The Rohingya issue-Shun laidback approach

Editorial
The Rohingya issue- Shun laidback approach

The pledge of the Myanmar authority to consider a set of new rights for Rohingyas, who have been made stateless in their own country, does not go far enough. It is the question of citizenship of the Muslims of Arakan State that is the nub of the issue. Amidst renewed violence against them in Myanmar, an early resolution of the matter assumes great importance.

The plight of the Rohingyas has been greatly enhanced by the fact that they have nowhere to seek succor except the sea, to escape the persecution, which, according to the OIC, has assumed 'genocidal' proportions.

What is appalling is the position taken by the Myanmar Nobel Laureate on the issue. We find Suu Kyi's unwillingness to take the side of the oppressed as morally untenable, particularly for a Nobel Peace Laureate. Contrary to her belief, her keeping equidistance from the issue will not promote national reconciliation; it will only encourage the oppressors to do more of what they are doing.

However, we hope that the chorus of international condemnation, including that of the UN and the OIC, of the Myanmar government's failure to protect its ethnic minority and even turning a blind eye to the violence perpetrated on them by the majority community with the support of the government agencies, would have a positive impact. And we would hope that President Obama would be able to convince the Myanmar junta to resolve the longstanding ethnic issue, during his forthcoming visit to that country.

While Bangladesh may have made its position clear to the OIC about its stance on the Rohingya issue, and it may have reasons for not offering permanent refuge to them, we find its unwillingness to be more forceful in calling upon the Myanmar government as well the international community, to stop the persecution, rather baffling. The problem is not an exclusively Myanmar issue. Bangladesh suffers the consequences of their persecution and can ill afford to remain a spectator to the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingyas. It must add its voice in as strong a manner as possible to that of the international community's in calling upon the Myanmar government for a just resolution of the matter.

Readers' Comments:

It is much to be regretted that Suu Kyi, the Nobel laureate, should overlook the sectarian violence on the Muslim Rohingas by the Rakhine Buddhists of her country. She is rather making matters worse by trying to internationalize an internal problem. Contrary to facts, she has wrongly raised her fingers at Bangladeshi infiltration into Rakhine state. How could she ignore the displacement of more than 100,000 persons only in the last six months? Their houses have been burnt, hundred killed, their property looted, women raped. The human tragedy has been termed by some as genocidal -and 90 per cent of the victims are Rohingas. That the Muslim community is deprived of their citizenship and that thousands still remain stranded in the coastal waters without food and nutrition is a moving humanitarian tale rarely to be witnessed in recent decades. By failing to rise up to the occasion, she has lost much of her charisma, prudence, quality of leadership and above all her hall-mark to be the champion of democratic rights of people. We pray that she realizes her mistakes and play a constructive role in the reconciliation of the two communities.
: Dr. Iftikhar-ul-Awwal

We are not expecting that NLD (National League for Democracy) can make policy or implement them because we know that NLD is just opposition party. What we want from Suu Kyi is that she must have moral courage to stand for the principle even not popular among voters such as Rohingya citizenship issue. All expectation are not from NLD but from national leader Suu Kyi . She could have defused the tension between Rakhine Buddhist and Rohingya Muslims by making a statement on the principle but she failed and thousand of innocent people are still paying the price.
: Naser Mullah , Riyadh KSA

Source: The Daily Star, Dhaka, 19 Novemver 2012; link: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=257983

Rohingya Issue- Dhaka shocked by Suu Kyi's comments

By Diplomatic Correspondent
Dhaka has expressed surprise over Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's recent comments about Rohingyas in her country's Rakhine state terming them illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

In a press statement yesterday, the foreign ministry said such comments were clearly inconsistent with the position of the Myanmar government, and the action taken by them to resolve the issue over the past several years.

Suu Kyi on November 13 in India described the recent violence in west Myanmar between Buddhists and Muslims as a "huge international tragedy", saying illegal immigration from Bangladesh had to be stopped.

