The slow walk into Hell : A look at Burma's forced famine

Source eldersledge, 30 Dec

 

(part of The Darkness Visible series)

(Blockades Hold Back Food, Water, and Medical Aid)

As Burma prepares the Rohingya for "citizenship" the order of the day appears to be starvation and police brutality. Thein Sein has publicly claimed that any Muslim who is a citizen of Myanmar will be treated as such under the newly formed democratic regime. Yet Rohingya and other Muslim ethnic groups in Burma have been subject to ethnic cleansing since June of 2012. This sort of violence occurred under the old Junta control and prior to Colonial power in the region. However this time around the threat of a total genocide against the Rohingya appears more plausible than ever before now that neighboring countries are developed enough to prevent escape.

In the months that followed the massive influx of ethnic violence in the region the Junta style authorities reappeared in the Rakhine region of Burma. Police and military leaders immediately began rounding up Rohingya and in some incidents mass executions have taken place. Rohingya who were able to fight back were dealt with through systematic roundups and disarming by government and Buddhist militia like mobs. Those who survived were forced into camps that greatly resemble the small concentration camps used by the Japanese during World War Two.

For those who were taken to police run camps and prisons the stories of torture became a very real situation. Boys as young as their early teens have been taken to these "safe houses" and prisons where they have been subjected to torture without ever once being convicted of any crime. Piles of bodies have been reported near or behind these facilities so as to leave the Muslim bodies out and unburied well past the time allotted for such ceremonies given by the Koran.

Yet now that the outside world has shown even the most minimal amount of interest the Burmese government has pulled back on outright slaughter of the Rohingya. Instead of the mass executions that immediately followed the outbreak of violence, the Myanmar authorities have turned to their Communist teachings for inspiration in implementing the Rohingyas' "final solution". Following in the footsteps of Stalin, Thein Sien's government has begun expanding upon their original goal of starving out the Rohingya who they claim hide in the "illegal refugee camps". This method is meant to recreate Stalin's infamous "forced famines".

(Wasting Away As The Outside World Watches)

The goal of this barbaric method of warfare is to force submission or extermination of a selected group by withholding the basics all humans need to live. In the case of the Rohingya the Burmese have decided to blockade the camps and keep all sources of food, water, and medical aid out of Rohingya hands. Police and military have been recorded going into the camps to fetch any source of food or water that the Rohingya may scavenge. The blockades also serve as a way to keep the Rohingya in the camps so that they have no hope of escape. In affect, the refugee camps within Myanmar have become death camps.

Starvation is the new reality for the Rohingya who hoped this wave of ethnic cleansing would pass like all the rest. Their children are dieing at an alarming rate as malnutrition claims the weakest members of their community first. Without some form of help soon the Rohingya within Burma may face total hell at the hands of their tormentors.

There are stories leaking out of Burma that the government is growing tired of waiting. That the regime wants the "final solution" sooner than later. Military personnel have been reported to have been growing in number in regions further away from where Western media normally has access too. These soldiers, as usual, carry only more ammunition and absolutely no aid for the Rohingya they are now harassing. Even with starvation claiming more lives every day... it appears the Buddhists in charge are looking to cleanse their land of all other religions once and for all.

This is the face of genocide in the modern age. This is the face of genocide in Myanmar. How long till we act? How many more times do we have to watch this before our hearts begin to beat?

Myanmar party lambasts Aung Sang Suu Kyi

Source bdnews,24 Dec 2012

 

Mon, Dec 24th, 2012 9:21 am BdST

Kolkata, Dec 24 (bdnews24.com) - Myanmar's Parliamentary Democracy Party (PDP) has pulled up Aung Sang Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) for 'conspiring to perpetuate military rule in the garb of democratic transition'. "What we now see in my country is a very subtle but effective collaboration between the military and Aung Sang Suu Kyi. And the West is a silent partner in this whole game," alleged PDP's senior leader Bo Aung Din, now on a tour of India. The PDP was formed by Myanmar's first prime minister U Nu in 1969, seven years after his government was ousted from power by the 1962 military coup led by General Ne Win. In the 1970s, the PDP tried to organize armed insurrection against military rule, but failed. Bo Aung Din said in an interview that military rule has turned Myanmar from the 'most prosperous economy in South-east Asia' to what is now one of the 'poorest country in the world'. He picked up cudgels with the United Nations and the Western countries over their support to the present process of transition to democracy. "This duality cannot continue. How can democracy co-exist at the same time with military control which is all pervading ? How can the world not see the atrocities perpetrated on the people , specially the ethnic minorities , by the Burmese military?," Bo Aung Din said. He alleged that Aung Sang Suu Kyi has struck a deal with the country's military junta to come to power by allowing the real levers of power to remain with the military. Parliament elections are due in Myanmar in 2015 and Aung Sang Suu Kyi's NLD is expected to sweep the polls , going by the present mood in the country. Her party swept the by-elections to 45 parliament seats recently. "Aung Sang Suu Kyi has given it (military rule) a cloak of passing durability , by her pretence that she wants democracy . Now she stands exposed as a political charlatan," Bo Aung Din alleged. And he blamed the United Nations for failing to recognize the aspirations of the Myanmar people and 'treating Aung Sang Suu Kyi' as the only political leader in the country. "UN official visits to Burma have treated Aung Sang Suu Kyi and the NLD as a permanent political leader and the NLD as the only political party for the people of Burma (Myanmar). This is unfair," said Aung Din . He alleged that Suu Kyi's politics was financed by British and US governments, who have their own axe to grind in Myanmar. "Aung Sang Suu Kyi's entire political movement, the NGOs supporting her both inside Myanmar and abroad, as well as domestic and foreign media fronts that ceaselessly promote her and her agenda, are entirely funded by the US and the British governments," he said, claiming that a 36-page document from the "Burma Campaign UK" explicitly details the enormous amounts of money and resources both the US government and its corporate-funded foundations have poured into Suu Kyi's image-building. bdnews24.com/sbh/0912h

Letter from America: The Rohingya Question – Part 6

Source Asiantribune, 31 Dec

 

By Dr. Habib Siddiqui

As we have noted elsewhere there are other records, including British, which mention the name

Rohingya. Consider, for instance, the account of the English surgeon to Embassy of Ava, Dr. Francis Buchanan (1762-1829 CE), who visited Burma decades before the British occupied the territory.

He published his major work "A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire" in 1799, in the fifth volume of Asiatic Researches, which provides one of the first major Western surveys of the languages of Burma. What is more important is that his article provides important data on the ethno-cultural identities and identifications of the various population groups in the first half of Bodawpaya's reign (1782-1819).

