Rohingya Muslim refugees shout slogans during a protest against what organizers say is the crackdown on ethnic Rohingyas in Myanmar, in New Delhi, India (December 19, 2016). Image Credit: REUTERS/Adnan Abidi

By Michael Hart
The Diplomat
January 18, 2017

Decades of persecution have left the Rohingya on the brink of genocide.

Amidst the latest wave of brutal violence unleashed by security forces in Rakhine state, Myanmar’s long-persecuted Rohingya stand on the precipice of genocide. The final months of 2016 witnessed untold state-sponsored devastation and suffering in the isolated communities of the country’s remote far western region, home to almost all of Myanmar’s minority Muslim population.

The present bloodbath however is far from an isolated occurrence and should not be labeled merely as an overzealous reaction to the killing of nine border guards in an attack by unidentified gunmen on October 9, which provided the initial spark for the onslaught. Instead, the current campaign follows decades of systematic discrimination, persecution, and dehumanization, which has served to legitimize multiple waves of violence and now leaves the increasingly-helpless Rohingya on the edge of genocide.

Soon after security forces launched a crackdown in the wake of the October incident, reports began to emerge of indiscriminate and widespread human rights violations being committed in Rakhine State. Human Rights Watch reported that the army imposed strict curfews on the local population and denied access to journalists, before proceeding to carry out a sustained campaign of destruction encompassing extra-judicial executions, torture, rape, and arbitrary arrests.

High-resolution satellite images obtained by Human Rights Watch provided evidence of the destruction of 1,250 buildings – including several mosques – across the five worst-affected villages since the violence erupted. In addition, thermal satellite data showed the presence of multiple active fires across the affected areas, which were later blamed on unspecified “terrorists” by the government. Myanmar’s leaders have labeled the violence as “communal” in nature, and have continually denied complicity in human rights abuses.

Amnesty International, however, has accused Myanmar’s authorities of subjecting the Rohingya to “collective punishment.” The respected human rights group has obtained first-hand accounts of security forces “firing at villagers from helicopter gunships, torching hundreds of homes, carrying out arbitrary arrests, and raping women and girls.” Amnesty has also described the response of the army to the October attack on the border guards as disproportionate, accusing the military of targeting “whole families and villages” of Rohingya, solely “on the basis of their ethnicity and religion.”

Despite the difficulty in obtaining information due to journalists and international observers being barred from the area, it is estimated that hundreds were killed and around 30,000 Rohingya displaced from their homes in the last few months of 2016, according to the UN. This is in addition to thousands already killed and up to 500,000 Rohingya previously displaced in earlier waves of violence. Many of the displaced live in extreme vulnerability and hardship as undocumented refugees in overcrowded and squalid camps across the border in Bangladesh.

Considering the multiple reports of atrocities carried out on the basis of identity, it becomes apparent that recent events in Rakhine State may amount to genocide. According to the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide, its occurrence is defined as when specific acts – such as killing, or deliberately seeking to make life intolerable for certain elements of the population – are “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” The UN definition allows considerable room for interpretation when applied in practice – assigning a specific moment or certain number of deaths after which a campaign of killing should be labelled as “genocide” is not easy, and the boundaries will remain indefinitely blurred. However, the plight of the Rohingya appears to be heading in this direction.

So how did we get to this desperate stage – where a country which had seemingly embraced democracy after the 2015 election of human rights icon Aung San Suu Kyi stands on the verge of being complicit in genocide against a minority group living within its borders? To answer this question, it is necessary to trace the history of the Rohingya in Myanmar, exploring how their long-term alienation and marginalization from society has legitimized continual persecution and violence.

The primary cause of their marginalization dates back to the country’s 1982 Citizenship Law, drawn up by the military government of General Ne Win. The law lists 135 ethnic groups that are officially recognized as having permanently settled within the boundaries of modern-day Myanmar prior to 1823. Notably, that list excludes the Rohingya. The Citizenship Law still applies today and serves to deny the Rohingya citizenship, which effectively renders the minority group’s 800,000 members in Myanmar stateless. As a result, the Rohingya are denied even the most basic of rights – they have been prevented from traveling to other parts of the country and have been denied access to education, healthcare, land ownership, and job opportunities.

Many people in Myanmar firmly support the government’s stance, justifying the Rohingya’s exclusion from society on the basis that they do not constitute an indigenous ethnic group. Instead, they claim the term “Rohingya” is only a recent invention, used to describe colonial-era immigrants who arrived in Myanmar from modern-day India and Bangladesh during the period of British rule. This wave of migration caused much resentment at the time, due to the belief that the new arrivals were taking over jobs and land rightfully owned by native residents. The resentment lingers, with many in Myanmar still referring to the Rohingya in pejorative terms as “Bengalis” or “illegal immigrants.”

This narrative has been contested as representing only a partial truth, with historical records suggesting that a sizeable Muslim minority has lived in Arakan – the area now known as Rakhine State – for centuries, descending from Arab traders who were later assimilated by further immigration from the Indian subcontinent. However, even if the dominant narrative was wholly accurate, it should in no way serve as justification for decades of discrimination, persecution, and indiscriminate violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar.

Over the decades, a strong sense of Buddhist nationalism has fueled anti-Rohingya sentiments, resulting in the group being subjected to periodic cycles of violence. Thousands fled to Bangladesh after large-scale crackdowns in 1978 and 1991. Yet the worst outbreak of violence came in 2012, when according to Human Rights Watch, the authorities – along with mobs of local Arakanese men – committed crimes against humanity across Rakhine State. It was reported that mobs attacked Muslim communities and razed entire villages, whilst the security forces stood aside – and in some cases participated in the violence. The deadliest incident occurred in October 2012, when 70 Rohingya – including 28 children – were massacred in Yan Thei village.

