at the end of August 2001, hundreds of refugees on a boat who became known as the "Tampa boat people" were stranded in the Timor Sea attempting to travel to Australia. Australia refused to let them in. I advocated for them and consulted with my compatriots, Xanana Gusmao, Mari Alkatiri and Bishop Belo, and we unanimously agreed that Timor-Leste would welcome them as a temporary measure. However, as poor Timor-Leste showed greater compassion than rich Australia, there was such widespread outrage at Australia's attitude that Australia relented and let them into an Australian off-shore island. So the refugees never had to disembark in our poor country.

In 2002, newly independent Timor-Leste faced its first test in how to manage a humanitarian refugee crisis. A boat full of Sri Lankan refugees, all from the majority Singhalese ethnic group, had approached our shores seeking water and shelter as they wished to continue their journey to New Zealand, a very long and perilous journey. Key Ministers in the Government argued against allowing the refugees on shore. I forcefully argued for. In the end I prevailed; the Prime Minister sided with me in my altercation with the other Ministers involved in the decision making dispute.

As it turned out they were economic refugees, not political refugees. They were brought on shore, interviewed and told their story, how they were duped by unscrupulous smugglers whom they paid each $2,000 to sail them to New Zealand. The boat carried some 50 people when in fact it could fit a maximum of 20. It would have sunk in the perilous seas to the South. They stayed in Timor-Leste for a month, were well treated, fed, allowed to visit the city, while we negotiated with the Sri Lankan authorities for their voluntary return home. They all returned home.

A few years ago, while President of Timor-Leste and on a visit to our own Atauro Island, I addressed a small crowd and the island's tiny police force in the Island. I was asked a question by a local concerning many undocumented Indonesian citizens from isolated neighboring Indonesian islands seeking medical help in Atauro.

I responded that as Head of State, and particularly addressing the police present, that "Anyone reaching our shores seeking shelter, food, water, medical care, whoever they are, wherever they may come from, we welcome them, shelter them from persecution or fear, provide them water, food, medical care. Ask questions later, where they are coming from, where they might wish to go.

"If they have nowhere else to go, if they are unwanted in rich Australia, we share with them our homes, for they are people like us, poor, homeless, persecuted. Timor-Leste must never turned its back on people fleeing hunger and wars. We too were refugees once, we fled our country, we fled poverty and persecution and we were sheltered by kind, caring people, who taught us about solidarity, about humanity."

In the case of the unwanted and persecuted Rohingya refugees, I would have acted differently. As poor as Timor-Leste may be, we are no longer as poor as in 2002. In the last five years or so we have been in the fortunate position ourselves of offering aid to people in other countries affected by natural disasters, well over US$10 million. Surely, we can share our bamboo roof, a loaf of bread, a plate of rice, cassava, some coconut water with our fellow brothers and sisters from Myanmar.

I am saddened. Were I in Timor-Leste I would have pleaded with the Government to let the refugees in under my personal responsibility. I would have invited them to camp in my small family compound. I would sign off terms of responsibility to care for them. In 2006 during our own political-security crisis, when our people were displaced and fled the city, I hosted hundreds of unknown people, children and adults, men and women, in my compound. They stayed in the relative safety of my home for weeks.

Today, far away from home, I plead with President Taur Matan Ruak and Prime Minister Xanana to let these unwanted, persecuted people stay in our country. And I am ready to welcome these unwanted children of God into my relatively comfortable home.

Amy Sawitta Lefevre

Thailand's navy denied on Friday a Reuters report that its personnel were involved in a lucrative smuggling and trafficking network that exploits minority Rohingya Muslims fleeing persecution and dire living conditions in Myanmar.

The Reuters investigation, citing people smugglers and Rohingyas who made the journey, found that Thai naval security forces were involved in the smuggling of Rohingya Muslims. They have fled Myanmar in sharply growing numbers over the last year following outbreaks of religious violence at home.

The smuggling network, centered on the west coast of southern Thailand, transports thousands of Rohingya mainly into neighboring Malaysia, a Muslim-majority country the Rohingya view as a haven from persecution.

"There is no truth to the allegations," Wipan Chamachote, a spokesman for the Royal Thai Navy, told Reuters. "We've found no indication of abuse by our staff in regards to Rohingya that enter the country, nor has there been any financial transaction for the purposes of human trafficking."

He added it was possible those interviewed mistakenly identified the navy, but said he was not implying that other Thai security forces were involved in the smuggling.

In addition to the Royal Thai Navy, the coastal seas are patrolled by the Thai Marine Police and by militias under the control of military commanders.

On Friday, Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra ordered the Labour Ministry to crack down on those involved in human trafficking, but made no reference to the allegations made against the navy.

"What Reuters found should prompt Prime Minister Yingluck to order a serious investigation into these allegations," said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

"But to date, they have resulted in low-level investigations that seemed more oriented to covering things up than getting to the bottom of the situation."

"IRRESPONSIBLE"

Reuters interviews with refugees and smugglers found that Rohingya who can't pay for their passage 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.

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.

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

"The Thai fishing industry remains resolutely irresponsible, and since they are influential in political circles, they have been able to stymie reformers who want to take on the industry's businesspractices," said Robertson.

The number of Rohingyas fleeing by sea 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, an advocacy group that has studied Rohingya migration.

It says at least 800 people, mostly Rohingya, have died at sea after their boats broke down or capsized in the past year.

Myanmar - a majority Buddhist country - says the Rohingya are Muslim migrants from Bangladesh. A 1982 Citizenship Act excluded Rohingya Muslims from a list of 135 designated ethnic groups, effectively rendering them stateless.

(This story was refiled to add full name of Thai prime minister in paragraph seven)

(Additional reporting by Pracha Hariraksapitak; Editing by Stuart Grudgings and Robert Birsel)

ABC Australia

July 19, 2013

Human rights activists have called into doubt the Myanmar president's promise to free political prisoners following the detention of a prominent rights lawyer.

