By Beh Lih Yi

Thomson Reuters Foundation

November 15, 2017

KUALA LUMPUR -- In a dimly lit shop in Kuala Lumpur, where dried fish, herbs and pickled tea leaves imported from Myanmar are on display, two men sit behind a counter inspecting bank notes.

“We send money to Balukhali and Kutupalong everyday,” one of the men, wearing a long white robe and an Islamic skullcap, said to a Rohingya man approaching the counter. 

“Send today, money arrives on the same day,” he said. 

The shop is among many in the Malaysian capital that Rohingya use to send money to the two vast refugee camps in Bangladesh since a military crackdown in August prompted over 600,000 members of the ethnic group to flee Myanmar. 

The Rohingya, a Muslim minority denied citizenship in Myanmar, have been escaping persecution in their mostly Buddhist homeland for decades but the latest exodus was the worst in years. 

With Rohingya families still heading to the camps, refugees who left in earlier waves who have managed to establish some sort of modest livelihood are pooling together their limited resources to send money to the newly displaced. 

Much is flowing from Malaysia, a Muslim-majority country that is home to more than 50,000 Rohingya refugees and asylum-seekers, where many of them work as daily laborers, hawkers and construction workers. 

Money transfer companies have reported a spike in remittances since the crisis erupted in August. 

But the community is also tapping popular mobile money services and a centuries-old transfer system with roots in the Middle East to send financial aid to the camps for families to buy food, medicine and other necessities. 

‘THEY HAVE NOTHING NOW’ 

Rohingya refugee Kamal, who has been in Malaysia since 2012, said his parents and six siblings fled to Bangladesh’s Balukhali camp in October and are counting on him for financial support.

Among them is his 65-year-old diabetic father who needs a regular supply of medicine. 

“They have nothing now, they have to buy every single thing,” Kamal told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a rented low-cost flat on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur that he and his wife share with another couple. 

“To boil water, they have to buy firewood and a bunch of wood is 40 taka (50 cents), which is enough to get a meal,” said the 30-year-old refugee, who uses a pseudonym to protect his identity. 

Kamal uses bKash, a popular Bangladeshi mobile money service, to send money to his family from wages he earns working odd jobs - sometimes 1,000 taka ($12)and sometimes up to 5,000 taka ($60) - as often as he can. 

His family pick up the money in Bangladesh from certified agents using a code. 

An employee at a licensed money transfer firm in Pudu, an area in central Kuala Lumpur frequented by refugees, said she had received an average of 30 money transfer requests daily to Bangladesh since the latest violence erupted.

In the past, Myanmar refugees would typically send money to their homeland, rather than Bangladesh, said the staff member, who declined to give her name. 

Remitting money through an official transfer store requires the Rohingya to show their U.N. refugee cards. 

That’s not something all Rohingya in Malaysia possess – it can be a slow process for a newly arrived asylum-seeker to apply for refugee status, and applications are not always successful. 

Those without official documents have turned to a network of informal transfer outlets modeled on the ancient “hawala” system which is based on trust, and typically leaves no paper trail. 

The system involves agents accepting funds in one country and promising to pay a beneficiary in another country in exchange for a fee that is smaller than at a bank.

Hawala is popular among migrants in the Middle East and has been used to remit money to remote areas, where banking is out of reach or too costly. 

TRUST, PERSONAL TIES 

Mohammed Siddiq, 34, hands over cash to one of these agents every month to send money to his family in a camp for displaced people in Sittwe, the capital of Myanmar’s western Rakhine state. 

The agent notifies his counterparts in Sittwe, and the money is delivered to his family inside the camp. 

“We trust our people, the agents have been loyal to us,” said Siddiq, who has been in Malaysia for 13 years and supports himself by delivering chickens to shops. 

“I have to trust these people because my family members in the camp have no other resources. I was afraid and worried but there is no other way.” 

Most of these services are run from grocery stores or restaurants popular with the Rohingya community in downtown Kuala Lumpur, often from an unmarked backroom. 

Siddiq said he uses the services because sometimes, when he was short of cash to send to his family, the agents would loan him money and note down the debt which he could repay later. 

A Rohingya man, who used to be an agent, said refugees rely on the system because of trust and personal ties, and their family is able to collect the money usually within a few hours. 

“Most of the time when the Myanmar people here have to send money it involves an emergency, so this is quick and efficient,” said the refugee, who declined to give his name. 

But he stopped acting as a middleman after a few months, partly because too many Rohingya were turning to him to borrow money. 

“It is hard to say no to friends, relatives because they are in emergency,” he said. “But later they disappeared, and I kept making losses.” 

Reporting by Beh Lih Yi @behlihyi, Editing by Ros Russell

New Report: Mounting Evidence of Genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar

International cooperation needed to halt killing and seek justice

(WASHINGTON D.C. and COX’S BAZAR, November 15, 2017) — There is “mounting evidence” of genocide against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, according to a new report published today by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and Fortify Rights. The government of Myanmar has a responsibility to halt atrocities being perpetrated by Myanmar security forces, civilian perpetrators, and militants and hold perpetrators accountable. The international community should develop and implement a shared strategy to ensure the cessation of atrocities and advance accountability.