Human Rights Watch found evidence of at least four mass grave sites after the 2012 crackdown, during which more than 125,000 Rohingya were displaced from their homes and forced to live in overcrowded camps lacking adequate food, water, and medical supplies. In the years since, around 110,000 refugees have left the country on flimsy boats – becoming known as the “boat people” and raising global awareness of the Rohingya’s plight – in an attempt to make the dangerous sea crossing and claim asylum in countries such as Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

In light of the latest round of bloodshed, many observers have strongly criticized Myanmar’s de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, for her failure to condemn the violence in Rakhine State. There was considerable hope that things would change for the Rohingya after her sweeping electoral victory in November 2015, when her National League for Democracy (NLD) ended decades of military rule. Whilst Suu Kyi has acknowledged there are “difficulties” in western Myanmar, she has remained reluctant to speak out in defense of the Rohingya, and has instead suggested that the international media often fail to acknowledge the complexities of Myanmar’s internal affairs.

In reality, Aung San Suu Kyi is in an extremely difficult position. Criticism of her silence on the issue must be muted by recognition of the fact that Myanmar’s fragile democracy is still in its infancy, whilst the military retains a dominant influence over defense and security affairs. As a result, she may be reluctant to challenge the establishment on the Rohingya issue for fear of hard-earned progress being reversed, and the even more daunting prospect of the country returning to full military rule. In this context, her ability to intervene on the Rohingya issue is severely restricted.

As long as there remains little political will within Myanmar to avert the bloodshed in Rakhine state, the situation of the Rohingya will continue to deteriorate despite widespread international outcry and growing calls for action. The recent spike in violence is indicative of a renewed campaign to remove the Muslim minority group from Myanmar – at the very least by spreading fear and forcing thousands to risk their lives and flee across borders or the open seas. Until institutionalized and widespread discrimination against the Rohingya – sustained across decades – is meaningfully challenged within Myanmar itself, violence will continue to be legitimized, and the Rohingya will always seemingly stand on the brink of genocide.

Michael Hart is a freelance writer and researcher focusing on civil conflict and the politics of East Asia. He has run the website Geopolitical Conflict since December 2015, which was established to provide news and analysis of conflicts which are under-reported in the mainstream media.

Dear Mr Secretary General,

I am writing to you to express my deep concern over the fate of the Rohingya people of Myanmar. I am certain you are familiar with their extremely precarious situation, as we have seen them teetering on the edge of genocide since at least 2012. Yet what prompts me to write this letter is the latest news coming out of Myanmar just in the last few days: a series of attacks against border guard outposts killed 9 Burmese policemen just over a week ago, the Rohingya were quickly deemed responsible, and the police and army in the local state of Rakhine/Arakan have already carried out over 100 indiscriminate extra-judicial killings of dozens of Rohingya - including old men, women and children. 

The fear on the ground is that the violence may now escalate to at least the level of violence of 2012 or 2013, when dozens were killed, over 100,000 were displaced to internal camps and many more Rohingya were driven out of the country altogether, triggering the South East Asia Migration Crisis which culminated in the spring of last year. And that may be the optimistic scenario. This new upsurge of violence may ultimately prove to be the final trigger to outright genocide that the UN and many NGO observers have been dreading.

What makes the situation today the most perilous it has ever been is the fact that in this crisis the Rohingya are likely to be targeted by all parts of Burmese society. Historically, the dark-skinned, Muslim minority had been chosen as the favourite ‘enemy within’ of the succession of military regimes that governed Burma/Myanmar. Whenever these governments needed to invoke some ‘dark forces’ that undermined the success of their ‘vision’ for the country, they scape-goated the country’s Muslims, particularly the Rohingya. Whenever they needed to distract attention from other national issues, some conflict with the Rohingya would suddenly materialise. 

Yet the violence of 2012-2013 had not been initiated by the federal state. Or indeed the local state. The decades of anti-Rohingya propaganda have been absorbed by the political culture of the country, and now the biggest threat to the Rohingya is actually their ethnic Rakhine Buddhist neighbours, in their native state of Rakhine/Arakan. Civil society groups, Rakhine nationalist political parties, even prominent groups of Buddhist monks are the perpetrators of dehumanising propaganda and incitement to anti-Rohingya violence. Indeed, in the last few years, the organs of the state have either been passive or have helped calm tensions down when they flared. 

But now these attacks are driven by the law enforcement agencies of the local state. And the civil society groups that have carried out most of the attacks in the recent years are merely waiting their turn. The floodgates have not been opened just yet: but they are about to burst through. 

The only thing that can stop the spiralling levels of violence from escalating into a full blown latter-day Rwanda scenario would be the intervention of the federal government of Aung San Suu Kyi to pacify Rakhine/Arakan and impose the rule of law. But as of yet, the federal government is making no haste to intervene, and Ms Suu Kyi does not seem to be moved by the gravity of the situation.

Fortunately, the situation is not beyond all hope. Ms Suu Kyi is known to be sensitive to international opinion, and indeed much of her political capital comes from the favourable view the West has had of her as a democracy campaigner for her country. We do have leverage to lean on her to confront this issue as a matter of urgency, and if we do, we know she has the political power and capital as the first democratic leader of her country in half a century to carry through what needs to be done.