Giving a long historical background, the foreign ministry particularly mentioned that the Myanmar government had accepted 236,599 Myanmar refugees of Rohingya ethnicity after their own process of verification.

“There is, therefore, no question that these people had moved from Myanmar into Bangladesh.

“It is the sincere expectation of the Bangladesh government that all concerned will refrain from making statements that are without any basis in fact,” the statement said.

Bangladesh will remain engaged with Myanmar for a durable solution to this outstanding issue in the spirit of good neighbourliness, it added.

The foreign ministry also said historic evidence shows that people of Rohingya ethnicity have been living in the Rakhine state for centuries, whereas Bangladesh came into existence only in 1971.

Therefore, there was no reason to ascribe Bangladesh nationality to these people living in the Rakhine state long before 16th December 1971.

Subsequent to Bangladesh's emergence as an independent state, there had been occasional influxes of Myanmar nationals of Rohingya ethnicity from Myanmar to Bangladesh due to internal situations in their homeland, the statement read.

The last such major influx took place in 1991-92 when 250,877 Myanmar nationals of Rohingya ethnicity took refuge in Bangladesh.

Of these, the Myanmar government took back 236,599 refugees through a tripartite agreement between Bangladesh, Myanmar and UNHCR after verification of their antecedents as people of Myanmar origin.

The remaining Myanmar refugees, along with their offsprings, were staying in two refugee camps in Bangladesh.

A quarter of these residual refugees were verified and confirmed by the Myanmar government as their nationals.

In addition to the above caseload of refugees, a large number of Myanmar nationals, again of Rohingya ethnicity, had subsequently crossed the border and illegally entered Bangladesh.

In numerous interactions at various levels, including during the visit of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to Myanmar in December 2011, the Myanmar government had assured Bangladesh to take back these undocumented Myanmar nationals after verification of their origin.

"Bangladesh has noted with appreciation the recent decision of the Myanmar government to review their citizenship laws to ensure inclusive nationality for all members of Myanmar society," the statement said.

Bangladesh also expects that this review would uphold accepted international standards in determining the nationality of all people living in Myanmar, it added.

Source: The Daily Star, Dhaka, 19 November 2012; link: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=258073

Myanmar to look at Rohingya rights

Myanmar to look at Rohingya rights
President Thein Sein writes to UN; OIC decries 'genocide'; Suu Kyi remark shocks many in India

Star Report

Myanmar's president has pledged to consider new rights for the stateless Rohingya minority ahead of a landmark visit by President Barack Obama, but stopped short of a full commitment that citizenship and other new freedoms would be granted.

In a letter sent to the United Nations on Friday, President Thein Sein made conciliatory remarks that condemned the "senseless violence" in western Rakhine state between Rakhine Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya.

Almost 200 people have died and more than 1,00,000 have been displaced since June in fighting between the two communities, reports Associated press.

The persecution of Rohingyas also affects Bangladesh. Whenever communal violence breaks out in Myanmar, the minorities intrude into Bangladesh through Teknaf bordering area.

Bangladesh accommodates around 29,000 registered Rohingya refugees, although different estimates suggest the number of the Myanmarese minorities unofficially living in and around Cox's Bazar ranges between 2.5 and 5 lakh.

Yesterday, the world's top Islamic body called for the international community to protect Muslims in Myanmar's unrest-hit Rakhine state from "genocide".

"We expect the United States to convey a strong message to the government of Burma so they protect that minority, what is going on there is genocide," said Djibouti's Foreign Minister Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, who is the acting chairman of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

"We are telling things how they are, we believe that the United States and other ... countries ... should act quickly to save that minority which is submitted to an oppressive policy and a genocide," he said at the end of an OIC foreign ministers' meeting in Djibouti.

OIC Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu of Turkey also urged a stop to what he called "ethnic cleansing" of the Rohingya, considered among the most persecuted groups in the world by the United Nations.

"We would like the international community to act immediately to stop the ethnic cleansing," he said.