“The Rohingya have suffered attacks and systematic violations for decades, and the international community must not fail them now when their very existence in Myanmar is threatened” said Cameron Hudson, Director of the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. “Without urgent action, there’s a high risk of more mass atrocities.”

“They Tried to Kill Us All”: Atrocity Crimes against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State, Myanmar is based on one year of research conducted by Fortify Rights and the United States Holocaust Museum in Myanmar and Bangladesh. More than 200 in-depth, in-person interviews—documented primarily by Fortify Rights in Myanmar and on the Myanmar-Bangladesh border—with Rohingya survivors and eyewitnesses of atrocity crimes, as well as international aid workers, informed the report.

It documents widespread and systematic attacks on Rohingya civilians from October 9 - December 2016 and from August 25, 2017 to the present day committed by Myanmar Army soldiers, police, and civilians.

“They tried to kill us all,” said “Mohammed Rafiq,” 25, from Min Gyi village in Maungdaw Township, recalling how soldiers corralled villagers in a group and opened fire on them on August 30, 2017. “There was nothing left. People were shot in the chest, stomach, legs, face, head, everywhere.”

The report reveals how Myanmar state security forces and civilian perpetrators committed mass killings in dozens of villages in Maungdaw Township in the first wave of violence in 2016 and in villages throughout all three townships of northern Rakhine State since August 25, 2017. Myanmar Army soldiers and civilian perpetrators slit throats; burned victims alive, including infants and children; beat civilians to death; raped and gang raped women and children. State security forces opened fire on men, women, and children at close range and at a distance and from land and helicopters, killing untold numbers. Survivors from some villages described how perpetrators slashed women’s breasts, hacked bodies to pieces, and beheaded victims, including children.

“These crimes thrive on impunity and inaction,” said Matthew Smith, Chief Executive Officer of Fortify Rights. “Condemnations aren’t enough. Without urgent international action towards accountability, more mass killings are likely.”

More than half of Myanmar’s one million Rohinyga have fled the country in the past nine weeks and over 700,000 Rohingya are now living as refugees in Bangladesh. Thousands are still arriving in Bangladesh weekly. Since 2012, the Government of Myanmar has confined more than 120,000 Rohingya to more than 35 internment camps throughout Rakhine State.

The Myanmar Army-led assault on Rohingya civilians comes in response to attacks by the Rohingya militant group, Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) on three police outposts on October 9, 2016 that left nine dead and another attack on 30 police outposts and one army base on August 25, 2017 that left at least 12 dead. Members of ARSA are also responsible for human rights violations.

The government of Myanmar has enforced strict restrictions on Rohingya freedom of movement, marriage, childbirth, and other aspects of daily life for decades. The authorities deny Rohingya Myanmar citizenship by law and deny their ethnic identity, claiming they are interlopers from Bangladesh and casting them as an existential threat to Buddhist culture. The government continues to deny the delivery of essential humanitarian aid, including food and nutrition, to affected areas of northern Rakhine State.

“These crimes won’t end on their own,” said Matthew Smith, Chief Executive Officer at Fortify Rights. “People of conscience in Myanmar need to do everything possible to end the abuses and culture of impunity in the country.”

Along with recommendations for the Government of Myanmar, the report details options for the international community, such as: enacting targeted sanctions on the individuals responsible for crimes in Rakhine State, instituting an arms embargo on Myanmar, and referring the situation to the International Criminal Court, which was established to investigate, try, and prosecute those responsible for atrocity crimes when the State is unwilling or unable to do so.

Reuters

November 15, 2017

NAYPYITAW -- U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called on Wednesday for a credible investigation into reports of human rights abuses against Rohingya Muslims committed by Myanmar’s security forces after a meeting with its civilian and military leaders.

More than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled to Bangladesh since late August, driven out by a military counter-insurgency clearance operation in Buddhist-majority Myanmar’s Rakhine State. 

A top U.N. official has described the military’s actions as a textbook case of “ethnic cleansing”. 

“We’re deeply concerned by credible reports of widespread atrocities committed by Myanmar’s security forces and by vigilantes who were unrestrained by the security forces during the recent violence in Rakhine State,” Tillerson told a joint news conference with Aung San Suu Kyi, the head of a civilian administration that is less than two years old and shares power with the military. 

Tillerson had earlier held separate talks with Myanmar’s military chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, whose forces have been accused of atrocities. 

A senior U.N. official on Sunday leveled allegations of mass rape, killings and torture against the Myanmar military, known as the Tatmadaw, after a tour of refugee camps in the Cox’s Bazar region of neighboring Bangladesh. 

Tillerson called for the Myanmar government to lead a credible and impartial investigation and said those who committed abuses should be held responsible. 

“The recent serious allegations of abuses in Rakhine state demand a credible and impartial investigation and those who commit human rights abuses or violations must be held accountable,” he said. 

“In all my meetings, I have called on the Myanmar civilian government to lead a full and effective independent investigation and for the military to facilitate full access and cooperation.”

He also said it was the duty of the military to help the government to meet commitments to ensure the safety and security of all people in Rakhine state. 