He wrote, "I shall now add three dialects, spoken in the Burma Empire, but evidently derived from the language of the Hindu nation. The first is that spoken by the Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan, and who call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan. The second dialect is that spoken by the Hindus of Arakan. I procured it from a Brahmen [Brahmin] and his attendants, who had been brought to Amarapura by the king's eldest son, on his return from the conquest of Arakan. They call themselves Rossawn, and, for what reason I do not know, wanted to persuade me that theirs was the common language of Arakan.

Both these tribes, by the real natives of Arakan, are called Kulaw Yakain, or stranger Arakan. The last dialect of the Hindustanee which I shall mention is that of a people called, by the Burmas, Aykobat, many of them are slaves at Amarapura. By one of them I was informed, that they had called themselves Banga; that formerly they had kings of their own; but that, in his father's time, their kingdom had been overturned by the king of Munnypura [Manipur], who carried away a great part of the inhabitants to his residence. When that was taken last by the Burmas, which was about fifteen years ago, this man was one of the many captives who were brought to Ava. He said also, that Banga was seven days' journey south-west from Munnypura: it must, therefore, be on the frontiers of Bengal, and may, perhaps, be the country called in our maps Cashar [Cachar]."

[Notes: 1. In the above account, the word Rohingya is spelled as Rooinga.. 2. Cachar district, part of the state of Assam in India, is located north-east of Sylhet in Bangladesh; it is located between the Indian state of Manipur and Bangladesh.]

Dr. Buchanan's above statement is very revealing in that it shows that before the British occupied Arakan and the rest of Burma there were already Muslims living there who had identified themselves as the Rohingya, and that it was not an invented term. This observation squarely contradicts the current campaign by ultra-nationalist Rakhines and Burman racists that the Rohingyas settled in the Arakan only after the British occupation.

In his massive work - A Geographical, Statistical, and Historical Description of Hindostan and the Adjacent Countries in Two Volumes, published in London in 1820, Walter Hamilton wrote about Arakan (the Rakhine state), "The Moguls know this country by the name of Rakhang, and the Mahommedans, who have been long settled in the country, call themselves Rooinga, or the natives of Arracan."

Thus, we can draw the conclusion that before the British even entered Arakan, the Muslim inhabitants called themselves by that name and were known as such by others.

These revelations about the Rohingya people from Buchanan and Hamilton should not come as a surprise to any genuine researcher of Arakanese and Burmese history. Numerous research works have demonstrated that a substantial portion of Arakan's Muslim population was made up of descendants of Muslims who had lived in Arakan for centuries.

In his first hand account of the Arakanese Muslims, Charles Paton, wrote, "The Musselman Sirdars generally speak good Hindustani, but the lower orders of that class, who speak a broken sort of Hindustani, are quite unintelligible to those who are not thoroughly acquainted with the jargon of the southern parts of the Chittagong district." It is not difficult to understand why the elites (Sirdars or Sardars) within the Arakanese Muslim society - the descendants of those attached to royalty and those in high offices - were more familiar with Hindustani, which is closer to Farsi, than the less educated cultivator class. Many of the forefathers of those elites came as the soldiers of generals Wali Khan and Sandi Khan who came to restore the kingdom of Nara-meik-hla in the early 15th century, and courtiers, ministers and administrators – as we shall see below - that later attached themselves with the Arakanese royalty in Mrohaung.

In his travelogue, the Augustine monk Friar Sebastian Manrique mentioned Arakanese king's coronation ceremony in the early 17th century in which the parade was opened by Muslim cavalry unit of Rajputres from India, which was led by its cavalry leader.

Michael Charney in his doctoral dissertation (under the supervision of Professor Juan Cole of the University of Michigan) mentions about the emergence of Muslim 'cultivator' class in Arakan from at least the 17th century when large number of Bengalis were kidnapped by Maghs and Portuguese slave traders to work in the Kaladan valley. Quoting Manrique, he says that from 1622 to 1634, some 42,000 Bengali captives were brought in by the Portuguese pirates. By 1630, there were probably 11,000 Bengali families living in rural areas of Danra-waddy. The actual number is, however, significantly higher since there were also royal-sponsored campaigns to bring Bengalis as captives. Charney estimates that between 1617 and 1666, the total number of those Bengali captives could be 147,000. He also mentions about Bengali captives brought from Chittagong to Arakan as late as 1723 during the reign of Sanda-wizaya-raza. Those captives were called Kala-douns in the Arakanese chronicles, "who were then donated as pagoda-slaves in the ordination halls and monasteries, including the Maha-muni shrine complex."

As noted by Professor Moshe Yegar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the capture and enslavement of prisoners was one of the most lucrative types of plunder of Bengal by joint Magh and Portuguese pirates. In his article, "The Crescent in the Arakan", Yegar wrote, "Half the prisoners taken by the Portuguese and all the artisans among them were given to the king; the rest were sold on market or forced to settle in the villages near Mrohaung. A considerable number of these captives were Muslims." It is not difficult to surmise that those abducted slaves and their descendants would identify themselves as the Rohingya.

Charney writes, "It is not surprising that in the late 1770s, as observers based in Chittagong explained, 'Almost three-fourths of the inhabitants of Rekheng [Danra-waddy] are said to be natives of Bengal, or descendants of such… In short, despite the lack of complete data, it is still apparent that the demographic contribution of Bengali captives to Danra-waddy's population is considerable."

Charles Paton, similarly, mentioned the reason why the Rohingya Muslims were traditionally employed in farming: "The Mugs being particularly fond of hunting and fishing, do not make such good farmers as the Musselmans; however, as Banias and shop-keepers, they surpass the Bengalis in cunning, and, on all occasions try, and very often successfully, to overreach their customers: stealing is a predominant evil amongst them …" The Arakanese (Rohingya) Muslims and Hindus, as children of the indigenous people of the soil, were mostly involved in wet farming since time immemorial, a tradition which they retained before and after the British moved into Arakan.

Charney also mentions about the existence of a small group of Muslims dating as far back as the 9th century. He also cites Arakan traditions which hold that ship-wrecked Muslims had settled in Arakan as early as the 8th century. The Muslim population grew significantly with the Mrauk-U dynasty. Even Muslim mercenaries were brought in to fight in special campaign or to solve special problems within Arakan. He writes, "It is unlikely that these mercenaries had no influence in terms of advertising Islam to the Arakanese. After all, the Muslim mercenaries who helped restore Nara-meik-hla to his throne seem to have built the Santikan mosque in Mrauk-U in about 1430. There was also certainly a small Muslim presence among the intermediary service elites in the royal city during the early Mrauk-U period… At the beginning of the seventeenth century, there were many Muslims in the Arakanese court, including a Turkish courtier … who seems to have become a kind of royal adviser."