The 57-member OIC decided at an August summit in Mecca to take the issue before the UN General Assembly, writes AFP.

Obama tomorrow will become the first sitting US president to visit Myanmar in a short but hugely symbolic trip that he hopes will spur greater reform in the once isolated country and highlight a rare success for his policy of engaging pariah regimes.

Ahead of the visit, Thein Sein said yesterday that the communal unrest was hampering the country's reforms and causing it "to lose face" on the world stage.

In October, he blocked the OIC from opening an office in the country, following rallies against the organisation's efforts to help Rakhine's Muslims.

In his letter to the UN, Thein Sein made no promises and offered no timeline for resolving the tensions, but it marked an overture to the international community and to Obama.

The White House has urged Myanmar to take urgent action to end the strife and has said Obama will press the matter with Thein Sein, along with demands to free political prisoners as the Southeast Asian country transitions to democracy after a half-century of military rule.

Thein Sein in his letter said his government was prepared to address contentious issues "ranging from resettlement of displaced populations to granting of citizenship," according to a statement from the spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that contained excerpts from the letter.

He said he also would look at issues including work permits and permits granting freedom of movement for the Rohingya to ensure they are treated in line with "accepted international norms."

The UN statement called Thein Sein's letter a step "in the right direction."

It was not clear from his letter whether Thein Sein was changing his stance on citizenship for the Rohingya. He has previously cited strict citizenship laws stating that only Rohingya whose families settled in the country before independence from Britain in 1948 were considered citizens.

Meanwhile, Civil society activists in New Delhi have protested against what they said Myanmar's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's unwillingness to acknowledge Rohingya Muslims' plight in her homeland.

The protesting groups, including the Association for Protection of Civil Rights and the Democratic Students' Union, on Friday issued a statement, in which they disapproved Suu Kyi's continuous silence and ambivalent attitude towards the violence against "a section of her compatriots known as Rohingyas."

Suu Kyi, who is now on a visit to India, told NDTV in an interview on Thursday that both sides were responsible for the ethnic violence in the Rakhine province and she did not want to take sides because she wanted to promote national reconciliation.

"The political position [on the issue] of Suu Kyi, the daughter of respected General Aung San who stood for democracy, peace and minority rights in Burma, is highly condemnable in all respects," the statement says.

"Its a complete hypocrisy that Aung San Suu Kyi doesn't stand by the victims of the ethnic cleansing in Burma [Myanmar], but wants India to stand by her cause," it adds.

The activists on Friday were agitating outside a leading women's college in the capital of India.

Suu Kyi had discredited the plight of Rohingyas by describing the situation in Myanmar as a mere issue of law and order, they said, adding her fight for democracy would remain incomplete until she spoke against the persecution of such minorities in her own country.

The protesters were detained for a brief period at Greater Kailash Police Station before being freed.

The United Nations has called the Rohingya -- who are widely reviled by the Buddhist majority in Myanmar -- among the most persecuted people on Earth.

Myanmar denies the Rohingya citizenship, even though many of their families have lived in Myanmar for generations.

The UN estimates that 800,000 Rohingya live in Myanmar, where they face heavy-handed restrictions: They need permission to marry, have more than two children and travel outside of their villages.

Reader's Comment:
The international community had time and again insisted that Rohingas be accorded Myanmar citizenship with all their civil and political rights. But Myanmar authorities put inordinate complications in rules and procedures which made the task almost impossible. Asking them to produce documentary proof of their forefathers for a century or so is akin to asking them to leave the land. We must remember the level of their literacy, the heritage of record preservation, the climatic factors, and the social context of frequent changes of homes and hearths which inevitably leads to shedding of vital documents. It is essential to liberalize verification and identification procedures and admit the Rohinga as Myanmar citizens. US President Barack Obama who is shortly expected to pay a state visit to Myanmar should take up the humanitarian issue in earnest, and restore peace in the region.
: Iftikhar-ul-Awwal

Source: The Daily Star, 18 November 2012; link: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=257938