A posting on Min Aung Hlaing’s Facebook page said Myanmar’s military supremo had explained to Tillerson the “true situation in Rakhine”, the reasons why Muslims fled, how the military was working with the government to deliver aid and the progress made for a repatriation process to be agreed with Bangladesh. 

The military launched its clearance operation after an army base and 30 police posts were attacked on Aug. 25 by Rohingya militants, killing about a dozen members of the security forces. 

CONSEQUENCES 

Tillerson condemned the militant attacks, but said any response by the security forces needed to avoid to the “maximum extent possible harming innocent civilians”.

An internal investigation by the military into the allegations of atrocities that was released this week was branded a “whitewash” by human rights groups. 

Back in Washington, U.S. senators are pressing for economic sanctions and travel restrictions targeting the Myanmar military and its business interests. 

Tillerson said he would advise against any broad-based sanctions against Myanmar, as the United States wanted to see it succeed. 

But he said if there was credible and reliable information on abuses by individuals they could be targeted by sanctions.

Tillerson said the United States would work with partners so that those responsible for any atrocities would face consequences, “using all available mechanisms, including those available under U.S. law”. 

Myanmar is undergoing a transition to democracy after decades of rule by the military, but the generals retain extensive powers over security and a veto over reform of a constitution that has barred Suu Kyi from the presidency. 

“Myanmar’s response to this crisis is critical to determining the success of its transition to a more democratic society,” Tillerson said. 

”It’s a responsibility of the government and its security forces to protect and respect the human rights of all persons within its borders and to hold accountable those who fail to do so.” 

He said the United States would provide an additional $47 million in humanitarian assistance for refugees bringing the total to $87 million since the crisis erupted in August. 

“The humanitarian scale of this crisis is staggering,” Tillerson said. 

But he said he was encouraged by talks between Myanmar and Bangladesh to agree on a refugee repatriation process. 

During the news conference, Suu Kyi was asked to explain why she had not spoken out more strongly over the plight of the Rohingya, as the Nobel peace prize winner’s perceived failure to speak up has damaged her international reputation as a stateswoman. 

“What I say is not supposed to be exciting,” Suu Kyi said, adding that she had aimed to keep the public informed without setting different ethnic, religious communities against each other. 

“It’s important to bring peace and stability to this country and that can only be done on the basis of rule of law and everybody should understand that the role of theirs is to protect peace and stability, not to punish people.” 

Writing by Simon Cameron-Moore; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, Robert Birsel

By UN News 

November 14, 2017

Human trafficking and exploitation are rife among Rohingya refugees who have fled Myanmar to seek safety in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, the United Nations migration agency has found.

“Understanding the scope of human trafficking is difficult in most settings due to the hidden nature of the crime,” said Kateryna Ardanyan, a counter-trafficking expert of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in a press release issued Tuesday. 

“In the chaos of a crisis like this, trafficking is usually invisible at first, as there are so many other urgent needs like food and shelter. But agencies responding to this crisis should not wait until the number of identified victims increases,” she added. 

According to interviews and community focus groups conducted in the district's makeshift settlements by IOM, desperate men, women and children are being recruited with false offers of paid work in various industries including fishing, small commerce, begging and, in the case of girls, domestic work.

With almost no alternative source of income, the refugees are willing to take whatever opportunities they are presented with, even ones that are risky, dangerous and that involve their children.

Once they start the job, they usually find that they are not paid what was promised. They are often deprived of sleep, made to work more hours than was agreed, not allowed to leave their work premises and not allowed to contact their family. Women and girls are often physically or sexually abused.

Some report being forced into jobs which they never agreed to do. In one case, a number of adolescent girls, who were promised work as domestic helpers in Cox's Bazar and Chittagong, were forced into prostitution. Others reported being brought to locations different from the agreed destination.

In one case, a woman reportedly went to work for a family and was brought back to the settlements dead. The family of the victim received a settlement from the employers.

Many of the recruiters are Bangladeshi, while some are Rohingya, and many were established in the area prior to the most recent influx. The number of criminals and trafficking rings operating in the district has expanded with the population.

The abuse mainly occurs in neighbourhoods surrounding the settlements, but recruiters are also taking people to places as far away as Cox's Bazar city, Chittagong and Dhaka.

IOM is also aware of cases where Rohingya have been trafficked to outside Bangladesh, and is assisting the victims. Most of the trafficking is taking place inside the country, which follows the pattern of trafficking globally.

Forced and early marriages are also taking place among the Rohingya population. For many families, it is a coping mechanism that offers protection and economic advancement for young Rohingya women and girls. 

“Rohingya refugees need preventative and proactive action now to mitigate risks of human trafficking, and the survivors need help, before this spirals out of control,” Ms. Ardanyan said.

Over 617,000 Rohingya refugees have settled in Cox's Bazar since 25 August, but exploitation of the Rohingya population in the district has been occurring since well before this most recent influx of people.