You are in a uniquely privileged position to help build the international pressure needed to move Ms Suu Kyi and her government to suppress the recent upsurge in violence before things get completely out of control. I urge you to take charge of this issue and help prevent yet another international humanitarian catastrophe. I realise that in the current news media cycle it can be difficult to get such a message through: between Trump, Brexit and Aleppo we barely have the energy to process everything else that is happening in the world today. But if we do not do something about the situation of the Rohingya as a matter of urgency, the issue will come back to haunt us as an even greater calamity - and one which we could have been able to prevent.

Should you need any help or support in this, from up-to-date information to contacts with on-the-ground sources, to contacts within the relevant UN and non-governmental agencies, I am at your service. Please do not hesitate to get back in touch.

Yours sincerely,

Dr Azeem Ibrahim

Academic, author of The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide

By Matthew Abbey

Asian Correspondent 

January 17, 2017

WHEN a video was uploaded to Facebook in early January showing unarmed men being beaten by police officers in Burma, the authorities were quick to arrest the four culprits after realising the world was watching.

The unarmed victims were a part of the Rohingya Muslim minority group, who for decades have faced government persecution.

Because of the government’s failure to address the plight of ethnic minorities, Burma’s de facto leader Aung Sung Suu Kyi has been routinely criticised by the international community. Although she is the country’s symbol of democracy, time and time again she fails to recognise the privilege of her ethnic Burman identity.

The villagers in the Rathedaung Township, where the beating took place, are no strangers to violence. What is depicted in the video is not unusual, but rather the treatment the Rohingya have come to expect. As the video shows, two officers, Pyae Phyo Thwin and Tay Zar Lin, whip and kick two unarmed men who sit passively on the floor among dozens of Rohingya villagers. Another officer, Zaw Myo Htike films the video as he passively smokes a cigarette, while Major Ye Htun Naing oversees the ordeal.

After the four men were detained by the Home Affairs Ministry and the Burman police force, Suu Kyi said in a statement that the police officers “will be punished”. But if it goes ahead, it will only be because Suu Kyi has bowed to international pressure.

U Zaw Htay, a government spokesperson, assured reporters in Naypyidaw that the government stresses the need to act within the limits of the law, but similar forms of abuse are widespread. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch regularly denounce the government for its treatment of the Rohingya, but the government deflects all criticism.

Even after Nobel Peace Prize laureates wrote an open letter labelling the treatment of the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing, the government gave scarce attention. The Rohingya are simply not a priority, with many not even recognised as citizens.

The international community rightly criticises Suu Kyi for failing to show support for the Rohingya, but few ask the question as to why she remains passive, especially as she is no stranger to political persecution. But the persecution levied towards Suu Kyi in prior decades was based on her activism, not her ethnic identity.

Suu Kyi has failed ethnic minorities because she fails to recognise her own ethnic Burman privilege. The Burman are the dominant ethnic group in Burma who make up two-thirds of the population. ‘Burmanness’, as a result, is a privilege bestowed upon the majority of the population. Because the majority of the population are benefitting, the plight of unprivileged ethnic minorities is ignored.

Burma is often viewed through an ethnic lens, but Suu Kyi fails to address the issue. A brief glance at past speeches in her book ‘Freedom from Fear’ (1991) is illuminating.

She once claimed; 

“We cannot have the attitude of ‘‘I’m Kachin,’’ ‘‘I’m Burman,’’ ‘‘I’m Shan.’’ We must have the attitude that we are all comrades in the struggle for democratic rights… Only then will we succeed. If we divide ourselves ethnically, we shall not achieve democracy for a long time.”

It’s a noble idea, but for the Rohingya who are systemically discriminated against based on ethnicity, ethnicity is important.

Remaining blind to privilege has allowed for institutional dominance to continue throughout Burma’s transition to democracy. As Burman civil society groups emerge, military operations in non-Burman states are on the rise. The space for the Burman is opening while the room for ethnic minorities is shrinking.

Racism cannot end without recognition of privilege.

As long as the Burman continue to turn a blind eye, ethnic minorities will continue to suffer. Burman privilege exists in this Southeast Asian nation in the same way that white privilege exists in the United States.

If Suu Kyi continues to ignore ethnicity, the Burman will maintain a superior status in the country under a façade of democratisation. In order for her to create a true democracy, racism against ethnic minorities must end. However, considering how Suu Kyi refuses to refer to the Rohingya by name, it may be worth waiting for a new government to form ethnic unity. 

Statement from Rohingya Communities Worldwide

Request OIC to support UN Commission of Inquiry

17th January 2017

We, the undersigned organisations, representing Rohingya communities around the world, would like to express our deepest appreciation to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Government of Malaysia with Honourable Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak for holding an Emergency Meeting of the OIC Foreign Ministers on Rohingya crisis on 19 January in Kuala Lumpur. 

The longstanding Rohingya problem of ethnic, religious and political problem has been going on for over seven decades from 1942 Muslim Massacre in Arakan. Particularly the successive military regimes from 1962 have been making all out efforts to annihilate the Rohingya people from their ancestral homeland of Arakan, by means of frequent armed operations and oppressive laws under consistent state policies of discrimination, exclusion and extermination against them. In violation of the customary international law the military had enacted the world’s most oppressive Myanmar Citizenship Law of 1982 criminally depriving the Rohingya of their right to nationality as well as their human rights and freedom. 

Due to mass atrocity crimes, more than half of the Rohingya population has had left the country. Those who are still in Arakan are being systematically destroyed since 1978. From June 2012 state-sponsored genocidal onslaughts occurred and reoccurred in Arakan and about 3,000 Rohingya were killed, drowned and missing in addition to large-scale destruction of their villages, mosques and madarassas and properties. More than 140,000 displaced Rohingya were herded to squalid semi-concentration camps while over 100,000 escaped persecution to take refuge in foreign countries. 