There was also a small, but wealthy and influential community of Muslim traders in Arakan. "Even higher status Muslims arrived as political refugees from Bengal with Shah Shuja in the mid-seventeenth century. Together, Muslims in the royal city formed a special social group with a privileged and unique socio-political role than their rural counterparts enjoyed, with different connections to the Muslim world," notes Charney. Suffice it to say that before Bodawpaya's invasion of Arakan, Arakanese Muslims (also known as the Rohingya) were employed in various professions: from high ranking courtiers in the capital city to non-elites and agriculturalists into the countryside.

Quoting British census, Charney says that in 1891 there were 126,586 Muslims in Arakan (most of whom were concentrated in Danra-Waddy, wherein sat the capital), comprising roughly 19% of the total population. This figure should not come as a surprise given the fact that in the 1830s, at least 30% of Arakan's general population was Muslim. For the original number to increase to the 1891 number, only a growth rate of 2.24% was necessary. This annual growth rate is below what was prevalent in those days amongst the Muslim population in Bengal and Arakan suggesting rather strongly that to grow to that size it did not require an influx from outside.

As I have pointed out in an earlier work on demography in Arakan, a rational basis for understanding the size of the Rohingya population in Burma during the British period lies in Charles Paton's data when the East India Company colonized Arakan. As the Sub-commissioner in Aracan (Arakan), he was able to estimate the population soon after Arakan came under British rule. He said, "The population of Aracan and its dependencies, Ramree, Cheduba, and Sandoway, does not, at present, exceed a hundred thousand souls, and may be classed as follows: Mugs, six-tenths; Musselmans, three-tenths; Burmese, one-tenth; total, 100,000 souls."

The questions that an unbiased researcher, therefore, has to ask are: what happened to those 30,000 Arakanese Muslims whom Paton called Musselmans? During the British period in 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901, 1911, 1921, 1931 and 1941 or thereafter what was the size of their population?

Ignoring such obvious signs and records of presence, many Rohingya-deniers continue to say that the Rohingyas are not an ethnic group in Myanmar. And in recent months we have witnessed quite a few state-managed demonstrations, which even included highly politicized pro-government, ultra-racist monks carrying placards that demanded that the 1982 constitution – responsible for making the Rohingya people stateless - should be strictly followed by the government so that they can be removed from Myanmar. Claims and demands of this kind are symptomatic of the depth of racism and bigotry that has penetrated the Buddhist society inside Myanmar. Consequently, the latest genocidal campaign to ethnically cleanse the Rohingya which began in June of 2012 has already succeeded in uprooting more than a hundred thousand Rohingya people who are now forced to live in concentration camps, unless they choose to settle for a life of uncertainty elsewhere. They cannot go out to fetch livelihood. As al-Jazeera's documentary film 'The Hidden Genocide' revealed, they are starving to death. It is a slow death camp for them!

====? To be continued.

For part 1: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/11/24/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

For part 2: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/01/letter-america-rohingya-ques... ;

For part 3: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/08/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

For part 4: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/15/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

For part 5: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/22/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

- Asian Tribune -

452 Rohingya refugees detained in Lankawi of Malaysia

 

Pl read by clicking the link-

1) 452 Rohingya refugees detained in Lankawi of Malaysia

 

 

 

2) 128 Rohingyas languish in India's Andamans

Source bdnews, 30 Dec

 

Kolkata, Dec 30 (bdnews24.com)— The 128 Rohingyas, whose boat drifted into India's Andaman islands earlier this month, say they don't want to go back to Myanmar. Authorities in the Andaman archipelago say the Rohingyas were trying to reach Malaysia from Myanmar's Rakhine state, but their boat drifted towards the Andamans. The boat came ashore at Narcoddum islands on Dec 9. Indian coast guards who intercepted the boat were told by the Rohingyas that they were trying to reach Malaysia. "They said their condition in Myanmar is desperate and so they want to reach Malaysia. But now they are stuck here in the Andamans," said an Indian official. The Indians are in a fix. The Rohingyas are determined not to return to Myanmar because they anticipate trouble if they are handed back. Malaysia, or any other country, will not take them for obvious reasons. India can only keep them for some time. Hundreds of Muslim Rohingyas are trying to flee from Myanmar's Rakhine state ever since the riots between them and Buddhist Rakhines erupted in summer and then again in autumn. Close to 80,000 of them have been rendered homeless and herded into makeshift camps by Myanmar authorities. Many have died at sea when their boats capsized. bdnews24.com/sbh/0945h

Breaking News: Authority Carrying Out Mass Arbitrary Arrests in Maung Daw

Source Rohingyablogger, 29 Dec

Maung Daw, Arakan - Since 5AM this morning, the village of Khadir Bil (Nyaung Chaung), Maung Daw has been under the besiege and blockage of a joint department of Police, Hluntin (Security Forces), NaSaKa (Border Security Froces) and Military. The joint department is carrying out mass arbitrary arrests of innocent Rohingyas in the village.

"At 5AM, a joint department of Police, Hluntin (Security Forces), NaSaKa (Border Security Froces) and Military besieged the village Khadir Bil (Nyaung Chaung).They have put blockades around the village since then so that no Rohingya from the village can escape. Now the joint department is raiding every house in the village and arbitrarily arresting innocent Rohingyas. Besides, they have been harassing Rohingya women in the village. Meanwhile, some innocent Rohingyas are being released after extorting money.

U Khin Maung Shwe [sic], the Judge of the Court of Maung Daw Tsp, has been issuing arbitrary arrest warrants of Rohingyas in Maung Daw with the baseless accusations of their involvements in the violence. In the village of Baggona alone, there is an arrest warrant issued for 42 Rohingya people in addition to the previously arrested 54 innocent Rohingyas who are in the detention cells (the hells on earth) in Buthidaung. He, U Khin Maung Shwe, is a Rakhine extremist who has been, since June, in the forefront of arresting and killing of Rohingyas and exaggerating the violence against them.

He has issued an arrest warrant for 14 people in Nyaung Chaung village. Since none of them is in the village now, they have been arresting innocent Rohingyas from the village. We fear that we might the face the similar situation sooner or later" a Rohingya Elder from Maung Daw.

He added "most of the time, the authority and administration of Arakan, mainly composed of Rakhine extremists, carry out violence, arbitrary arrests and tortures against Rohingyas and Kamans without the permission and acknowledgement from NayPyiTaw (or Central Government). Sometimes, they don't even follow the direction given by NayPyiTaw."