President Thein Sein made the pledge during a visit to London this week.

It is part of a series of democratic reforms initiated by his civilian government since taking power in 2011.

However, Amnesty International says a prominent Rohingya lawyer, U Kyaw Hla Aung, was detained in Myanmar's Rakhine state on the same day as the presidents announcement.

The rights group has accused Myanmar police of targeting the 74-year-old because of his work as a Rohingya human rights advocate.

Shibab Ahamed, the country director of ActionAid Myanmar, says while Thein Sein looks to be implementing his reforms, there are still areas of concern.

"So I think that it looks like political prisoner in Myanmar and Muslims are treating probably differently," he said.

The commitment from Thein Sein is to free all political prisoners by the end of the year.

Maung Zarni 

Asia Times

July 19, 2013

LONDON - Britain, the largest donor country and former colonizer of Myanmar, is effectively aiding and abetting the unfolding "ethnic cleansing" of Muslim Rohingya by helping to finance the country's controversial 2014 national census. 

Ex-general and head of Myanmar's quasi-civilian government Thein Sein made an official visit to Britain this week, during which his hosts announced a new 30 million-pound (US$45.6 million) development assistance package and resumption of arms sales. One third of that amount is earmarked to bankroll the former colony's census, "which is essential to make sure support is getting to those who need it more", according to an official British government statement. 

Because Thein Sein's government is forcing the Rohingya people to register as "Bengali", a continuation of a decades-old policy of stripping the Rohingya of both their citizenship and ethnic identity, Britain's financial support for this process is troubling. The coming census will no doubt be used to reinforce this racist policy and practice of forcibly registering the self-referenced Rohingya and erasing the fact that the Rohingya as an ethnic nationality group ever existed in Myanmar. 

During a question and answer session following his beautifully written, liberal sounding speech at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, or Chatham House, Thein Sein was emphatic about his government's policy towards the estimated 800,000 to one million Rohingya whose cultural, economic and historical roots can be found on both sides of the once East Bengal and former Arakan State. 

He stated that "to use the term Rohingya, in our ethnic history we do not have the term Rohingya". This official denial and the racist policies that perpetuate the marginalization of the Rohingya is tantamount to ethnocide, a blatant erasure of a verifiable fact that a distinct ethnic community, with all its typical sociological fluidity, exists in Myanmar. 

Gregory Stanton of George Mason University, who is president of Genocide Watch and a world renowned scholar in genocide studies, sees in Myanmar's mistreatment of the Rohingya a Nazi-like "us versus them" classification in which the dominant group and its political state dish out discrimination, mistreatment and eventually "final solutions". 

In his influential essay entitled "The Eight Stages of Genocide", Stanton writes: "We treat different categories of people differently. Racial and ethnic classifications may be defined by absurdly detailed laws - the Nazi Nuremberg laws, the "one (African blood) drop" laws of segregation in America, or apartheid racial classification laws in South Africa." 

Classification is universal across all cultures and political systems. However, when it is carried out in a militaristic state with a deeply Islamophobic "Buddhist" society such as the present-day Myanmar, there is only a short jump between the deliberate act of mis-classifying the Rohingya as "illegal Bengali" or "Bengalis" and being dehumanized as "viruses", "ogres" or the local language equivalent of "niggers". The next stage is mass violence with state impunity against a given dehumanized community. 

That is precisely what has happened to the Rohingyas of western Myanmar since 1978. In February that year, the Burma Socialist Programme Party-led government, a one-party, one-man dictatorship under General Ne Win, launched the country's first large-scale ethnic cleansing operation. Known as the Na-Ga-Min, or King of the Snakes, operation, inter-ministerial and inter-agency units from police, customs, immigration, army, navy, intelligence, civil administration and the home ministry's religious affairs department were mobilized against the Rohingya. 

Even the government's conservative estimate put the number of Rohingya who fled to neighboring, newly independent Bangladesh at 150,000; other independent sources put the figure much higher. Since then the Rohingya have been living in security grids where virtually every aspect of their lives is severely restricted and monitored as a matter of policy. 

A cursory glance at doctor-patient ratios, adult illiteracy and mortality rates among children under five speaks volume about the policy-induced dire conditions under which the Rohingya are forced to live. The doctor-patient ratio for the Rohingya in northern Rakhine State is 1:83,000, adult illiteracy is over 90%, and the mortality rate for under-five children is twice as high as Myanmar's already very high national average. 

No longer able to endure decades of a myriad forms of sexual violence, summary execution, forced labor, extortions, and other means of abuse, many Rohingya families - including women, children and the elderly - have attempted to flee the country, willingly risking their lives in rickety boats on the Andaman Sea and facing an uncertain future as stateless people in countries as varied as Canada, Australia, Thailand, Malaysia and neighboring Bangladesh. 

Unconscionable policy

Ethnocide may sound like esoteric academic jargon but its consequences are grave and of growing international concern. A policy of ethnocide sets the ideological and social-psychological stage for an otherwise peaceful people to carry out unspeakable and unconscionable atrocities against those whom they have been trained to consider an existential threat. 

The military-controlled state in Myanmar - now headed by ex-general Thein Sein and his quasi-civilian government in Naypyidaw - has both paved the way for and carried out ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya. Ethnocide of the Rohingya has empowered the racist, ultra-nationalists among the local Buddhist Rakhine, national leaders and Buddhist society at large to dehumanize the Rohingya. 

The fact that Thein Sein felt comfortable enough to repeat his government's ethnocidal stance on the Rohingya at the prestigious Chatham House should ring alarm bells among the British public. His speech spoke volumes about the extent to which Myanmar's former colonial master has become officially complicit in the atrocities against the Rohingya, London's expressed "human rights concerns" notwithstanding. 