By Alex Crawford 

The Guardian

November 14, 2017

Alex Crawford of Sky News reports from Rakhine state on the fleeing Rohingya Muslims unable to get to Bangladesh and stranded on Dang Khali Saur beach, desperate for food and water

It’s the sound of the wailing that is most haunting. It’s a deep, soulful, pit-of-your-being, howling hurt. And it follows us as we’re swept along by this moving, wretched mass of humanity. These are the Rohingya Muslims who are unable to flee the violence being unleashed against them by travelling overland to Bangladesh because of the distances involved; the certainty of running into Myanmar soldiers and having to navigate landmines. They’ve run in the only other direction they could – towards the beaches of Maungdaw district in Rakhine state, until they reached water and could go no further.

We’ve travelled in a traditional Bangladeshi fishing boat to Dang Khali Saur beach, now home to what’s believed to be the largest number of stranded Rohingya in Rakhine. Here, the bulk of the atrocities by the Myanmar military have been taking place.

We wade through the shallows from the boat and are met by a group standing knee-deep in water. At the front, being held up by a young man, is a small, frail woman, with hollowed out cheeks and sunken eyes. I grasp her upper arm to steady her as she wobbles and her thin frame takes my breath away. I can encircle her entire upper arm by touching my thumb with my forefinger. We follow the crowd along the beach. It’s slow progress because of the sheer numbers. Men are crying openly. A woman walking behind me sobs continuously: big, helpless gulps of despair.

Through night vision on the camera we can see the hordes of people around us, holding babies, grasping tiny hands, propping up their elderly. We’re constantly stopped as parents thrust their babies at me. One father holds his baby boy’s skinny little leg, imploring me to feel how slight it is. A young woman is holding a newborn and she tells us her baby was born a week ago, right on this beach. Some of them have been here for two months, trapped on this sand prison, they say. There is an army outpost nearby, they tell us, and landmines beyond the beach prevent them from returning inland, to their villages. 

“When they started burning our homes and slaughtering us, we ran for our lives,” one man tells us. “We ran towards the beach and the soldiers guided us past the landmines down a path to the [shore], then they sealed the path behind us. Now we’re trapped here.” They tell us repeatedly of killings and rapes at the hands of the Myanmar military. 

As I’m talking to one mother, asking her about her baby – how old he is, where he was born – others push their way through the crowd. Suddenly there are rows of women cradling their young ones in their arms. A 19-year-old girl says she gave birth the day before and we can see the umbilical cord is still attached. She’s half hunched over, her face twisted in pain. 

The captain of our boat has said we can take about 15 people back with us. It was taking in water even on the trip over, with his crew scooping out bucket-loads from the bottom minutes after we set off. He is keeping a careful count of who is coming on board. The girl insists on her mother, and the father of her baby, coming too.

The boatman has done this trip several times before. He’s well aware of the desperation of these people so he’s anchored his boat some distance away from shore to avoid a sudden rush when we set off. It is a cruel selection procedure. The consensus of the boat and crew is that the very youngest, the most frail and the most vulnerable should be given passage. But those who fulfil that criteria far exceed the boat’s capacity. One of the men on the boat has come in search of his relatives. He tracks down only two of them, a younger brother and a young cousin. But he guides them to the waiting area to board the boat, grateful that he’s managed to find at least two. One woman holds my hand, sobbing, and tells us her husband was shot by the soldiers. She’s alone with three young children. 

There’s feverish activity at one stretch of the beach as a huge contraption of jerry cans, bamboo and plastic string is being turned into a life-raft. It looks about 40 square feet and there are scores of men with small head torches working on it. “We have no money at all, so we have to make our own boat,” we’re told. 

These people who’ve survived the arson, execution and rape inland. But now, unless they somehow get away from this beach hell, they tell us they fear dying of starvation and disease. In the shadows, we can just make out some tents, rigged up from small plastic covers and bamboo sticks. The heat is stifling but these people are stranded here, exposed to the elements with no easy access to fresh water, food or shelter. A young man is carried to us and the crowd tells us he was beaten trying to forage for water. Their testimony is in stark contrast to the denials being issued by the Myanmar authorities, who insist there’s no persecution and their security “clearance” is because of terrorist activity against the army.

The boatman is getting very agitated about how long we’ve been ashore and the crowd is increasingly chaotic and frantic. He’s worried there will be a rush for his craft when they see we’re leaving. So many are being left to fester further on this miserable stretch of land.

A few of the crew try to hold people back, waving their arms and shouting at them to stay back. The group who board carry sackfuls of the few belongings they’ve managed to bring with them – a few solar panels, rice and clothes. Once again, these Rohingya are on the move but there’s no joy among them, not even discernible relief. These are people who have endured an awful lot. Twin boys of five or six years old sit clinging to each other on the side of the boat. They look terrified. They, like everyone on the boat, has no idea how they’re going to manage from now or what will happen to them. But somehow whatever is in front of them is worth running towards because it cannot possibly be as bad as what they are escaping from.

Alex Crawford is Sky News special correspondent

By AFP

November 14, 2017

MANILA: Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi faced rising global pressure Tuesday (Nov 14) to solve the crisis for her nation's displaced Rohingya Muslim minority, meeting the UN chief and America's top diplomat in the Philippines.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres told the Nobel laureate that hundreds of thousands of displaced Muslims who had fled to Bangladesh should be allowed to return to their homes in Myanmar.