Besides, as it has been known, the authority in Arakan is forcing Rohingyas to register themselves as Bengali, an identity they don't belong to. Registration process includes taking digital fingerprints and photographs that will permanently make their Rohingya identity disappear. Now, the NaSaKa in Nagpura (NgaKhuRa) village of Maung Daw started to force Rohingya villagers to sign themselves "Bengali."

"On 22nd December 2012, the commander Win Hlaing and Chief Staff (U-Si-Hmuu) Tun Tun Naing of NaSaKa Region (NayMayay) 5 started to force Rohingyas to sign themselves as Bengali. According to them, it is the order from higher authority Myanmar. If Rohingyas don't follow the order, they will be arrested and prosecuted. The following Rohingyas were arrested as they hesitated to accept the term "Bengali."

(1) Nazir Ahmed S/o Zakir Ahmed (30 years old)

(2) Abul Alam S/o Ataullah (27 years old)

(3) Noor Alam S/o Mohammed Shafi (46 years old)

(4) Hussien Ahmed S/o Noor Alam (19 years old)

(5) Zakir S/o Nurur Zallal (31 years old)

(6) Sayed Noor S/o Sayed (25 years old)

(7) Amnullah S/o Mohammed Ullah (31 years old)

The following two Rohingyas were forced to sign themselves as "Bengali."

(1) Shakat Ali S/o Ashu Ali 35 years old

(2) Shah Alam S/o Mohammed Alam 36 years old" reported by the correspondent of ERC (European Rohingya Council) Media.

The pogroms and all kinds of atrocities against Rohingyas and Kamans have been being carried out in Arakan for months. As a result, they are now on the verge of extinction. Yet, International government bodies and communities are not taking effective actions to stop the genocides and man-made humanitarian catastrophe in Arakan.

Briefing Report on Rohingyas at the MAS-ICNA Annual Convention in Chicago

By BRAFA,

(MAS-ICNA Convention held on December 21^st to 25^th, 2012)

First of all, I would like to thank the organizing Committee members of this 11^th Annual Convention of MAS-ICNA for giving me an ample opportunity to present the plights of Burmese Rohingya ethnic minority of Arakan-Burma with current update information.

Before briefing the situation of Burmese Rohingya people, I want to introduce all of you about myself and our organization called "The Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association. My name is Shaukhat (aka) MSK Jilani and currently, I am carrying the duty as a Chairman in the Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association.

The Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association (BRAFA) is based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin State and it was formed by the Burmese Rohingya residents and citizens of America living in Milwaukee area to advocate the suffering cause of ethnic Rohingya minority people of Arakan-Burma who are the worst victims of a pre-planned controlled genocide and ethnic cleansing at the hands of Burmese government security forces and law enforcing agencies with the active collaboration of extremist, racist and xenophobic Rakhine Buddhist people led by Buddhist Rakhine National political forces such as Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP), Arakan League for Democracy (ALD), some NLD members, Rakhine academicians and intellectuals, Buddhist monks, Rakhine Youth Association and other members of Arakan Liberation Party (ALP).

The Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association is a non-profit community based organization working together with all American communities and societies, NGOs, human rights organizations including the US Government administration for the prevention and protection of Arakan Muslim population from the Burmese Government's controlled genocide and ethnic cleansing in Burma.

Now, I want to continue to tell you about the Rohingya Muslims of Arakan and its national status in Burma. Burma is a home country to numerous ethnic groups and about 60% of the area is inhabited by nearly 140 ethnic races and Rohingya is one of them. Currently, Burma has a population of about 60 million of which nearly 8 million are Muslims. Of the Muslim population about 3.5 million (both at home and in exile) are Rohingyas of Arakan. The Rohingyas are a majority community in Arakan.

Rohingyas are Muslims who have been living in Arakan from time immemorial. They trace their ancestry to Arabs, Moors, Pathans, Moghuls, Bengalis and some other Indo-Mongoloid people. Muslim Rohingyas are living in Arakan generation after generation for centuries after centuries and their arrival in Arakan has predated the arrival of many other peoples and races now residing in Arakan and other parts of Burma. Early Muslim settlement in Arakan dates back to 7^th century A.D. while Muslims merchants and missionary teams used to travel to China and Indochina peninsula.

Muslim Rohingyas are much more than a national minority with a population of 3.5 million (both home and abroad) having strong and supporting history, separate culture, civilization, language and literature, historically, settled territory and reasonable size of population and area. Rohingya people consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the society. They are determined not only to preserve and develop their ancestral history and their ethnic identity, but also to transmit to future generations as the basis of their continued existence as an ethnic people, in accordance with their own cultural pattern, social institution and legal system. By history, by tradition, by culture and civilization, the Muslim Rohingyas are as much citizens of Burma as anyone else in the country. They are equal in every way with other national communities in Burma.

During the colonial period from 1824 to 1947, the British recognized the separate identity of the Rohingya people and declared Northern Arakan as the Muslim region. Again, the previous democratic government from 1948 to 1962, the Prime Minister U Nu, Prime Minister U Ba Swe, other ministers and high-ranking civil and military officials stated that Rohingya people are like the Shan, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon, and Rakhine. They have the same rights and privileges as the other nationals of Burma regardless of their religious belief or ethnic background.

The Rohingya people have a long historical and national status in Arakan-Burma. According to 1947 Constitution, 1947 Burmese Residence and Registration Act, 1948 Burmese citizenship law, and 1974 Burmese Constitution, Rohingyas are the citizens of Burma and no anyone can deny these historical and constitutional facts. Being an integral part of the Burma citizenry, Rohingya people had exercised the right of franchise in all general public elections held in Burma during the later colonial period from 1935 to 1948, parliamentary democratic period from 1948 to 1962, Ne Win's Burma Socialist Program Party (BSPP) period from 1974 to 1988, 1990 multi-party general election held by the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) and finally, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC)'s 2010 elections, including its constitutional referendum held in 2008. In their exercise of franchise, The Rohingya people elected their representatives to the Legislative Assembly, to the Constituent Assembly, to the Parliament, to the People's Assembly and People's Councils of different levels.

Rohingyas representatives were appointed as Cabinet ministers, Parliamentary Secretaries and in high government positions. As an indigenous race and community group of Burma, Rohingya had their own political, cultural, and social organizations as well as they had a program in their own language in the official Burma Broadcasting Services (BBS) and also Rohingyas' participation in the official " Union Day" celebration in Burma's capital, Rangoon, every year.