Apparently designed to hit Britain's subliminal colonial guilt, Thein Sein framed the Rohingya as a problem which the former British colony inherited from the Raj upon achieving independence in 1948. In Thein Sein's words: "During the colonial administration there was a migration of economic migrants from other countries into the Rakhine State (formerly known as Arakan) to work on the lands... So they grew their crops and then they did the harvest and then they went back home. But later on they decided to settle in the region. During the colonial administration there were 50,000 Muslims in that region... Now we have 800,000 Muslim population in the region. That of course caused a lot of tension." 

Colonial-era statistics have proven more often than not unreliable and the racial conceptualizations and classifications on which these demographic data rest were often full of racist and pseudo-scientific methodologies that were part and parcel of colonial rule. In 1824, the year of the British annexation of the Arakan, itself a pre-British feudal colony that was depopulated by both Buddhists and Muslims by repressive military conquest, around one-third of the population of Arakan was Muslim, according to colonial records. 

Today, out of the estimated three million who live in Rakhine State, around a third are Muslim. This is hardly a demographic threat to the local Rakhines and certainly not a national threat to the predominantly Buddhist country of 50-plus million people. Beyond the numbers' games, there are other people-centered - as opposed to nation state-centric - perspectives that are far more convincing and far closer to Arakan's historical realities than is Thein Sein's dubious explanation. 

In a public seminar on the Rohingya held at Columbia University in September last year, Amartya Sen, the world renowned Bengali philosopher and economist and Harvard University professor, perceptively observed: "The Rohingya did not come to Burma. But Burma came to the Rohingya." 

Like other borderland ethno-cultural communities, the Rohingya as a people can be found on both sides of the borders of modern nation states, namely the former Burma, which since 1989 has been known as Myanmar, and former East Pakistan, which since 1971 has been known as Bangladesh. The boundaries of once boundary-less feudal kingdoms, many characterized by fluctuating territorial control and administrative powers, were abruptly locked and divided into post-colonial nation states. 

In fact, there is nothing strange or persecution-worthy about numerous ethno-cultural and linguistic communities being split and scattered across these manufactured borders as nation states emerged out of wars, conflicts and other processes of exploitation. Even in the case of Myanmar, there are other groups such as the Chin, Kachin, Karenni, Mon, Shan, Tai, and, yes, even the Buddhist Rakhine, who also belong to different neighboring nation states. Notably, none of these communities are facing ethnocide or genocide by Thailand, Laos, Bangladesh, India or China. 

Twisted history

The truth is that the Rohingya were not always denied their existence by the Myanmar state. In contrast to Thein Sein's ethnocidal perspective, and in spite of the contemporary debates as to whether the Rohingya are historical or ancestral "children of the land", four successive Myanmar governments - the parliamentary democracy government of prime minister U Nu (1948-58), the caretaker government of General Ne Win (1958-60), the Union Government of premier U Nu (1960-62) and General Ne Win's early military government, namely the Revolutionary Council (1962-74) - had all officially recognized the Rohingya as a distinct ethno-cultural community. 

The Rohingya had their own national ethnic language program based at the state's sole national broadcasting service (Burma Broadcasting Service, or BBS) alongside other national ethnic language programs such as Shan, Lahu, Bama and others. The official social studies textbooks described them as Myanmar's Rohingya ethnic nationality and placed them on the ethnic map of the country. 

The household lists and national identification cards bore the word "Rohingya" for those who self-identified as such. All cabinet offices of these aforementioned governments used the word "Rohingya" in their official dispatches and records, while senior military generals in the ministry of defense addressed the Rohingya community and its religious leaders as 'esteemed Rohingya leaders' in the former's public remarks and speeches. The government's official Burmese Encyclopedia (published in 1964, two years after the military government came to power) had a specific section on the Rohingyas of northern districts of the country. 

Since the first genocidal operation against the Rohingya in February 1978, successive military leaderships have been relentless in their drive to cleanse western Myanmar of the ethnic group - whom they now derisively and officially insist on calling "Bengali" - both from state discourse and from the land. Ethnocide began under Ne Win's whimsical dictatorship, which was steeped in nationalist and anti-colonial ideologies that justified draconian policies towards the Rohingya. As a result, Myanmar now has an apartheid system for the Rohingya, who have survived various waves of ethnic cleansing since 1978. 

Instead of confronting Thein Sein over his past and present role in the ethnocide and ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya, the British government instead gave 10 million pounds for his government's 2014 census, a project that will almost surely drive the final nail into the coffin of the Rohingyas' existence in Myanmar. 

This also puts Britain's plan to involve the British Ministry of Defense in training Myanmar's armed forces in the areas of human rights and civil-military relations in a new light. For while British officials talk of human rights and accountability in military classrooms, they will simultaneously be financing a census that will be used to facilitate ethnic cleansing with British tax-payers' money. 

For those familiar with Britain's international trajectory, its decision to help fund Myanmar's ethnocidal census, which in turn will be technically assisted by the United Nations Population Fund, should not come as a surprise. Nor should the British government's decision to reward Thein Sein with the export of made-in-UK arms worth $5 million. Foreign Office spin-masters will, one can be sure, soon be justifying this questionable arms deal as one to help end the country's ethnic conflicts. 

On July 19, 1947, made-in-England bullets killed independence hero Aung San and a group of the country's co-founders in a British-assisted but locally carried out assassination. Aung San, a staunch anti-imperialist nationalist, was then seen as an obstacle to the unfettered pursuit of Britain's post-colonial, post-World War II commercial and strategic interests in Myanmar. 

Sixty years on, the resumption of export of made-in-UK arms to Thein Sein's military-backed, genocidal regime sends an ominous signal to those ethnic and religious minorities who may not be as open to British official and corporate interests as the ethnic Burman military generals and their cronies. 

In pursuit of its own hidden and not-so-hidden strategic and corporate interests, Britain is simply repeating the old colonial policy of ethnic divide and exploit. In the days of the British Raj of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the British pursued their imperialist aims and interests through the use of the country's non-Buddhist ethnic minorities along the country's borderlands, then referred to as the "frontier peoples". 