From 9 October 2016, under the pretext of hunting down the assailants of the police outposts, the military, security forces and Buddhist Rakhine militias have been carrying mass atrocity crimes creating the Maungdaw district a “killing zone”, unobserved by the outside world due to sealing off the area in Northern Arakan. An estimated 500 people were killed or burned down; at least 300 women and girls were raped, unknown number of people arrested, about 2500 houses torched, valuables and properties looted and foodstuff destroyed forcing about 65,000 people to cross over to Bangladesh. These crimes are still on-going. State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been protecting the criminal military, is morally and officially responsible for the crimes against Rohingya that amount to genocide and crimes against humanity as per Articles 6 and 7 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998). The UN Human Rights Commission stated that violation of human rights of Rohingya may constitute crimes against humanity. 

The Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD-led government has manifestly failed or is unwilling to conduct any credible investigation into atrocity crimes against Rohingya. Instead the government with the military is shamelessly denying any human rights violations against them. Thus the defenceless Rohingya continue to be subjected to crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing. In the absence of national protection, the international community has a responsibility to intervene into Arakan in order to end the violations and protect the civilian population. 

We therefore call upon the OIC and its member states to officially support the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry into the totality of the situation in Rakhine State, where most Rohingya live. 

We further call upon the OIC to endeavour utmost for ensuring that the establishment of such a Commission is included in the Burma/Myanmar resolution at the next session of the Human Rights Council.

We believe that the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry is a crucial first step to start to address the cycle of discrimination, persecution and violence our people face. The Commission must investigate human rights violations which have taken place in order to establish the truth, investigate government laws and policies used against the Rohingya, and make recommendations to the government of Burma/Myanmar and the international community on how to address the situation, ensuring strict compliance with international law and human rights standards. 

Our existence as a race is under threat. Failure to act now will prolong our suffering and create greater regional problems and insecurity in the future, and hence we look to you for help in our most desperate hour.

Signatories:

1. Arakan Rohingya National Organisation 
2. Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK 
3. British Rohingya Community in UK 
4. Burmese Rohingya Community in Denmark 
5. Burmese Rohingya Association Japan 
6. Burmese Rohingya Community Australia 
7. Burmese Rohingya Association in Queensland-Australia (BRAQA) 
8. Canadian Burmese Rohingya Organisation
9. Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organisation in Malaysia (MERHROM)
10. Rohingya American Society 
11. Rohingya Arakanese Refugee Committee 
12. Rohingya Community in Germany 
13. Rohingya Community in Switzerland 
14. Rohingya Community in Finland 
15. Rohingya Community in Italy 
16. Rohingya Community in Sweden 
17. Rohingya Organisation Norway 
18. Rohingya Society Malaysia 
19. Rohingya Society Netherlands 

For more information, please contact:

Tun Khin (Mobile): +44 7888714866

Nay San Lwin (Mobile): +49 69 26022349

Ko Ko Lin (Mobile): +880 1726068413

By Bernama

January 17, 2017

PETALING JAYA: The emergency meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Foreign Ministers this Thursday in Kuala Lumpur will discuss restoring the status of the Rohingya in Myanmar.

OIC Special Envoy for Myanmar Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar said the main objective was to create protection for the ethnic minority, whose rights as citizens have been denied.

"Malaysia proposed the meeting because of the urgency of the matter, and not because we want to interfere in Myanmar's internal affairs. Neither do we want to confront the Myanmar government.

"This is not a communal issue as claimed by the government but rather a religious issue because they (the Myanmarese) are targeting Muslims in their conflict with the Rohingya," he told Bernama here today.

The ongoing troubles in the Rakhine state had caused thousands of Rohingya to flee Myanmmar with reports of atrocities, including rape and murder. Whole villages are said to have been burned to the ground, in some cases with the residents still in their houses.

The actions of the Myanmmar security forces against the Rohingya were a gross violation of human rights, Syed Hamid said, adding that the conflict could threaten the peace, security and economy of the region and encourage radicalism.

"We support the Myanmar government's effort to transform the country to become a much better nation under the new leadership. But the transformation must be inclusive of all sectors of its society.

"They must acknowledge the existence of the Rohingya, whose citizenship was stripped for no reason. They are the natives of the country and, without that recognition, the problem will continue to overflow to neighbouring states," he said.

The former foreign minister also expressed concern over the Myanmar government's refusal to allow the Food Flotilla Mission to enter the country to distribute humanitarian aid to the Rohingya.

"They have allowed the humanitarian mission from Indonesia to enter. Why can't they allow this flotilla mission to enter as well?

"They must understand that the flotilla is organised by a non-governmental organisation and will include NGOs from other countries. It is not organised by the Malaysian government," he added.

Syed Hamid also said that the Asean community, which Myanmar de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has referred to as a family, must respect and understand its obligations not only under the Asean Charter but also international law.

Democratic Voice of Burma

January 16, 2017

By The Daily Star

January 15, 2017

Myanmar wants to address the Rohingya issue and other concerns in a spirit of good neighbourliness, trust and mutual understanding.

Myanmar State Counsellor and Foreign Minister Aung San Suu Kyi conveyed this message to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in a letter, which was handed over to the PM on Wednesday by Myanmar's State Minister for Foreign Affairs U Kyaw Tin, who visited Dhaka recently as a special envoy.

“The special envoy also presented to the prime minister the state counsellor's letter expressing her confidence that Myanmar and Bangladesh would be able to address the issues of mutual concern in a spirit of good neighbourliness, trust and mutual understanding between the two countries,” according to a statement released by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Myanmar.

There is no mention of the word "Rohingya" in the statement.