In Burma, the ethnic Rohingya minority people have been systematically deprived of their political and social status after the military take over the power in March 1962 from the civilian democratic government. With the promulgation of the most controversial and discriminatory citizenship law of 1982 which is against the international customary law and standards, the Rohingya people who had inhabited in Arakan as early as 788, were now legally considered as non-nationals or illegal immigrants in their own country-Burma. In spite of their indigenous status recognized by the previous parliamentary governments, the Rohingyas were not listed among the so-called 135 ethnic nationalities of the country recorded by the Burmese Successive military regimes with an ulterior motive to make them "stateless people" within the country.

Due to widespread persecution through ethnic cleansing, prejudice and genocidal action against the innocent Rohingya people since the Burma independence in 1948, the majority of Rohingya population almost 2 million has been compelled to live in exile, particularly, in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia. Recently, few thousands Rohingya people were resettled in US, EU countries, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan under the refugee resettlement program. Now, there are 1.5 million Rohingyas are left in Burma.

In continuation, I would like to high light some following important points of the suffering ethnic Rohingya minority under the name-sake democratic Burmese Buddhist Government Administration led by President Thein Sein.

(1) Violence against Islam and Muslims of Arakan,Burma

From June to October 2012 of brutal violence, the Burmese security forces have barred the Muslim Rohingyas from worshipping in mosques across Rakhine (Arakan) State. The authorities have shut down almost all mosques in northern Arakan while prohibiting the daily 5 time congregational prayers. Even during the last holy month of Ramadan the clampdown intensified and on the Annual Eid Festival Days- 2012 the Muslims have to remain inside their homes without congregating for Eid- prayer.

.

Uncountable copies of holy Quran, Hadith books and other religious books have been burnt down or destroyed while many mosques and religious schools with libraries were devastated. The destruction still continues. The Central mosque known as Jamei Masjid of Akyab was burned as well as many other masjids and Madrasas were burned down in Akyab, Maungdaw, Ratheydaung, Buthidaung, Pauktaw, Minbra, Mrohaung, Kyauktaw, Mreybone, Kyaukpru townships in Arakan State.

(2) Pre-planned Massacre and violence

This violence is directed against the Muslim Rohingyas in Arakan. The government did nothing to prevent it. The army, police and security forces have become killer forces. The popular slogan of the Buddhist Rakhines under the leadership of RNDP (Rakhine Nationalities Development Party) is "Arakan is for Rakhine Buddhist people. Muslim Rohingya has no rights to live in Arakan and needed to be kicked out of the country.

In fact, it is a government sponsored pre-planned massacre, and it is a state terrorism against unarmed and peaceful living ethnic Rohingyas. Silent extermination with sporadic killing, arrest, rape, destruction and extortion continue unabated today. Unfortunately, the news media has been quoting the highly controversial government's statement giving the number of deaths as few hundreds whereas at least 2500 Rohingyas were killed and thousands of people disappeared that were presumably killed. Unknown numbers of Muslim girls and women have been raped by the Burmese security forces and Rakhine Buddhist youth and more than 135,000 Rohingyas and Arakan Muslims become refugees and internally displaced persons in Arakan due to violence and ethnic cleansing conducted by the Buddhist Rakhine political forces backed by the Burmese government authorities.

Ethnic cleansing on Arakan Rohingya Muslim population have been continued effectively while world medias and world leaders keep continuing their role but still there is no positive sign have reached for a concrete solution.

(3) President Thein Sein's Attitude towards Rohingyas

President Thein Sein said there is no place for Rohingyas in Burma who are foreigners and he himself has disowned the Rohingya People asking the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to take care of them in refugee camps until resettlement in third countries. It affirms that the Rohingyas have no domestic or national protection.

During President Thein Sein's UN General Assembly Speech in September29, 2012, he pledged to take care of the Rohingya problem when he returns home, however, he did nothing and a second more violent attack in October 2012 was engineered against all Muslim population in the southern part of Arakan state, no action was taken yet against the criminal masterminds of the violence by the Burmese Government.

(4) Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's Attitude towards the Rohingya people

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel peace prize winner and who is regarded by the world peace-loving people as an example of democracy icon in Burma and moral code of conduct worldwide has remained uncharacteristically silent on the persecution of Rohingyas making the situation more appalling while leaving them friendless within Burma and overseas.

(5) The Face Saving Inquiry Commission to show the world

The Inquiry Commission formed by the President Thein Sein government to show the world for Face saving is not credible as it consists of controversial figures like Dr. Aye Maung, Chairman of the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP), U Aye Tha Aung, Chairman of the Arakan League for Democracy, U Khin Maung Swe, Chairman of the National Democratic Force (NDF) and 88 Generation Student leader Ko Ko Gyi who were either involved in the violence or have been proved to have preconceived idea or deep ill will against the Rohingya people.

(6) Crimes against Humanity

What is happening in Burma against Muslim population of Arakan is in fact crimes against humanity as human rights are universal and human concern is international concern. The systematic grave violations of human rights of Rohingya by both state agency and Arakan ruling Rakhine party is an ethnic cleansing, and they cannot be pleaded as domestic affairs of Arakan and Burma. The world has become a small global village and all peace-loving people of the world, UN and world veto power countries have moral responsibility to protect and prevent controlled genocide against the Rohingyas by all available means. The human rights of the Rohingya people were violated and Rohingyas were made the victims of Government sponsored controlled genocide.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) adopted by the U.N. General Assembly on December 10, 1948 prohibited all forms of torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, torture remains unacceptably common. Recent times have witnessed an especially, disturbing trend of countries claiming exceptions to the prohibition on torture based on their own national security perceptions.

Unfortunately, today, the Burmese quasi –civilian Government led by President Thein Sein mis-using the word democracy, peace, and development for the people of Burma is in total violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

So, from this MAS-ICNA Annual Convention, we call upon the United States Government Administration, the Veto power countries and the international communities and societies to take action jointly putting strong pressure to the Government of Burma through United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to save the people of Burma particularly, the Rohingyas and other helpless and voiceless ethnic minorities who cannot resist except suffering leading to extinction.

There is a very systematic, organized, concerted and
criminal design by the Burmese Buddhist authorities, which can
appropriately be termed as ethnic cleansing, genocide
and socio-cultural degradation of the Rohingya people
in Arakan state of Burma (Myanmar). If the process of
marginalization and gross violations of human rights
against the Rohingya people are allowed to continue
there won't be a single Rohingya left in Arakan within
the next fifty years. They will be an extinct
community, much like the fate of the native population
of Tasmania.

Since 1999, the USA has designated Burma as a "Country of Particular Concern" under the International Religious Freedom Act for particularly severe
violations of religious freedom. However, after the democratic reforms in Burma by President Thein Sein, US Government has lifted all sanctions. Though changes are taking place in Burma since the year 2011, the plights of Rohingya people remains unchanged, and they have been facing continuous discrimination on religious, as well as racial grounds. It is high time that the world body take appropriate measures so that the basic human rights of the Rohingya people are protected and guaranteed under the UN supervision.