In 2013, Britain's new design in Myanmar is about pursuing British interests through the dominant "Buddhist" generals and their repressive state while looking the other way when their colonial era ethnic instruments, namely the frontier or borderland ethnic peoples of the Rohingya, Karen, Kachin, and others are being further marginalized, militarily overwhelmed or ethnically cleansed. 

Maung Zarni (www.maungzarni.com) is a Burmese dissident blogger and a Visiting Fellow at the Civil Society and Human Security Research Unit at the London School of Economics.

Kuwait News Agency

July 18, 2013

Despite the continued persecution of the Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar, the European Union Thursday announced that as of tomorrow, Myanmar is set to benefit once again from a special advantageous trade arrangement with the EU.

A European Commission statement said it has taken the move "after the country's recent efforts to improve the political, social, and labour environments there." The EU will bring the country back under the preferential trade regime, known as the 'Generalised Scheme of Preferences', which will grant duty-free and quota-free access to the European market for all products except for arms and ammunitions.

The EU's trade preferences had been suspended in 1997 as a result of Myanmar's serious and systematic violations of core international conventions on forced labour, the statement noted.

EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht said in press statements, "Trade is fundamental to supporting political stability and the EU's trade preferences mean we will give this reform-minded country priority access to the world's largest market. The EU is also going to help Myanmar boost the capacity of both public and private firms to make use of these new opportunities." Myanmar exports to the EU totaled 164 million euro in 2012, and this is approximately 3 percent of the country's total exports, and it comes to 0.01 percent of the EU's total imports. These limited exports to the EU are concentrated on clothing.

Meanwhile, the Jeddah-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in a statement earlier this month called on the government of Myanmar to assume its responsibility to eradicate all forms of discrimination against Muslims.

It said that this discrimination includes the 2005 law which imposes a policy on all Rohingya Muslim families that limits them to only two children.

According to media reports, last year, at least 180 people were killed in the western state of Rakhine in clashes between local Buddhists and the Rohingya Muslim minority.

In March, over 40 people were reported killed in Buddhist-Muslim clashes which broke in central Myanmar where mosques were burnt down and Muslim homes were destroyed.

Thomson Reuters Foundation

July 18, 2013

PHANG NGA, Thailand – The men managed to gain access to the detained women and promised Narunisa she would be reunited with her husband, who had left for Malaysia seven years ago when their second daughter was just a year old. So the stateless Rohingya Muslim from Myanmar sneaked out of a government-run shelter in southern Thailand where she has been held since January. 

Instead of taking Narunisa to Malaysia, the traffickers smuggled her, her two daughters and two other Rohingya women in and out of numerous hideouts where they were kept against their will. One of the men raped Narunisa repeatedly. 

She now wants the traffickers, including a Thai policeman, to be punished, but the slow, creaky wheels of Thai justice are proving a challenge. 

The incident also raises concerns over the safety and vulnerability of detained Rohingya women in Thailand and shines an unflattering light on Thai police - at some officials’ possible complicity in the trafficking of Rohingya and in harming rather than helping victims. 

Narunisa is one of 62 women and children at the shelter in Phang Nga, near Thailand’s popular beach resorts. The 25-year-old fled Rakhine state in western Myanmar when it became impossible to make a living after two bouts of sectarian violence last year left scores dead and some 140,000 displaced, most of them Muslims. 

Although the Rohingya have been in Rakhine for centuries, Myanmar has excluded them from the country’s 135 recognised ethnic groups and denied them citizenship, rendering them stateless. Rights groups say they face some of the worst discrimination in the world, which worsened after the riots. 

Narunisa’s village, unlike many others, was not destroyed in the violence, but her source of income quickly vanished when she could no longer go to the main market in Rakhine’s capital Sittwe to sell fruits and vegetables she had grown. Sittwe is now, except in one cordoned off area, devoid of Muslims. 

RAPED AT KNIFEPOINT 

Three days after arriving on Thailand’s shores in a wooden boat, Narunisa was detained and sent to the shelter in Phang Nga. Soon after, traffickers gained access. 

“The guys came once first and looked from the outside. They came again and got permission from the shelter people, and we started talking,” Narunisa said in an interview with Thomson Reuters Foundation at the shelter. She gave one of the traffickers, a Rohingya, her husband’s phone number in Malaysia. 

“He called him and said, 'I'll bring your wife and kids to you, send me money’.” 

She persuaded two other women to escape from the shelter with her on May 27. Two men were in a pick-up truck waiting for them - 26-year-old Rohingya Korlimula and a Thai man, who Narunisa later learned was Senior Sergeant Veerayut Ferngfull. 

They were taken to different hideouts. The traffickers asked for 50,000 baht (about $1,600) from each woman for the journey. Narunisa’s husband, who now has a second wife, paid the full amount for his wife and daughters but the other two could not afford to pay in full. 

After 12 days, the two other women were taken elsewhere - Narunisa did not know it yet, but they had been released after failing to pay more money and brought by police back to the shelter - while she and her 8- and 10-year-old daughters were brought to a house on an island. 

That night, after her children had fallen asleep, Korlimula said he wanted to marry her. When she refused, he raped her repeatedly at knifepoint for the next three nights. 

“I told him, ‘You know I'm married and my husband is in Malaysia. You call him “brother”. Why are you doing this?’” she recalled in tears. 

On June 13, Narunisa and her children were dumped on the side of the road in Phang Nga province’s Kuraburi district. 

After police found her, she was charged with absconding from the shelter and was kept in a police station. Her daughters were sent back to the shelter. 

DEATH THREATS 

On June 18, Narunisa was released and went to the Khao Lak district police station to press charges. Thomson Reuters Foundation was present and saw firsthand the problems faced by rape victims seeking justice in Thailand. 

The petite woman, dressed in a brown headscarf, a green top and a printed pink sarong, recounted her experience while waiting patiently to get the attention of the policemen, who for at least 15 minutes argued among themselves whether Khao Lak was the right jurisdiction to investigate the crime. 

They then questioned her in detail - a process that required four languages - and were flippant when she was unable to recall some details. 