The press release, which is available in the website of Ministry of Information of Myanmar, said Myanmar and Bangladesh “have agreed to start consultations for verification and repatriation of those who are proved to have fled from Myanmar following the 9 October attacks against police outposts.”

The ministry released the statement following the visit of U Kyaw Tin to Bangladesh as special envoy of the state counsellor from January 10-13, it said.

The special envoy had separate meetings with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali and Foreign Secretary Md Shahidul Haque.

During the meetings with the foreign minister and foreign secretary, it said, the two sides cordially discussed issues of mutual interest and expressed the common desire to deepen bilateral relations and cooperation between Myanmar and Bangladesh and to resume the existing annual bilateral consultation mechanisms as well as to hold regular meetings between the two border security forces and army-to-army talks.

They also stressed the importance of exchanging information with a view to maintaining peace and security along the border and to preventing infiltration of terrorists.

The statement said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina expressed her desire to strengthen ties with its neighbouring countries and reiterated Bangladesh's zero tolerance policy against terrorism. She also stressed that Bangladesh would not allow its soil to be used for terrorist acts against its neighbouring countries and sought Myanmar's cooperation to resolve the border issues through negotiations.

The special envoy also presented to the PM the state counsellor's letter expressing her confidence that Myanmar and Bangladesh would be able to address the issues of mutual concern in a spirit of good neighbourliness, trust and mutual understanding between the two countries.

By Esther Htusan

Associated Press

January 15, 2017

KYEE KAN PYIN, Myanmar — Muslim villagers in western Myanmar's troubled Rakhine state said Sunday that they hope positive change will result from a U.N. envoy's visit to the region, where soldiers are accused of widespread abuses against minority Muslims, including murder, rape and the burning of thousands of homes.

U.N. Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Yanghee Lee concluded a three-day visit Sunday to probe the situation in northern Rakhine, where an army crackdown has driven an estimated 65,000 Muslim ethnic Rohingya to flee across the border to Bangladesh in the past three months.

"We really hope that her visit brings a positive change for Rohingya and we hope to gain our human rights," a displaced Rohingya man living temporarily in Kyee Kan Pyin village said on condition of anonymity due to security reasons.

The crackdown began in October after nine policemen were killed in attacks by a shadowy group along the border. The government and the army have rejected the accusations of abuses and killings, saying recently that they have simply been conducting a "clearance operation" in the region.

Rohingya villagers and activists say hundreds of civilians have been killed, but the number cannot be verified because authorities have limited access of aid workers and journalists to areas where the deaths occurred. Recent satellite images showed thousands of houses were burned.

"We have received hundreds of villagers whose houses were burned and they are living in our village and they have nowhere to go," said Kyee Kan Pyin resident Mohammad Hussein.

Despite living in Myanmar for generations, an estimated 1 million Rohingya are barred from citizenship in the Buddhist-majority nation of 50 million, and instead live as some of the world's most persecuted people. More than 100,000 Rohingya still live in squalid internal displacement camps.

Lee is on a 12-day visit to Myanmar to assess the human rights situation, less than a year after the formation of the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. She is focusing her attention on the Rohingya, who mostly live in Rakhine state. She said she would present a report to the U.N. Human Rights Council in March.

During her visit to Kyee Kan Pyin on Sunday, Lee met hundreds of people who are temporarily living in the village after their houses were burned during the army's clearance operation.

"We warmly welcome her visit," said the Rohingya man who did not want to be named. "It is such a hopeful thing that the U.N. envoy came and met us in this kind of situation. But at the same time, we are worried for our security for talking to her because some villagers who have spoken to diplomats and international people have been arrested recently."

On Saturday, Lee visited the northern Rakhine prison where authorities say they are holding hundreds of Rohingya suspects in the October attacks that killed the nine policemen. It was unclear whether she had access to any of the prisoners.

On Friday, she visited Rakhine's capital, Sittwe, in the southern portion of the state. She visited an enclave in Sittwe where 4,000 Rohingya are confined, but residents there were pessimistic that her mission would improve their situation.

This is Lee's fifth mission to Myanmar. In November, she spoke out forcefully about the alleged abuses and called for an immediate and independent inquiry.

By Kyaw Ye Lynn

Anadolu Agency

January 15, 2017

Cancelation of event marks second time this month that Buddhist hardliners impeded a Muslim gathering

YANGON, Myanmar -- A Muslim gathering in a small Myanmar town has been canceled due to a protest from a Buddhist nationalist group -- the second such disturbance in the country this month.

The event due to be held in the town of Pyay in Bago region, around 440 kilometers northwest of Myanmar’s former capital Yangon, was canceled last minute after a Yangon-based nationalist group pressured local authorities and Muslim residents, the Irrawaddy online magazine reported. 

The report said authorities had permitted the ceremony -- scheduled to be held for at least three hours Sunday -- to last 30 minutes after negotiations Saturday with the nationalist group and Muslim residents. 

The hardline Buddhist nationalists, however, later demanded that the ceremony be called off entirely.

“We have had the ceremony every year peacefully,” Kyaw Naing, a member of the festival organizing committee, was quoted by the magazine as saying.

He underlined that the Muslim community agreed to cancel their ceremony over the protest to demonstrate that Islam is a religion of peace for the people of Myanmar as well as across the world.

“Authority actually already granted permission to us for the ceremony,” he said.

The incident marked the second time this month that Buddhist hardliners impeded a Muslim gathering.

On Jan. 8, a crowd including hardline Buddhist monks -- who many blame for a rise in persecution of Muslims in Myanmar -- disturbed a religious service in Yangon’s Botataung Township, accusing the worshipers of holding it without the approval of local authorities.