In conclusion, on behalf of Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association (BRAFA) and all Rohingya people scattered all over the world and those who are living in Arakan and Burma in subhuman condition, I would like to fervently appeal all brothers and sisters who are here to provide moral support to the cause of suffering Muslim Rohingyas of Burma and to advocate their rightful citizenship status in Burma by all available peaceful means as they are a part and parcel of Muslim Ummah. We have brotherly responsibilities to work for the suffering Rohingya Muslim brothers and we do hope that you all will do the best level within your capacity for those suffering humanity.

Thanking you very much.

Sincerely,

Shaukhat (aka) MSK Jilani

On Behalf of the Burmese Rohingya American Friendship Association (BRAFA)

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Non-binding UN resolutions cannot help Rohingyas: Iran MP

Source islamicinvitationturkey, 28 Dec

 

An Iranian lawmaker says non-binding resolutions adopted by the UN will not help improve the situation of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, urging the UN to take practical measures.

Mehrdad Baouj-Lahouti on Friday dismissed non-binding resolutions as ineffective in resolving the problems of Rohingyas, saying that the UN must deal with human rights violations across the globe without double-standard behaviors.

On December 24, the UN General Assembly expressed serious concern over violence between Rohingya Muslims and Buddhists in Myanmar and called upon its government to address human rights abuses.

The General Assembly also approved by consensus a non-binding resolution.

The unanimously adopted UN resolution expresses "particular concern about the situation of the Rohingya minority in Rakhine state, urges the (Myanmar) government to take action to bring about an improvement in their situation and to protect all their human rights, including their right to a nationality."

The resolution was identical to one approved last month by the General Assembly's Third Committee, which focuses on human rights.

Rohingya Muslims have faced torture, neglect and repression in Myanmar since it achieved independence in 1948. Hundreds have been killed and thousands displaced in attacks by Buddhist extremists.

Buddhist extremists frequently attack Rohingyas and set fire to their homes in several villages in the troubled region. Myanmar's government has been blamed for failing to protect the Muslim minority.

Rohingyas are said to be Muslim descendants of Persian, Turkish, Bengali, and Pathan origin, who migrated to Myanmar as early as the 8th century.

Myanmar: Is a warning by the Election Commission enough for offense against Islam by the RNDP?

Source m-mediagrop, 27 Dec

 

The Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) was sent in and warned by the Union Election Commission on 25 December in Nay Pyi Taw about three matters. Among the three matters is the writing offending Islam and Muslims of Myanmar featured in the Toe-Tat-Yay Newsletter (Volume 2, Issue 12), a political publication of the RNDP.

The author with the pseudonym "Marga Thitsar" of the article, titled "If Rakhine State Disintegrates" and featured in the Toe-Tat-Yay, hatefully insults Islam and Muslims of Myanmar.
By violating (i) the Constitution, (ii) existing laws, and (iii) the Political Parties Registration Law, the official political publication of the

RNDP leader Dr. Aye Maung

who himself chairs the Citizens' Fundamental Rights, Democracy and Human Rights Committee at the Amyotha Hluttaw (the Upper House) has committed the following-

(a) Offense against Islam adhered by millions of people around the world;

(b) Offense against Muslim festivals;

(c) Offense against mosques;

(d) Comparison of the Islamic call to prayer, the Adhān or Azan, with the sound of the animal, the cow;

(e) Misinterpretation of and offense against the Feast of the Sacrifice by Muslims;

(f) Use of rude and offensive words in describing all the indigenous and citizen Muslims of Myanmar;

(g) Hateful incitement against all the indigenous and citizen Muslims of Myanmar who are involved in businesses and professions within legal bounds by mentioning the numeral symbol (786) of bismi-llāhi r-raḥmāni r-raḥīm, which means "In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful";

(h) Wrongful misrepresentation of Islam and Muslims in spite of Islam's clear prohibition against marriage to those of different faiths and against forced conversion of anyone to Islam;

(i) Wilful disturbance of multi-faith peace, and incitement to hatred among the indigenous peoples and citizens and to national disintegration;

(j) Incitement by abusing religion for political gains;

(k) Rude and offensive comparison of all the Muslims across the world with animals.

The Union Election Commission (UEC) only gave a warning to the RNDP for its insult to a world religion, i.e. Islam, as mentioned below. It is stated in the notice by the UEC to the RNDP that the party is liable to face action up to disbandment by referring to Sub-Section (d) [A political party must abstain from writing, delivering speech or organizing and instigating that can cause conflict or that can affect dignity and morals relating to nationality, religion, individual or public.] and Sub-Section (e) [A political party must abstain from abuse of religion for political ends.] of Section 6 of the Political Parties Registration Law. However, the UEC only gave a warning regards blatant breach of these regulations by the RNDP. Therefore, we strongly encourage that the government of the Union of Myanmar and the Union Election Commission immediately take decisive action according to law in order to prevent conflict between citizens of diverse races and groups and religious affiliations who have resided in peace in the Union of Myanmar for thousands of years.

The author with the pseudonym "Marga Thitsar" of the article, titled "If Rakhine State Disintegrates" and featured in the Toe-Tat-Yay, hatefully insults Islam and Muslims of Myanmar.

The author with the pseudonym "Marga Thitsar" of the article, titled "If Rakhine State Disintegrates" and featured in the Toe-Tat-Yay, hatefully insults Islam and Muslims of Myanmar.

Rohingya Trucked North: Checkpoint Exposes 127 in Minivan Convoy

Source Phuketwan, 27 Dec

Rohingya arrested in southern Thailand await return to the Burma border

Photo by 77 nation channel

 

 

PHUKET: A total of 127 Rohingya have been arrested in southern Thailand and trucked back to the Thailand-Burma border.

Those held were in five minivans in a convoy bound for the Malaysian border crossing at Padang Besar in Songkhla province.

On December 24 a police-Army checkpoint in Satun province pulled over two of the vans, which each contained 22 men and boys.

The drivers of another three minivans fled after dropping off their passengers, who totalled 83.

The youngest of those arrested was a boy aged 10. Most of the captured Rohingya were teenagers or young men.

Hundreds are fleeing the Burmese state of Rakhine where thousands of homes have been torched since June in a simmering racial conflict between local residents and the Muslim Rohingya.

About 170 are reported to have been killed in the conflict, which has left thousands of Rohingya confined in displaced persons camps.

Many prefer to take their chances by paying people smugglers and fleeing by sea, with Malaysia as the target for most.