The police continued to voice concerns over jurisdiction problems. At one point they asked for the exact address of where she was raped, despite repeated explanations that she is unfamiliar with Thailand. They finally started taking notes, nearly an hour after the victim had stepped inside the station. 

“He told me he was going to take me to my husband and then raped me. This shouldn’t happen. He should be punished,” Narunisa said, remaining her composure. 

She only burst into tears later, as her daughters ran out to greet her when she was taken back to the shelter. 

Her ordeal is not over yet. A day after filing her complaint, a Thai man reportedly turned up at the shelter and threatened Narunisa and the shelter director, saying he had killed several Rohingya already and killing more “would be no problem”, according to Human Rights Watch. 

The threat was reported to the authorities, but no police protection has yet been assigned to the shelter at the time of writing. The shelter director has purchased a gun and set up surveillance cameras. 

Korlimula and Veerayut the policeman have since been charged but they remain free. Veerayut is believed to be the first Thai official to be charged with trafficking of Rohingya. 

Both deny the charges. Korlimula claims he and Narunisa were in love. Meanwhile, Chalit Kaewyarat, Phang Nga provincial police commander, told Thomson Reuters Foundation “an internal investigation shows it was unlikely (the policeman) was involved in human trafficking.” 

(Additional Reporting by Jutarat Skulpichetrat)

Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty

The Hindu 

July 17, 2013

The Bodh Gaya blasts have brought the Rohingya issue back to headlines. But the hapless condition of the refugees has remained largely away from the public eye, writes Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty after visiting a camp in Delhi 

Mohammad Younus is 40. Father of six children aged between 14 and one. Today is a day of big hope for him. He has plans to reach the UNHCR office in Vasant Vihar, New Delhi, early and find out if he has become “lucky.” 

“If I am lucky, UNHCR might issue me a refugee card today, I have been waiting for it for over a year now,” says Younus, all perked up. Last time he went there, he was asked to return after six months. “I couldn’t hold my frustrations anymore, waited the whole day to meet a senior official to plead my case, he finally asked me to come on July 18 to collect my card,” says Younus. 

A resident of Maungdaw district of Myanmar’s Rakhine (Arakan) State for three generations, Younus and his family of seven fled the country two years ago “unable to suffer persecution anymore” and landed up in Delhi. For nearly a year now, they have been living in a refugee camp in Delhi’s Madanpur Khadar on a vacant plot off river Yamuna. Like many of the 54 families living in plastic sheet covered poky hole of a damp room in the camp, Younus is hopeful the card will cement his status as a Rohingya refugee in India, and may enable him to get a job to sustain his family plus receive a dole of Rs.1000 per month through partner NGOs of the UN body. 

Asking him to “keep hope” is 65-year-old Iman Hussain, a camp inmate, and a “lucky” one — holder of an UNHCR refugee card for a year now. “I was in Jammu for two years but had to shift to Delhi to pursue my case at the UNHCR,” says Hussain, who pins down his skill as “kheti-bari” (farming) but is a daily wage earner now at a construction site in South Delhi. “My land in Arakan was seized by the Government. Thereafter, I had to take land from it on lease for farming. Since the charges are very high, I lost my livelihood, had to leave. The construction work is back breaking but I have no option. My wife is not finding work because she only speaks the Rohingya language,” he adds. 

Joining the conversation is Omar Hamza (28), who fled Arakan four years ago leaving behind his mother. He quickly flaunts his asylum seeker card issued by UNHCR, states his hope of receiving a refugee card soon. Also details the escape route he took to India, usually taken by Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar. “My mother wants to join me; I don’t know whether she will be able to make it. There is a sea (Bay of Bengal) between Myanmar and Bangladesh through which Rohingyas enter Bangladesh in boats. Since we have no visas, we have to be very careful. Many die in the sea in the process; many get caught and are dumped in jails. After reaching Bangladesh, they cross into West Bengal and come to Delhi,” he explains. 

Younus has his reasons for choosing India. “My sister has been staying in a refugee camp in Bangladesh, it is tough there. Also, many Rohingyas are languishing in their jails for years now. Though it is a Muslim country, it has not treated Rohingyas any better. I have always heard that Muslims in Hindustan live a much better life, so my natural choice was this country.” Omar though has a different take. He feels UNHCR has not done much for Rohingya refugees in India. “In Bangladesh, it has set up schools and living quarters for them. Thanks to the schools, the children of the refugees can today communicate in English and definitely have a better future. Look at us, when UNHCR asked us to fill forms to seek asylum, none of us knew how to write.” Education beyond Class 10, they say, is barred for Rohingyas in Myanmar. “Even that is difficult there as children are often given duty in local police stations. I studied till Class 2. After I was taken by the police to work in the thana for a week, my parents stopped me from going to school,” says Younus. 

What brings tears to his eyes is the thought that even his next generation will be no better. He points at his 14-year-old son, standing nearby with a vacant expression, saying, “He has never gone to school. In fact, none of the 30-35 children in this camp have seen a school. My son is becoming a rag-picker. What future do they have?” Two women from an NGO came to teach the children some time ago. “I was thrilled but they stopped coming,” he says. With nothing to do, their children loiter around the area; some have become victims of snake bites. “A child died last week,” he adds. 

Omar says, “Our stories are never-ending. The problem is, we have very few listeners. Look at 50-year-old Dolo, she is a widow living in the camp, sells vegetables, is ever worried about her relatives at Arakan. The cell phone that they used to contact her has been seized by the police.” 

Younus, Omar and others came to the camp last year after Delhi Police evicted them from Vasant Vihar where they were on protest in front of the UNHCR office seeking asylum. Zakat Foundation let 52 families create a camp on their land allocated for an orphanage. A.M. Amanullah, who has compiled a status report of the refugees in the camp for the Foundation a month ago, counts the number of people at 195. Omar though adds, “Three more families have joined us.” 