Security personnel had to be deployed to guard the gathering, and Muslim residents later complained that some nationalists had behaved badly as they tried to pray.

Hardline nationalist monks -- such as the Organization for the Protection of Race and Religion (Ma Ba Tha) -- rose to prominence in Myanmar on the back of communal violence between Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in western Rakhine State in mid-2012.

Anti-Muslim rhetoric from the group has been seen as deliberately stoking the flames of religious hatred in the predominantly Buddhist country.

By Al Jazeera

January 15, 2017

UN special rapporteur Yanghee Lee looking into country's human rights record, including alleged abuses against Rohingya.

UN special rapporteur on human rights Yanghee Lee has been denied access to some areas in Myanmar's northern Rakhine State, with the government citing "security concerns" for its decision. 

Al Jazeera also learned on Sunday that Lee was only allowed to speak to individuals who were pre-approved by the government while she visited Muslim Rohingya villages in the area.

"These are things that will certainly hamper her investigation," Al Jazeera's Florence Looi, reporting from Sittwe, said. "Lack of access will make her job more difficult."

As part of her 12-day visit to Myanmar, Lee is spending three days in Rakhine - home to around 1.2 million stateless Rohingya, a Muslim minority that has suffered decades of poverty and repression, and been denied basic rights such as citizenship and freedom of movement.

Lee also visited the border guard posts, attacked in October, as well as a prison.

Northern Rakhine has been under strict military lockdown since October 9, when a gang killed nine border police officials near the border with Bangladesh, leading to a clampdown that has left anywhere between 84 and 400 Rohingya dead.

According to the UN, at least 65,000 Rohingya have reportedly fled across the border to Bangladesh to escape violence allegedly committed by the military, including the burning of homes, rape and murder of civilians. 

The Myanmar government and military have denied all the allegations. 

On Friday, Lee met Muslim community leaders during her visit to a Rohingya neighbourhood in Sittwe.

Lee also visited border guard posts, the attacks on which in early October triggered clearance operations by the military. 

But a powerful ethnic party rejected a request for a meeting with Lee on Friday evening. 

"We are not meeting her because we don't believe she and her organisation [the UN] have a will to resolve the issues fairly," Ba Swe, joint secretary of the Arakan National Party, told Anadolu Agency on Saturday.

By The Daily Star

January 13, 2017

Bangladesh mounts pressure on Myanmar to take back their nationals

Keeping themselves confined to a tiny room with no light inside, two young Rakhine Muslim women were struggling to get rid of the trauma and forget the brutality they had gone through.

They remained speechless for minutes seeing the presence of a newsman at Kutupalong refugee camp in Ukhia. Later, they revealed the horrors -- reprisals, rape and burning people and houses.

"We're asked to get undressed and look up at the sun...we were left naked and with no food and water before being gang-raped (by Myanmar forces)," Hosne Ara (not her real name), a 25-year-old Myanmar national, told UNB narrating the horrible torture perpetrated on her and her relatives.

Hosne Ara, hailing from Kyari Parang village from Myanmar side, said her husband Sona Miah and her son Ibrahim got confined to their house when Myanmar forces put their house on fire.

"I was caught by several soldiers. The soldiers had previously gathered women of the village and took all of them to nearby paddy fields where they were all raped one after another," she recalled avoiding the eye contact.

Nur Sufia, another 20-year-old woman, sitting beside Hosne Ara, was also sharing a similar sad story.

"On December 10, soldiers came to my house and burned it down. I managed to escape with my two kids -- Mohammed Selim, 4, and 18-month-old Noor Kayes," Sufia told UNB.

She said four soldiers caught her and raped her before shooting the kids in their heads. "My husband and two brothers were burned in the fire."

Though a commission probing violence in Myanmar's Rakhine State denied security forces had abused Rohingya, anyone can see totally a different picture while talking to the new arrivals from Myanmar here in Bangladesh.

Around 65,000 people fled Myanmar and entered Bangladesh since October 9 last and the influx is still on, according to officials at the Foreign Ministry.

Nur Mohammad, who arrived in Bangladesh 20 years back from Myanmar, told UNB that people are still crossing the border secretly and taking shelter in Bangladesh.

"Those who arrived here are unwilling to go back to Myanmar fearing further attacks. The international community needs to put genuine pressure on Myanmar so that peace and stability are restored in Rakhine State," he said.

It is very difficult to digest the stories being unfolded from the victims who took shelter in Bangladesh side, Nur added.

Arafat Ara, another victim, said the Na'f River has lot of stories to tell. "Through this river, I have been able to arrive here. Journeys of many people to Bangladesh for shelter ended halfway," said the 25-year-old Rakhine Muslim woman who took a boat journey through the Na'f river with her five children.

Describing tortures on Rohingya people by Myanmar forces, Dudu Miah, a community leader in Leda unregistered refugee camp, told UNB that the United Nations needs to deploy peacekeepers there to restore peace.

"We had full support for Aung San Suu Kyi in the past. Now she is not talking about Muslims. We've no hope right now," he said adding that Rohingya people will get back to their homeland if their rights are protected.

Bangladesh has already clearly conveyed Myanmar side to take back all Myanmar nationals -- documented, undocumented and new arrivals - as soon as possible.

Bangladesh has also proposed a coordinated and holistic approach to stop marginalisation of Rakhine Muslims, restore peace and stability in Rakhine State ensuring their livelihoods so that Myanmar nationals living in Bangladesh feel encouraged to return home.

As part of mounting international pressure on Myanmar, the member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will come together in Kuala Lumpur on January 19 to discuss possible remedies to the situation of the Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar.