How the Rohingya arrested on December 24 got to Songkhla province in southern Thailand is not known. Part of their journey was probably made by sea.

Brokers on the Thai-Malaysia border are known to systematically transfer Rohingya south from camps hidden in plantations in Thailand with the connivance of officials in both countries.

The arrest of the 127 may have come because the officers at the checkpoint are not part of the system or rival brokers have perhaps fallen out.

The arrests were made by officers from Khuankalong police station in Satun, where Lieutenant Sompong Meechoo said local police were not part of any smuggling group.

''The Rohingya will be trucked straight back to Ranong,'' he said, referring to the Thai-Burma border port hundreds of kilometres to the north where the arrested men and boys could possibly have stopped off on their journey.

Because the arrested Rohingya are inevitably all men and boys, some reports speculate that they could be heading to join the insurgency in Thailand's south.

Thailand's Internal Security Operations Command has checked out these reports over several years but never found evidence to justify them.

Isoc tallies 2817 Rohingya arrested or ''helped on'' in Thailand in October and November.

Other experts in the deep south conflict say there has never been an instance where a single Rohingya has been killed or injured in incriminating circumstances in eight years of conflict.

Chris Lewa, director of the advocacy group Arakan Project, said: ''Rohingya only transit through Thailand on their way to Malaysia, helped on by Thai authorities.

''There has never been any evidence of Rohingya involvement in the deep South insurgency.

''Why should countries in the region repeatedly make these kinds of assumptions just because they are Muslims?''

The Rohingya are protective of their womenfolk, who seldom venture far from home. However, having a boy of 10 among the latest batch of arrests indicates some are becoming more desperate to flee Burma.

Hundreds of Rohingya are believed to be voyaging past the Andaman coast and the holiday island of Phuket this relatively tranquil October-April ''sailing season.''

Those apprehended on land north of Phuket are usually trucked quickly back to Ranong, often described as Burmese to reduce complications.

As stateless non-citizens, the Rohingya are not wanted back in Burma so they are usually delivered to people smugglers.

The smugglers demand extra payments and those who cannot meet the terms are usually put to work in fish factories or indentured to trawlers.

Earlier this month, Singapore refused to allow a Vietnamese cargo ship to dock with 40 Rohingya who survived a sinking in which 200 are thought to have drowned.

All of Burma's Asean neighbors continue to turn a blind eye to the tacit ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya now underway in Burma.

Humanitarian crisis for Burma's eternal outsiders

Source theage, 26 Dec

 

They scavenge for grass and plants to eat and live in makeshift camps and town slums surrounded by barbed-wire checkpoints, refugee prisoners in their own country.
Sitting among filth and garbage in a bamboo hut Ali Hassan, a 24-year-old former brick worker, pleads for the lives of his newborn twins.
''My babies are starving in front of my eyes. I cannot buy anything now I have no money,'' he says.

Dire … Haleema Ahmed, above, scavenges for plants among the weeds and grass to supplement her family's food intake. Photo: Steve Sandford

There is an abundance of fish in the sea and rivers of Burma's western Rakhine state, which borders Bangladesh.

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There are also coconuts in the trees and rice in the fields.
But the United Nations's most senior humanitarian official, Valerie Amos, describes conditions in camps where more than 115,000 people displaced by ethnic violence are struggling to survive as ''dire''.

Displaced Rohingya children at the edge of Camp Coconut. Photo: Steve Sandford
 

''I have seen many camps during my time but the conditions in these camps rank among the worst,'' she says.
The camp occupants are Rohingyas, members of a Muslim minority who are denied Burmese citizenship even though their families have lived in the country for centuries. The UN says they are among the world's most persecuted people.

Following an outbreak of ethnic violence in June and again in October and a subsequent clampdown by Burma's security forces, tens of thousands of Rohingya are prohibited by soldiers from leaving designated areas to work, forage for food or seek medical treatment.
Heartbreaking images emerging from Rakhine, also known as Arakan, point to ethnic cleansing of 800,000 Rohingya, who are seen by the Burmese government and many of the country's Buddhists as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Video taken for Fairfax Media in a slum Muslim area of the Rakhine capital, Sittwe, shows a mother of seven, Haleema Ahmed, scavenging for grass and plants to help feed her family, reviving memories of images of starving villagers eating grass in North Korea.
''The food that is being donated to us is not enough to eat. We have to help ourselves to find our own food,'' she says. ''I have to collect grass and plants to sell and eat to fill my empty stomach.''
Zaleena Hatwa, 33, a mother of two boys and three girls, is living in a one-room hut at ''Camp Coconut'', where beachside coconut trees mark a boundary the Rohingya may not cross. ''I fled my house only with the clothes I was wearing … they beat and killed many of us,'' she says.
Zaleena Hatwa says before the violence she had a house and money. ''Now I am forced to live like a crazy street person,'' she says.


There are few Rohingya leaders to speak up internationally for their people, who are referred to by the Burmese Buddhist majority as ''Bengalis'' or the pejorative term for foreigner, ''kalar''.
Abdul Hakim, a cleric at a small Muslim mosque in the Aung Min Glar district of Sittwe, called for the United Nations to intervene to save his people.
''The Rohingya have been living here for 800 years but now the Buddhist want to drive the Rohingya all out of Arakan … they don't want to live together with the Muslim,'' he said. ''We want equal rights and we want the rule of law. We want peace and justice. The UN has the power, if they want to do something, they can.''


Baroness Amos, who visited eight refugee camps recently, called on the Burmese government to promote reconciliation in Rakhine, where she said tensions ''between communities is running very high''.
Her remarks underscored concerns about Burma's stability as it emerges from 50 years of repressive military rule under the reformist government of the President, Thein Sein.
The government and Rakhine community groups have placed extreme restrictions on humanitarian agencies working in Rohingya camps and Muslim areas.
People seen to be working with the Rohingya are often threatened.
Aid workers report seeing starving babies and toddlers so weakened by hunger they sit limply in their parents' arms.

The UN estimates there are 2900 babies and toddlers with acute malnutrition in the camps who may already be beyond help.
Satellite imagery shows extensive destruction of homes and property in Muslim areas following a rapid escalation of violence since June that led to at least 170 deaths.
One 14-hectare coastal area shows almost 1000 razed buildings, houseboats and floating barges. Reports have emerged of mass graves, and human rights organisations cite executions, torture, rapes, beatings, mass arrests and burnings by security forces, mainly against Rohingya.