"The Secretary-General highlighted that strengthened efforts to ensure humanitarian access, safe, dignified, voluntary and sustained returns, as well as true reconciliation between communities, would be essential," a UN statement said, summarising comments to Mr Suu Kyi.

Mr Guterres' comments came hours before Ms Suu Kyi sat down with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on the sidelines of the East Asia Summit in Manila.

Washington has been cautious in its statements on the situation in Rakhine, and has avoided outright criticism of the Myanmar leader.

Supporters say she must navigate a path between outrage abroad and popular feeling in a majority Buddhist country where most people believe the Rohingya are interlopers.

At a photo opportunity at the top of her meeting with Mr Tillerson, Ms Suu Kyi ignored a journalist who asked if the Rohingya were citizens of Myanmar.

At a later appearance after the meeting, Mr Tillerson - who is headed to Myanmar on Wednesday - was asked by reporters if he "had a message for Burmese leaders".

He apparently ignored the question, replying only: "Thank you", according to a pool report of the encounter.

ETHNIC CLEANSING

More than 600,000 Rohingya have flooded into Bangladesh since late August, and now live in the squalor of the world's biggest refugee camp.

The crisis erupted after Rohingya rebels attacked police posts in Myanmar's Rakhine state, triggering a military crackdown that saw hundreds of villages reduced to ashes and sparked a massive exodus.

The UN says the Myanmar military is engaged in a "coordinated and systematic" attempt to purge the region of Rohingya in what amounts to a "textbook example of ethnic cleansing".

The stream of desperate refugees who escape across the riverine border bring with them stories of rape, murder and the torching of villages by soldiers and Buddhist mobs.

The Myanmar government insists military action in Rakhine is a proportionate response to violence by militants.

Following its first official investigation into the crisis, the army published a report this week in which it cleared itself of any abuses.

However, it heavily restricts access to the region by independent journalists and aid groups, and verification of events on the ground is virtually impossible.

Ms Suu Kyi, a former democracy activist, has been lambasted by rights groups for failing to speak up for the Rohingya or condemn festering anti-Muslim sentiment in the country.

Musician and campaigner Bob Geldof on Monday slammed Ms Suu Kyi as a "murderer" and a "handmaiden to genocide", becoming the latest in a growing line of global figures to disavow the one-time darling of the human rights community.

Supporters say she does not have the power to stop the powerful military, which ruled the country for decades until her party came to power following 2015 elections.

In a summit on Monday night with leaders of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of which Myanmar is a member, Mr Guterres also voiced concern about the Rohingya.

He said the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya was a "worrying escalation in a protracted tragedy," according to the UN statement.

The UN chief described the situation as a potential source of instability in the region, as well as radicalisation.

By AFP

November 14, 2017

Torched villages and unharvested paddy fields stretch to the horizon in Myanmar's violence-gutted Rakhine state, where a dwindling number of Muslim Rohingya remain trapped in limbo after an army crackdown coursed through the region.

A rare military-organised trip for foreign media by helicopter to Maungdaw district -- the epicentre of a crisis that exploded in late August -- showed a landscape devoid of people, with the emerald paddy fields scarred by the blackened patches of destroyed Rohingya villages.

More than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled the area over the past two and a half months, running from a scorched-earth military campaign against militants that the UN has described as a "textbook example" of ethnic cleansing.

Myanmar, a mainly Buddhist country, has denied committing atrocities but has heavily restricted access to the conflict zone with the exception of brief government-organised visits.

Under the watchful eye of an army brigadier and border police, journalists on Sunday were able to speak to some of the several hundred Rohingya camped at the beach near Ale Than Kyaw village, hoping to flee across treacherous waters to neighbouring Bangladesh.

While the worst violence appears to have subsided, those left behind say they are trapped -- unable to afford the $50 boat fee, but without the means to eke out a living in the region.

"We used to work in farming and fishing, but now the owners don't want labour," said 25-year-old Osoma, explaining that most Rohingya businesses and landowners have joined the exodus.

The young mother of three, carrying a month-old baby in her arms, said her family was not certain if life in Bangladesh's sprawling refugee camps would be better.

"But we want to stay with the others who are there already," she told AFP.

- Desperate escape -

Rakhine's northernmost Maungdaw district was once home to around three quarters of Myanmar's 1.1 million-strong Rohingya population, according to government figures.

Aid workers estimate that only some 150,000 remain there, with other communities living further south.

With no one left to work Maungdaw's fields, huge swathes of verdant farmland are at risk of rotting -- a cruel irony given the severe food shortages in aid-dependent Rakhine and the squalid refugee camps across the border.

Myanmar says it has trucked in workers from other parts of the state to harvest 70,000 acres of abandoned rice paddies.

But some stretches of untouched fields have already started to turn brown in the mountain-studded region.

The media trip to Rakhine comes amid mounting global pressure on Myanmar over its handling of the crisis, with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson set to visit the capital on Wednesday.

The top American diplomat is expected to take a firm tone with the country's powerful military leaders, whom he has deemed "responsible" for the crisis.

Meanwhile, on the shores of Rakhine, some desperate Rohingya are taking matters into their own hands.

Ro Shi Armad, 18, has teamed up with several other families to build a flimsy-looking raft using plastic containers and bamboo.