A walk through the fly-infested camp displays to you their hapless living conditions. The rains have made it worse. Next to the toilets — two for a population of 200, is a water tap. Looking at a pack of kids frolicking in water gushing out of the tap makes you wonder how long their happiness shall last. What 23-year-old refugee Robi Alam says doesn’t make you any hopeful. “After the Bodh Gaya blasts, Police and Media visited us, asked questions. This kind of news will further dash our hope for a future.” 

(According to UNHCR, New Delhi, 4,200 Rohingyas are registered with it. Till last month, 1800 of them have been granted refugee status and issued refugee ID cards.)

Amnesty International

July 17, 2013

Amnesty International has called into question President Thein Sein’s recent commitment to clear Myanmar’s jails of prisoners of conscience by the end of the year. 

On the same day he made this promise to delegates at a conference in London, police in Myanmar’s Rakhine state arbitrarily detained a 74-year-old Rohingya human rights defender. 

“The government continues to rely on repressive laws to silence dissent and jail peaceful protesters in Myanmar,” said Amy Smith, Amnesty International’s Myanmar researcher. 

“For there to be lasting change in the country, these practices need to be stopped and the laws need to be brought in line with international standards.” 

During a speech at the independent policy institute Chatham House in London on 15 July 2013, President Thein Sein said, “I guarantee to you that by the end of this year, there will be no prisoners of conscience in Burma.” 

Thein Sein added that all cases are being reviewed through a committee established by the government earlier this year, “to ensure that no one remains in prison due to his or her political beliefs.” 

“We’ll be looking to President Thein Sein to make good on this promise. He could start by avoiding the creation of new prisoners of conscience by ending the arrest and imprisonment of human rights defenders and peaceful protesters,” said Smith. 

Since Monday, U Kyaw Hla Aung, a 74-year-old prominent Rohingya lawyer and former staff of an humanitarian non-governmental organisation has been held in police custody in Rakhine state. 

U Kyaw Hla Aung has spent more than 16 years in prison in Myanmar due to his involvement in peaceful activities, and continues to be monitored and harassed by the authorities. Most recently, he was arbitrarily arrested and detained in June 2012 along with several Rohingya aid workers following violence between Buddhist and Muslim communities in Rakhine state. He was later released in August 2012. Amnesty International believes he is currently being targeted as an influential Rohingya human rights defender with connections to members of the international community. 

“U Kyaw Hla Aung joins scores of other human rights defenders who have recently been arrested, charged, or detained for their involvement in peaceful activities. The charges against these activists should be dropped and those detained should be immediately released,” said Smith. 

On 4 July 2013, Amnesty International highlighted recent arrests of human rights defenders and peaceful protesters in Myanmar in a public statement. The authorities rely on a range of domestic laws to criminalize individuals exercising their rights to freedom of expression, assembly, and association. Amnesty International called on the Myanmar government to bring these laws in line with international human rights standards. 

Since the statement was issued, further activists have been arrested. For example, on 10 July 2013, police in Pyay Township in Bago Region arrested activist Wai Phyo for organizing a “Free Political Prisoners” poster campaign in July 2011. He is being charged with violating the 1962 Printing and Publications Registrations Act. Wai Phyo is the Secretary of Generation Wave, a pro-democracy youth group in Myanmar. 

“It’s all well and good for Thein Sein to promise an end to prisoners of conscience, but there is a long way to go from what we’ve seen in recent months,” Smith said.

U Kyaw Min

RB Opinion

July 18, 2013

Racism in history met with defeat. Hitler did not success. Melosevic failed. Sadam Hussein was hanged. We cannot see what is at the rare side of mirror. What we can say is there always is repercussion on racial suppression. Hatred breeds hatred. Love begets love. Anyone who extend a helping hand to destitute Rohingya or who say a word in favour of Rohingya become the target of criticism or condemnation by some chauvinists in Rakhine State. They did not spare personalities like Daw Aung San Su Kyi and Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. NGOs and INGOs were barred or restricted in their relief supply works. Their statements, interviews, testify that they are behind all these violence in Rakhine and in other parts of Myanmar. When President Obama talk in favour of Rohingya in his speech at Yangon University Convocation Hall in November 2012, Rakhine Leader U Aye Maung criticized it and declared “giving recognition to Rohingya by American President would lead to third wave of violence in Rakhine State”. It implied he will instigate that third wave of violence. 

Here we must realize the universally accepted truth that any victory gained by violence would only perpetuate violence. In this context Mohandas Gandhi said “I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love always won. There have been tyrants and murders, and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it-always.”

Ban Ki Moon asked Myanmar government to grant Rohingya their citizenship. Citizenship of Rohingya is from the beginning of independent not an issue. Bo Gyoke Aung San recognized them as citizens. In his constitutional assembly in1947 Mr. Sultan Ahmed, Mr. Abdul Gaffar and U Pho Khine (a.k.a) Nasiruddin were assembly members from Northern Arakan. As it is today there were some extremist who objected Rohingya’s voting rights in 1952 election. There came Dr. Ba Oo’s inquiry commission which recommended Rohingyas are Burmese indigenous, thus they should have full citizenship rights including right to elect and to be elected. Hence from 1952 to 2010 in all parliamentary elections Rohingya were able to participate. Rohingya have MPs and even one time a minister also i.e Mr. Sultan Mahmood of Sittwe (Akyab).

So, why the citizenship issue of Rohingya be a subject of denial today. The silly objection is sheer out of racial hatred. It is neither valid in historical perspective nor in legal background. Separation and segregation, all this are mentality of apartheid South Africa. We have thousands of documents including presidential orders, Supreme Court decrees to show Myanmar government’s recognition of Rohingya as genuine citizen. Change of institution like NaSaKa (Border Immigration Check Force) is not enough. Change of heart: fair and equal treatment is essential. In Burmese we have an adage, “Min hmar thitsar, Lu hmar gaddi”, i.e., the king should keeps his word and the people should honor their promise. Once we heard the “Thitsar Sagha”, i.e, the true word of Prime Minister U Thein Sein in Bandoola Hall Buthidaung a few months before 2010 election. He told to the audience, “You Muslims here are our citizens; you may have relatives across the border. It is not a matter of denial citizenship to you. It is a phenomena we find in every border. So you will get nationality scrutiny cards in the near future. We are arranging everything for this.”