This is going to be an 'extraordinary' meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers where Bangladesh will place its position on overall situation apart from the latest developments on the Rohingya issue.

Myanmar's special envoy and Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Kyaw Tin who arrived here on Tuesday evening, discussed bilateral issues with special focus on Rohingya crisis during his meetings with Bangladesh.

Sharing the outcomes of the meetings, Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali on Thursday said Bangladesh is 'quite evidently' heading towards the next step to have a permanent solution to Rohingya issue. "Surely, they'll have to take back their (Myanmar) nationals (documented, undocumented and new arrivals)."

Bangladesh has also proposed forming a proper body to verify the citizenship of Myanmar nationals and Rakhine Muslims who took shelter here.

Both Bangladesh and Myanmar agreed to quickly sign two under-discussion MoUs on security dialogue and cooperation; and border liaison office to boost security cooperation between the two countries.

Bangladesh thinks Chittagong and Cox's Bazar are extremely important and tourism development activities and stability are being hampered there due to recent arrivals from Myanmar and over 3 lakh undocumented Myanmar nationals.

Bangladesh also placed a demand for bringing back normalcy in Rakhine State so that Myanmar nationals staying in Bangladesh can go back to their home safely and with dignitary.

By Simon Lewis and Serajul Quadir 

Reuters

January 13, 2017

YANGON/DHAKA -- Myanmar has agreed to begin talks with Bangladesh over an estimated 65,000 Rohingya Muslims who have fled Myanmar's northwestern Rakhine State since attacks on border posts three months ago, a senior Myanmar official said on Thursday.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi dispatched a special envoy to Dhaka this week in a thaw in the troubled relations between the neighbors, who each see the stateless Rohingya as the other's problem.

Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina told Suu Kyi's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Kyaw Tin on Wednesday that Myanmar must accept back all "Myanmar nationals" in Bangladesh, the Bangladeshi premier's spokesman said.

Aye Aye Soe, director general of Myanmar's foreign affairs ministry, said the two countries would start discussions on an "identification and verification process". 

"If they find they are from Myanmar, they will be repatriated at the appropriate time," she said, adding there was "no timeline" for the talks.

The agreement marks a rare bright spot in the two countries' bilateral relations, which are complicated by as many as 500,000 Rohingyas living in Bangladesh after fleeing decades of persecution in Myanmar.

The United Nations says about 65,000 more people have fled the Muslim-majority northern part of Rakhine to Bangladesh since attacks that killed nine Myanmar border police on Oct. 9, sparking a heavy-handed security response.

Residents and refugees say Myanmar troops and police have carried out beatings, sexual assaults and extrajudicial killings, arbitrarily arrested villagers and set fire to homes. Myanmar has denied almost all the allegations.

The crisis has raised concerns from diplomats and human rights advocates that Myanmar's military remains unaccountable, despite a Suu Kyi-led civilian government taking power more than nine months ago.

DENIED CITIZENSHIP

A quick resolution seems unlikely as many in Buddhist-majority Myanmar see the Rohingya - whom they call "Bengalis" - as interlopers not deserving of citizenship, despite some tracing their lineage inside Myanmar's borders back centuries.

Officials in Bangladesh, where the Rohingya are also not accepted, refer to "Muslim nationals of Myanmar".

"If they are Myanmar nationals they will be repatriated here," said Myanmar's Aye Aye Soe.

Asked what the term "Myanmar nationals" referred to, she said: "It could be citizens or it could be people from Myanmar side."

Aye Aye Soe restated Myanmar's position after a previous verification process that only 2,415 of those living in Bangladesh from past exoduses were from Myanmar.

The new talks will focus on those who have arrived in Bangladesh since the recent bout of violence, she added.

Bangladesh Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali said that, with the Myanmar delegation's visit, the repatriation process was "heading towards the next step, quite evidently." 

While keeping relations with Myanmar "friendly," Bangladesh's government wants the Rohingya out of its border area so tourism can develop there, he told reporters on Thursday.

"We want to see them leave Bangladesh quickly," Mahmood Ali added.

(Editing by Dominic Evans)

Myanmar Government makes baseless, slanderous allegations against Ro Nay San Lwin and the Rohingya Blogger News: Rohingya Blogger’s Statement

London, UK

January 13, 2017

Rohingya Blogger News group is deeply disturbed by Myanmar government’s slanderous and baseless allegations against its coverage of the crimes of the Myanmar security forces against the Rohingya people in the last few weeks.

We are a group of honest citizen journalists based in the Rohingya diaspora, as well as on the ground inside the predominantly Rohingya region of Northern Arakan in western Myanmar (Burma).

Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi’s Information Committee and the Commander in Chief’s Office are both officially behind this deplorable official propaganda designed to destroy our credibility with international news agencies, which consult with and rely upon our local expertise for in-depth knowledge of the decades-long genocidal crimes committed by Myanmar governments against the Rohingya community.

Myanmar government falsely accused us of “fabricating” incidents that we claimed took place in Gawduthara village tract in southern Maungdaw Township, Rakhine State, on the 7th and 8th of January, 2017. This attack on the integrity of the Rohingya Blogger first appeared on the Facebook page run by Myanmar military’s Commander-In-Chief’s Office.

We fully stand by our reporting about Myanmar troops committing sexual violence against 13 Rohingya women and girls that took place at Gawduthara. As a matter of fact, besides speaking to the rape victims and/or eye witnesses, Rohingya Blogger News Group has verified the initial accounts of rape, robbery, arrest and torture of Rohingya villagers by Myanmar troops.