Scores of refugees have drowned in recent months while attempting the perilous journey to Bangladesh.

"We're not worried if we die on the way over," the teenager told AFP.

"What else can we do now?"

By Jim Gomez

Associated Press

November 14, 2017

MANILA, Philippines — The United Nations chief expressed alarm over the plight of Rohingya Muslims in remarks before Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi and other leaders from a Southeast Asian bloc that has refused to criticize her government over the crisis.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said late Monday that the unfolding humanitarian crisis can cause regional instability and radicalization. He met with leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations on the sidelines of its summit in Manila.

“I cannot hide my deep concern with the dramatic movement of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Myanmar to Bangladesh,” Guterres told the ASEAN leaders. Suu Kyi sat close to him but looked mostly at a wall screen showing the U.N. leader.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled Myanmar’s Rakhine state since late August, when the military launched what they called “clearance operations” in response to insurgent attacks. The refugees say soldiers and Buddhist mobs attacked them and burned their villages to force them to flee.

In its most forceful denial so far, however, Myanmar’s military issued a statement late Monday saying security forces did not commit atrocities during “clearance operations.” It cited an internal investigation that it said had absolved it of any wrongdoing in a crisis that has triggered Asia’s largest refugee exodus in decades.

The report contradicts consistent statements from Rohingya refugees now in Bangladesh — some with gunshot wounds and severe burns — who have described massacres, rapes, looting and the burning of hundreds of villages by Myanmar’s army and civilian mobs.

Suu Kyi does not have the power to stop Myanmar’s military, but has defended it from international condemnation, drawing harsh criticism and damaging her image as a democracy activist and human rights campaigner.

Gutteres said at the United Nations in September that the attacks against the Rohingya appeared to be “ethnic cleansing.” He said Friday that it was “an absolutely essential priority” to stop all violence against Rohingya Muslims, allow them to return to their homes and grant them legal status. But his remarks were more measured in front of his ASEAN audience and he did not use the word “Rohingya” itself, a term that angers people in Myanmar who do not consider them a recognized ethnic group.

“It is a worrying escalation in a protracted tragedy and a potential source of instability in the region, and radicalization,” Guterres said, welcoming ASEAN efforts to provide humanitarian aid.

Since the crisis began, Guterres said he has called for “unhindered humanitarian access to affected communities and the right to safe, voluntary and dignified return of those who fled, to their places of origin.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also raised the Rohingya issue in a meeting with the ASEAN leaders, including Suu Kyi, in Manila on Tuesday. Trudeau said he has deployed a special envoy to find out how Canada can support the Muslim minorities and pledged to support ASEAN efforts to help resolve the problem.

“This is of tremendous concern to Canada and many, many other countries around the world,” Trudeau said of the Rohingya crisis at a news conference. “Again, we are always looking at not how we can sort of shake our finger and yell at people, but how we can help, how we can move forward in a way that reduces violence, that emphasizes the rule of law, that ensures protection for all citizens.”

The conservative ASEAN, which includes Myanmar and other countries critical of its handling of the Rohingya crisis like Malaysia, has refused to formally discuss the crisis as a bloc in a strongly critical manner. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesman, Harry Roque, however, said at least two leaders raised the issue Monday during the bloc’s annual summit.

Founded in 1967 in the Cold War era, ASEAN has a bedrock policy of noninterference in each of its members’ domestic affairs and decides by consensus, meaning just one member can shoot down any initiative by other members. Those principles have allowed erring governments to parry criticisms while being involved in an internationally recognized regional grouping.

In a draft of a post-summit communique seen by The Associated Press, the leaders included a brief line on the issue, praising an ASEAN disaster-response center for the delivery of relief goods to recent flood and landslide victims in Vietnam, displaced Filipinos in the southern Philippine city of Marawi and “affected communities” in Rakhine in Myanmar.

___

Associated Press writer Teresa Cerojano contributed to this report.

The Telegraph

November 13, 2017

Myanmar's army on Monday released a report denying all allegations of rape and murder of Rohingya Muslims, after replacing the general in charge of the operation that drove more than 600,000 of the oppressed group out of the country.

A report posted on the Facebook page of Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, the Myanmar army's commander-in-chief, said an internal investigation had cleared the security forces of all accusations of committing violent atrocities against the Rohingya.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas have made the fraught journey to Bangladesh since the Myanmar military launched a crackdown in Rakhine state in August.

It was not explained why Major General Maung Maung Soe was transferred from his post as the head of Western Command in Rakhine state.

Over the weekend, a senior UN official who had toured the refugee camps in Bangladesh accused Myanmar's military of conducting organised mass rape and other crimes against humanity.

The denial came ahead of a visit on Wednesday by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who is expected to deliver a stern message to Myanmar's generals, over whom de-facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi exerts little control.

Senators in Washington are pressing to pass legislation imposing economic and travel sanctions targeting the military and its business interests.

In September, another senior UN figure said the actions of the Myanmar military against the Rohingya seemed a "textbook example of ethnic cleansing".

The government in Buddhist-majority Myanmar regards the Rohingya as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.

Myanmar says the clearance operation was necessary for national security after Rohingya militants attacked security posts and an army base.