That Prime Minister is now our President. We hope he will stick to his “Thitsa Sgha” and we will be full Myanmar citizens under his auspicious leadership despite a lot of outcry to deprive Rohingya of their citizenship. Once all citizens are equal, there, we hope, will be peace, tranquility, rule of law and prosperity. This is the voice of Rohingya people in Rakhine State, Myanmar.

Maung Aurther

RB News

July 18, 2013

Maung Daw, Arakan - Yesterday (17th July 2013) morning, U Abdullah (28), a Rohingya religious scholar from the village of Waccha, southern Maung Daw, was arbitrarily arrested and tortured by the fanatic Rakhine Police. It has been reported that the Police were from Police station located in nearby Rakhine village of Myawaddy. 

“His name is U Abdullah S/o U Abdu Shukkor (Age 28). A young, innocent and religious scholar with a good morality! Suddenly, this morning, three Police officers raided the village of Waccha and arrested him for no reason. He was handcuffed, severely beaten and tortured. Then, Police stripped him off his clothes by force before the eyes of his fellow villagers. While Police was dragging him to their station, he managed to run away. The Police were from the station located in nearby Rakhine village of Myawaddy” said a villager. 

The villager continued “so after a few hours, around 15 Police Officers raided the village again. They were indiscriminately beating children, young, old, men and women alike. They were robbing money from every Rohingya they found before them. 

Besides, Police threatened us ‘if you don’t tell us where this man is hiding, we will carry out similar things tomorrow as well.’ We don’t even know where he is hiding. We are extremely worried and living in terror.” 

It has been continually reported that since the abolition of NaSaKa (Border Security Force), Police, made up of racist Rakhines, has got absolute authority and power to oppress Rohingyas. And they are brutally carrying out atrocities against Rohingyas as expected.

Reuters

July 17, 2013

PARIS - French President Francois Hollande pressed Myanmar's president on Wednesday to investigate violence against the country's Muslim minority in depth, and said a pledge to release political prisoners must be followed by action.

Hollande met briefly with Thein Sein in Paris two days after the former military leader visited his British counterpart in London as part of a tour aimed at securing Western aid to help Myanmar emerge from decades of dictatorship.

The Socialist president greeted Thein Sein coolly and skipped a habitual exchange with journalists after their encounter, issuing a statement instead as rights groups elsewhere in Paris protested against attacks on Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims.

"The President of the Republic underscored the necessity of seeing that all prisoners of conscience are released without condition, and that recent intercommunal violence is fully investigated," the statement said.

Hollande welcomed the opening of Myanmar's political process to opposition parties and Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, and said France was willing to provide aid to develop healthcare and education.

However, he echoed calls by U.S. President Barack Obama - whom Thein Sein met earlier this year - and British Prime Minister David Cameron to press ahead with democratic reforms and efforts to resolve decades of inter-ethnic fighting.

On Sunday, Thein Sein said 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.

He also said he was close to brokering a nationwide ceasefire to end long-running ethnic conflicts.

Hollande urged that rights groups be allowed to operate more freely in Myanmar - a nod to the many groups that urged him to adopt a tougher stance toward the former military dictatorship in the days before his visit.

Julien Bayou, a spokesman for the online activist network Avaaz, said reports of violence against Muslims were still emerging from Myanmar and that reconciliation was not yet a reality.

"France cannot remain silent before these crimes against humanity," he told Reuters TV. "More needs to be done to pressure Myanmar's leaders."

(Reporting By Elizabeth Pineau; Writing by Nicholas Vinocur; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty

The Hindu

July 17, 2013

U Ba Sein, a Rohingya based in the U.K., talks about his popular blog — perhaps the only one — on his community 

U Ba Sein doesn’t quite fit your idea of the indigent Rohingya refugee from Myanmar. An accountant in Sheffield, U.K., he is a graduate of Rangoon University, doesn’t even use his Muslim name Mohammad Shah. “Many Rohingyas have two names, I prefer to use my Burmese name because it is on all official documents,” says Ba Sein. 

Having grown up in Arakan, Ba Sein says, “I know how Rohingyas have been persecuted in the last four decades from my personal experience but not too many people globally knew about it till recently.” In 2005, while working in Saudi Arabia, Ba Sein thought of starting a blog on his community, perhaps the only one till date. 

“Being away from the region, my idea was to gather as much news as possible published by international media on the ethnic and religious discrimination of the Rohingyas in Arakan. I also thought blogging would help me make more and more people aware of the plight of my community. Though later, I went about gathering information from the ground,” says Ba Sein in an email interview. 

Today, he has a small team of volunteers that helps him run his blog, www.rohingyablogger.com, a popular one-stop stand for information on Rohingyas — their history, language, culture, videos and photographs of their life in Arakan and news from across the world related to the refugees living in various countries today. It also has a twitter and facebook account now. 

“As I have only a team of volunteers, I can’t move forward like professional media but I am still managing to get some news from the ground (read Arakan) on my blog. That is valuable information for the global media. It has helped me get international audiences. The blog has also become a source for PhD students researching on Rohingyas,” he says. “Since many Rohingyas want the Myanmar Government to know their sufferings,” Ba Sein’s blog is in two languages — English and Burmese. 

Sinch he started the blog in Saudi Arabia, a Muslim country, he says, “I didn’t face any problem. Of course, I would be arrested if I do this in Myanmar. I left Myanmar in 1993, have never gone back.” 

He feels the world “is sympathetic towards the Rohingyas” but adds, “with the fragile reforms going on in Myanmar, the international community can’t pressurise much the present Government.” Though Rohingya refugees have been living across the world for years now, the issue, he says, “became international after violence broke out in Arakan in June, 2012. Before that, the world didn’t consider it a serious issue.” The President of Myanmar Thein Sein, he states, “has promised many that he will change the situation of the Rohingyas. But so far, it is just talking.”