We stand by the fact that Myanmar troops from a army battalion based in Mawrawaddy village and the Border Guard Police (BGP) from Magyi Chaung Village camp gang-raped 13 Rohingya women and girls in the late evening of 7 January, 2017. The same troops detained and severely tortured 7 Rohingya villagers, all men, on 8 January.

On the morning of 8 January a group of BGP troops led by Police Major Kyaw Thu Yee arrived and took records of of the incidents in detail and reported the matter to his superiors. Subsequently, the BGP troops subjected 30 women and seven men to various types of sexual violence, severe beatings, and other physical and mental tortures. In the late afternoon, the commander of the Battalion based in Mawrawaddy took the men who were tortured and provided them with medical treatment.

Again, on 10 January Myanmar troops brought the four Rohingya villagers who were already tortured to the local BGP camp where the latter were forced to sign confessions. Subsequently, the troop commander gave each signer 50,000 Kyat (US$45 approximately) and ordered them not to speak of the “incidents" of sexual violence, robbery and torture that they witnessed or experienced first-hand.

The Rohingya Blogger has collected evidence of these incidents, which remain in our News Group’s possession.

Following the slanderous attacks on Rohingya Blogger by the Office of Myanmar Commander-In-Chief, the State Counsellor’s Information Committee released the same information without mentioning us directly by name. The Info Committee instead described us as an “Internet propaganda page” which it said had posted fabricated news. Burmese media and State media then published the same information in Burmese and English language on-line publications, as well as hard copies.

Among the international journalists, we are one of the most trusted sources of Rohingya news, updates and raw stories for more than 10 years. Rohingya Blogger has received awards from nine organizations based in the United States in 2015. We have cooperated with every major media outlet in the world, from CNN and BBC to Al Jazeera and New York Times, in order to inform the world of Myanmar’s persecution of the Rohingya people – which is now increasingly and commonly described as “ethnic cleansing”, “crimes against humanity”, or even “genocide”.

We categorically reject and denounce the baseless accusations against us made jointly by the Aung San Suu Kyi’s Government and the military leaders of Myanmar.

Additionally, we denounce the false or fake news made by Myanmar’s State Counsellor’s Office where Aung San Suu Kyi’s Information Committee distorted a video clip from Al Jazeera news (ref: #AJNewsGrid November 21, 2016) as if Al Jazeera English was warning the world of “Fake News” spread by Rohingya Blogger. Al Jazeera uses raw stories about Myanmar’s atrocities against Rohingya because its editors and producers have worked with us and known us to be fully credible and truthful as the on-the-ground source of news about the Rohingyas.

The Myanmar Government’s mouthpiece, The Global New Light of Myanmar, posted an article stating that one of our bloggers and citizen journalists, namely Ro Nay San Lwin, was sending out fake news. Contrary to the malicious distortion by the Global New Light of Myanmar, the video news clip in question actually referred to Internet users posting wrongly attributed photos that claimed to be of Rakhine State. In fact, the AJE news story which Myanmar government mouthpiece referred to showed Ro Nay San Lwin’s tweets as the ones containing and transmitting verified photos about the unfolding situation in Northern Rakhine State. For the Aung San Suu Kyi government to be running this apparently distorted story in its official media outlet is a sign of desperation among Myanmar’s senior leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi. However powerful and influential, Myanmar leaders may be, they are losing their propaganda war internationally - clearly designed to cover up and deny atrocity crimes of genocidal proportions.

To Myanmar State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, we have a message for you. We had loved you once and we called you our friend and even ‘Mother’. We ask now that you find in the Rohingya the same humanity you find in yourself. We ask that you give the Rohingya the same compassion the world gave you. Finally, we ask that you “use your liberty to promote ours”.

The Myanmar government’s allegation against RB can be read here. 

The Myanmar government’s fabricated news about Al Jazeera’s video clip can be read here.

The video clip of Al Jazeera can be watched here.

Rohingya Blogger Team

For more information, please contact: Ro Nay San Lwin + 49 69 26022349

The following organizations and individual have endorsed this statement.

1. International State Crime Initiative (ISCI)
2. Burma Campaign UK
3. Burma Task Force USA
4. Global Minorities Alliance (GMA)
5. Centre for Human Rights Research & Advocacy (CENTHRA), Malaysia
6. Burma Human Rights Network (BHRN)
7. Burmese Muslim Association
8. Protect The Rohingya (South Africa)
9. Civil Rights Movement
10. International Campaign for the Rohingya
11. Al Kanz (France)
12. Arakan Rohingya National Organisation
13. Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK
14. Burmese Rohingya Community in Denmark
15. Rohingya Community in Germany
16. Rohingya Community in Switzerland
17. Rohingya Organisation Norway
18. Rohingya Community in Finland
19. Rohingya Community in Italy
20. Rohingya Community in Sweden
21. Rohingya Society in Netherlands
22. Burmese Rohingya Association in Japan
23. Rohingya American Society
24. Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand
25. Rohingya Advocacy Network in Japan
26. Burmese American Muslim Association (BAMA)
27. Rohingya Society in Malaysia (RSM)
28. Burmese Rohingya Association in Queensland-Australia (BRAQA)
29. Burmese Rohingya Community Australia
30. British Rohingya Community UK
31. Rohingya Culture Center Chicago
32. Rohingya Association Canada
33. Rohingya Peace Network of Thailand
34. Dr. Maung Zarni
35. Dr. Azeem Ibrahim
36. Jamila Hanan
37. Jennifer Sawicz
38. Andrew Day
39. Ahsan Khan
40. Janice Ahmed
41. BarakaCity
42. Dr. Habib Siddiqui
43. Paul Mooney
44. Matthew Smith

Please send email to info@rohingyablogger.com if you would like to endorse this statement.