By Anadolu Agency

November 13, 2017

Downing Street spokesman says UK is 'appalled' by attacks on Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar

ISTANBUL -- A U.K. government spokesman on Monday said violence against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar "looks a lot like ethnic cleansing".

In comments reported in U.K. media, the Downing Street spokesman said the British government had been "appalled by the inhumane violence which has taken place in Rakhine state".

"It’s a major humanitarian crisis which has been created by Burma’s military and it looks like ethnic cleansing," he added.

This follows the UN's description of the violence against Rohingya Muslims as a "textbook example of ethnic cleansing".

Turkey has also been at the forefront of raising the Rohingya crisis internationally.

Earlier on Monday, Live Aid founder Bob Geldof returned a civic award in Dublin in protest at Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi's response to the Rohingya crisis in her country, where, since Aug. 25, over 611,000 people have fled the western state of Rakhine into Bangladesh.

The refugees are fleeing a military operation in which security forces and Buddhist mobs have killed men, women and children, looted homes and torched Rohingya villages.

The Rohingya, described by the UN as the world's most persecuted people, have faced heightened fears of attack since dozens were killed in communal violence in 2012.

By Nomia Iqbal

BBC Newsday

November 13, 2017

The United Nations is warning that more than half a million Rohingya refugees who have fled Rakhine since August are at risk of exploitation in Bangladesh. One woman told Nomia Iqbal, from the BBC's Newsday programme, how she had been groomed and forced into prostitution after fleeing.

With her face covered in a pink scarf, 21-year-old Halima agreed to talk to me in a private place.

"As we entered Bangladesh, we were taken to camp, where a local Bangladeshi man gave us some food," she said. "He told me he had lost his wife and he has two kids. He said he wanted to marry me."

Halima said she had believed him and had accompanied him to his house in Cox's Bazar.

"When I got to the house, I saw seven to eight young girls like me," she said. "I was scared. In this house he forced me to have sex with many men."

Halima came to Bangladesh three months ago to escape the violence in Northern Rakhine. She does not know where her family are and arrived with her neighbours.

More than half of the mainly Muslim Rohingya refugees are children - they have been escaping the violence carried out against them committed by the Myanmar army and some local Buddhist extremists.

Hamima told me she had stayed two months in the house, which was run by a Bangladeshi woman. 

"I was dolled up and had this make-up on," she said. "Sometimes three to four men would come to the house in one night. It was so difficult and I would start bleeding for days."

During that time, she was not given any money, but only three meals a day.

One evening a man arrived at the house who would go on to help Halima.

"This man was a police officer who came to have sex but after hearing my story he called me 'sister'. He stayed overnight but did nothing and instead gave me his mobile phone number."

One day, Halima said, she suffered a vicious attack by the female owner of the house and was injured for 15 days.

She decided to make a plan to escape and when another man arrived to sleep with her, she used his mobile phone and contacted the policeman. He arrived with six other officers at midnight.

"He rescued me and six other girls," she said. "He said 'you're free now'."

But Halima found herself staying in Cox's Bazar because she did not know anywhere else in Bangladesh. 

Now penniless, she says she has no choice but to be a prostitute. 

She stays in a place with another woman who does similar work and says food and help are provided every now and again. 

For young Halima, this is clearly not the life she expected after fleeing across the border for safety.

"I want to go back to praying five times a day, having meals with my family," she said. "I want the life I had before with my family in Myanmar."

The Bangladeshi government says aid agencies are doing all they can to protect vulnerable people. 

The UN has also said it is focusing on specific activities to tackle the problem, including funding an initiative which involves Rohingya refugees using microphones inside the camps, to announce the names of children when they go missing. 

"I am worried about two sets of risk," the UN's High Commissioner for Refugees, Fillipo Grandi, said.

"One is exploitation, including sexual exploitation, when people come with nothing. They are extremely vulnerable to this. "The other feature of this particular crisis is trauma that people carry with them."

The scale of the problem is staggering.

Reuters

November 13, 2017

Azimul Hasan, 10, a Rohingya refugee boy, serves plates at a roadside hotel where he works at Jamtoli, close to Palong Khali camp, near Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, November 12, 2017. REUTERS/Navesh Chitrakar

Associated Press

November 13, 2017

SHAH PORIR DWIP, Bangladesh — Nabi Hussain owes his life to a yellow plastic oil container.

The 13-year-old Rohingya boy couldn't swim, and had never even seen the sea before fleeing his village in Myanmar. But he clung to the empty container and struggled across the water with it for about 2 1/2 miles, all the way to Bangladesh.

Rohingya Muslims escaping the violence in their homeland of Myanmar are now so desperate that some are trying to swim to safety in neighboring Bangladesh. In just a week, more than three dozen boys and young men used cooking oil containers like life rafts to swim across the mouth of the Naf River and wash up ashore in Shah Porir Dwip, a fishing town and cattle trade spot.

"I was so scared of dying," said Nabi, a lanky boy in a striped polo shirt and checkered dhoti. "I thought it was going to be my last day."