Greg Keller

Associated Press

July 17, 2013

PARIS — French leaders met with Myanmar President Thein Sein Wednesday to discuss widening economic and diplomatic ties, while human rights activists denounced the continued anti-Muslim violence in the largely Buddhist southeast Asian country.

French President Francois Hollande met with Thein Sein for about an hour. Earlier the Myanmar president also met with French corporate leaders and had lunch with Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault.

It was the second leg in a European tour for the Myanmar president. He met British Prime Minister David Cameron earlier this week.

French foreign trade minister Nicole Bricq is scheduled to travel to Myanmar at the end of the month. France hopes to score contracts in sectors including water treatment, transport, energy and telecommunications. French oil giant Total SA is already active in the country via a stake in an offshore gas field.

France and other Western nations imposed sanctions on Myanmar’s previous military junta and avoided military-to-military contacts. Most sanctions were dropped after Thein Sein took office in 2011 and instituted economic and political reforms.

However, just last week U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon warned Myanmar that it must end Buddhist attacks on minority Muslims in the Southeast Asian country if it wants to be seen as a credible nation.

In the talks with Thein Sein, Hollande inisisted on the liberation of all political prisoners, a French presidential advisor said, something Thein Sein has pledged to carry out by the end of the year. Hollande also brought up France’s concerns over the treatment of ethnic and religious minorities. The advisor spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

Myanmar for decades has faced rebellions from several ethnic groups seeking autonomy. The Kachin Independence Army is the only major rebel group that has not reached a cease-fire agreement with the government.

Nearly 250 people have died and tens of thousands, mostly Muslims, have fled their homes in religious violence in the past year. Buddhist mobs have marched through villages burning houses and mosques and brandishing machetes and clubs.

New freedoms of speech under Thein Sein have made it easier to disseminate radical views, while exposing deep-seated racism felt by much of the population toward Muslims and other minorities.

Sectarian violence began in western Rakhine state last year, when hundreds died in clashes between Buddhists and Muslims that drove about 140,000 people, mostly Muslims, from their homes. The violence had seemed confined to that region, but in late March, Buddhist-led violence — fueled by the killing of a monk after a Buddhist mob burned down several Muslim-owned shops — swept the town of Meikthila in central Myanmar, killing at least 43 people.

Celestine Foucher of Info Birmanie, a French human rights organization, said Thein Sein’s election triggered ‘‘misplaced and exaggerated euphoria’’ in the West.

‘‘By inviting the new president, it looks like we’re giving 100 percent backing to someone who is only making a 10 percent effort’’ to improve human rights in Myanmar, Foucher said, noting that the Myanmar leader’s first meeting was with a business lobby.

‘‘That shows you where the priorities lie,’’ she added.

Reuters

July 17, 2013

Muhammad Muslim, 52, fled Myanmar in 1988 when the junta brutally suppressed a pro-democracy movement in the country then known as Burma.

As a Rohingya from western Rakhine state, he had no passport. Myanmar's government does not grant citizenship to the ethnic Muslims whom they consider illegal Bangladesh immigrants - even those whose families have been in the country since the colonial British brought them in during the late 19th century.

Muslim left Myanmar illegally, so he has no other papers that tie him to his home country. He spent 17 years in Malaysia as an illegal immigrant, waiting in vain for legal refugee status. And now he waits with his wife, two adult children and 23 other Rohingya in a dank, no-star hotel near Jakarta's grubby port, hoping to get that status with the U. N. refugee office in Indonesia.

Since last year's Buddhist-Muslim violence in Myanmar, the numbers of Rohingya leaving the country have spiraled - with many of them now heading to Indonesia and onward to Australia.

Up until two years ago, hardly any Rohingya were making the perilous voyage in rickety fishing boats to Indonesia. Now the country is hosting nearly 850 of them, and immigration detention camps are filled with Rohingya.

Refugees seeking asylum in Australia often set sail from Indonesia or Sri Lanka, heading for Australia's Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island in dangerous and overcrowded boats, with the help of people smugglers. Since 2001, almost 1,000 people have died at sea while attempting to reach Australia.

Australia's immigration department has recorded 337 Rohingya asylum seekers in the first half of this year, compared with 389 for all of last year and 100 in 2011. The Burmese Rohingya Community in Australia estimates a total of 2,000 Rohingya refugees are living in Australia.

Many were allowed into Australia on bridging visas and receive around A$219 ($200) a week in welfare, but are barred from working until their status has been finalized, a process that can take years.

Others face being sent to detention centers on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea, or the Pacific nation of Nauru. This is part of a reinstated policy aimed at deterring people smugglers by ensuring those who board boats have no better chance of living in Australia than those who apply through official channels.

Myanmar could go a long way towards resolving the refugee crisis by providing Rohingya papers that give them "a legal basis for declaring their point of origin", said Michael Vatikiotis, Asian regional director for Humanitarian Dialogue, a conflict-mediation organization. "Countries like Malaysia have plentiful jobs for legal migrant labor, but so long as the Rohingya arrive as refugees without legal status, they are prone to trafficking."

At the Jakarta port hotel, Muslim said he once hoped to go back to Myanmar. "Now I don't anymore. Every day things are getting worse in Myanmar," Muslim said, in fluent Malay.

His family never hoped to catch a smuggler's boat to Australia; he simply couldn't afford the thousands of dollars per person for a berth. Muslim came to Indonesia because he heard a rumor that the UNHCR office in Indonesia processed resettlement cases much quicker than in Malaysia.

When told that the Indonesia office still often took several years to process a resettlement case, Muslim sighed and said: "That's fate."

(Reporting by Aubrey Belford in Jakarta, Lincoln Feast in Sydney, Jason Szep in Bangkok and Stuart Grudgings in Kuala Lumpur. Editing by Bill Tarrant)