Although Rohingya Muslims have lived in Myanmar for decades, the country's Buddhist majority still sees them as invaders from Bangladesh. The government denies them basic rights, and the United Nations has called them the most persecuted minority in the world. Just since August, after their homes were torched by Buddhist mobs and soldiers, more than 600,000 Rohingya have risked the trip to Bangladesh.

"We had a lot of suffering, so we thought drowning in the water was a better option," said Kamal Hussain, 18, who also swam to Bangladesh with an oil container.

Nabi knows almost no one in this new country, and his parents back in Myanmar don't know that he is alive. He doesn't smile and rarely maintains eye contact.

Nabi grew up in the mountains of Myanmar, the fourth of nine children of a farmer who grows paan, the betel leaf used as chewing tobacco. He never went to school.

The trouble started two months ago when Rohingya insurgents attacked Myanmar security forces. The Myanmar military responded with a brutal crackdown, killing men, raping women and burning homes and property. The last Nabi saw of his village, all the homes were on fire.

Nabi's family fled, heading toward the coast, passing dead bodies. But when they arrived at the coast with a flood of other Rohingya refugees, they had no money for a boat and a smuggler.

Every day, there was less food. So after four days, Nabi told his parents he wanted to swim the delta to reach the thin line of land he could see in the distance — Shah Porir Dwip.

His parents didn't want him to go. One of his older brothers had left for Bangladesh two months ago, and they had no idea what had happened to him. They knew the strong currents could carry Nabi into the ocean.

Eventually, though, they agreed, on the condition that he not go alone. So on the afternoon of Nov. 3, Nabi joined a group of 23 other young men, and his family came to see him off.

"Please keep me in your prayers," he told his mother, while everyone around him wept.

Nabi and the others strapped the cooking oil containers to their chests as floats, and stepped into the water just as the current started to shift toward Bangladesh. The men stayed in groups of three, tied together with ropes. Nabi was in the middle, because he was young and didn't know how to swim.

Nabi remembers swallowing water, in part because of the waves and in part to quench his thirst. The water was salty. His legs ached. But he never looked behind him.

Just after sundown, the group reached Shah Porir Dwip, exhausted, hungry and dehydrated.

Nabi is now alone, one of an estimated 40,000 unaccompanied Rohingya Muslim children living in Bangladesh. He looks down as he speaks, just a few feet from the water, and murmurs his biggest wish:

"I want my parents and peace."

Late afternoon on the next day, authorities spotted a few dots in the middle of the water. It was another group of Rohingya swimming to Bangladesh with yellow plastic containers. They arrived at the same time as a pack of cattle — except that the cows came by boat.

___

Bernat Armangue is the South Asia news director for The Associated Press, based in New Delhi. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/BernatArmangue

By Shovel Mamun, Ashif Islam Shaon

Dhaka Tribune

November 12, 2017

Shovel Mamun and Ashif Islam Shaon of Dhaka Tribune speaks with British Member of Parliament George Foulkes

He discussed the upcoming Bangladesh general election in 2019 and the Rohingya crisis. Foulkes, Baron Foulkes of Cumnock PC is a British Labour Co-operative life peer. He has been a member of the House of Commons, the Scottish Parliament and as a life peer is now a member of the House of Lords.

What could Commonwealth countries do to solve the Rohingya problem?

Bangladesh has done a lot better than a lot of countries with the Rohingya crisis. Both the people and the government of Bangladesh should be congratulated for their sincere efforts. We want to help Bangladesh and are making every effort to ensure CAP countries are beside Bangladesh to help solve this problem. Every country should put pressure on Myanmar to address their responsibilities.

My hope is that the Rohingya problem is resolved quickly. But things as they are, Bangladesh is a developing country and is faced with far more complications than other developed countries. Britain along with other countries has started to provide funds and assistance to the Bangladeshi government to aid in the effort.

We will raise the Rohingya issue in our parliament to find an effective solution.

Do you think there is a bilateral solution to this problem?

There is a need to have a bilateral agreement between the countries on this issue and Bangladesh needs support from other countries such as the UK. If there is commitment from the global community, it is possible to find a bilateral solution.

In your opinion, do you think Myanmar government has been delaying their efforts to find a solution?

Yes they are. This is genocide. British media has broadcasted reports of Myanmar army torturing the Rohingya people. Every country has a responsibility to pressurise the Myanmar government to find an effective solution quickly.

What are your thoughts on the polls for the upcoming Bangladeshi elections?

Great Britain has been practicing democracy for a very long time. I visited Bangladesh in 1991 during national elections and at the time, all parties, including BNP and Awami league, participated in what I felt was a free and fair electoral process.

However, in the previous election many questions were raised and phrases like “one party election” were being thrown around. My hope is that all parties will come together and participate in the upcoming national elections because in the end, democracy doesn’t work without participation.

What are some challenges in a democracy?

There are a lot of challenges. Take Russia for instance who are said to have influenced the recent US Polls by using social media. Fabricating news to influence the outcome of an election is a global issue and Bangladesh is no exception.

There is however, a difference between developed countries and developing countries such as Bangladesh. In the US, people are able to go and vote freely in a safe and secure polling station that are monitored and where vote rigging is not possible. While the economy of Bangladesh is rising, it is still developing and that brings its own set of challenges.