The violence erupted after reports circulated that on May 28 a Rakhine Buddhist woman had been raped and killed. Retaliation was swift after details were circulated in an incendiary pamphlet.
On June 3, a large group of Rakhine Buddhists stopped a bus and killed 10 Muslims on board. Violence between Rohingya and Rakhine then swept through Sittwe and surrounding areas.
Since October more than 4000 Rohingya have paid smugglers to get on typically leaking and unsafe boats to make the perilous voyage to Muslim-majority Malaysia, where their presence is mostly tolerated. Several hundred have drowned in at least four boat sinkings.

At least one boat a day now leaves the region, its passengers mostly Rohingya men and teenage boys seeking a new life. Many others have fled to Bangladesh, where 400,000 Rohingya are languishing in camps. Bangladesh also considers them illegal immigrants.
In Rakhine state, authorities have begun a process of verifying the nationality of all Muslims, but there are widespread calls for those deemed ''illegal'' to be deported. The goal of the survey is unclear.
A 1982 law enshrines the citizenship of Burma's officially-recognised ethnic groups but the Rohingya were excluded despite their claims to have met the criteria of having ancestors in the country before 1823, the date of the first Anglo-Burmese war. Rohingyas say they can trace their ancestry back to an eighth-century shipwreck on an Arakan island.

Observers say widespread hostility towards the Rohingya throughout Burma is likely to inhibit their naturalisation.

''We have no plan to accept as an ethnic group those who are stateless, or any new tribes who are not officially recognised, like the Rohingya,'' said Zaw Htay, a high-ranking government official.
The opposition leader and democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi has disappointed international supporters by failing to speak up strongly for the Rohingya, prompting speculation she has her eye on 2015 elections.

In a squalid camp near Sittwe, Rashid Ahmad, 63, tells how security forces watched as a Rakhine mob attacked Rohingya residents in his village.
''They started beating and killing people, so my family and my niece's family ran away from the village to the seashore to take a boat,'' Rashid Ahmad said.
''My niece had already got on a boat but a mob of Rakhine people pulled her off the boat with her two children.
''One was a boy and the other a girl. They killed the boy with a long knife and spears … my niece was raped and then killed by the Rakhine mob.''
Rashid Ahmad said his people had lived in Burma for a long time and have a proud history as Muslims ''but have never felt law and justice from the government''.
''We are helpless unless we get help from another country,'' he said.


Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/world/humanitarian-crisis-for-burmas-eternal-outsiders-20121225-2bv7x.html#ixzz2GIskYC4K

Lawmakers- Arresting Rohingyas Alive, Retuning dead!

Source Rohingyablogger, 25 Dec

Maung Than Soe (aka) Mohammed Khan

RB News

December 25, 2012

(Translated into English by M.S. Anwar)

A Letter from a Bleeding Heart to RB News

I, Daw Kyaut Khin at my 41, daughter of U Hla Kyaw, a widow and mother of three children, was born and brought up at the quarter of MyoThuGyi in Sittwe (Akyab), a place where we have been living for generations. On 10th June 2012, when Rakhine terrorists were killing and annihilating Muslims in our quarter, I was struggling to escape the horrific scenes with my two children (my eldest son was away from home on his trip) to save our lives. Meanwhile, my second son, Maung Than Soe @ Mohammed Khan (Son of U Maung Oo Shwe), was arrested and abducted by the two Police officers, Win Tun Oo and Than Shwe, from Police Station No.1.

My Son was trying to escape from the hands of the two Police officers and run away as he was too frightened, he was hacked with sword by the waiting Rakhine (Buddhist) terrorists and consequently got severe injuries on his head and right arm. I could not help and do anything as Police dragged away my son with such injuries. As I was attempting to run for life with my four-year-old child with a broken and bleeding heart, we were beaten and hacked by the Rakhine terrorists. As a result, I had to get my head stitched nine times and my four-year-old daughter also got injuries on her hand.

As I was getting treatment in hospital for the severe injuries I was given, I got a chance to see my son, Maung Than Soe, from a distance, ailing from the critical injuries.

The lawmakers and authority of this country, feel it being in my shoes what and how I would be feeling going through such pains! I can't explain!

On 19th December 2012, to make my heart bleed more, only the dead of my son, Maung Than Soe, was delivered to me from the above mentioned Police Station No.1. His dead body was full of injuries resulted from the tortures by the inhumane police.

My son was arrested 6-7 months ago and I was never given a chance to see him in the prison. I was never given a chance to provide him with foods and medicines. Which country on earth will have such lawmakers who arrest innocent people alive and return their mere dead bodies!!!

Feel it, how much pain we, weak and vulnerable people, are going through! My father is also a pure Rakhine and my mother is Kaman.

What fault have we done?

Is our fault that we are Muslims?

Concerning the arrest of my son, Police had never given me any notice or any other documents.

Is it that anybody here can be killed, hacked or chopped on mere reason that he/she is Muslim??

Daw Kyaut Khin

Sittwe

Myanmar-Kachin war escalates

Source Bangkok Post, 23 Dec

(Note: we are sorry for the Bangkok Post wrongfully mentioned as rebel.)

 

YANGON _ Fighting between ethnic Kachin rebels and the Myanmar army has intensified, causing increased hardship and fear at camps set up to shelter civilians fleeing the fighting, reports said Sunday.

The Myanmar Times quoted rebel sources saying that clashes occurred south of the Kachin Independence Army's stronghold at Laiza, and near the town of Pangwa in the northern Kachin state near the China-Burma border.

"Day by day the fighting is continuing," said U Myint Thane, joint general secretary of the National Council of the Union of Burma, based in Thailand. "It has disappointed all of us."

Fighting in the Kachin state has frustrated efforts by the reform government of President Thein Sein to end the ethnic strife that has plagued the country since independence from Britain in 1948.

Kachin rebel leaders have blamed hardline officers of the army for mounting new offensives in the state.

"We've had reports that there are over 400 (Myanmar army) troops near Laiza and more than 500 near Pangwa," Myin Thane said.

Fighting has occurred every day since Dec 13, with the military deploying helicopter gunships and heavy artillery against the Kachin rebels, according to rebel sources.

The paper quoted an official of the aid group Kachin Baptist Convention as saying he was concerned that refugees in camps near Pangwa would have to leave if the fighting got any closer.

"The people are afraid because the fighting is happening near their camps," he said.

More stories: http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/investigation/327559/no-end-in-sight-amid-season-of-slaughter

Related search: Myanmar, Kachin, rebels

Letter from America: The Rohingya Question – Part 5

Source Asian Tribune, 23 Dec

By Dr. Habib Siddiqui

No discussion on anti-Indian riots is, however, complete without a mention of the Japanese invasion of

Burma.

Japanese Occupation of Burma

In January 1942, the Japanese Imperial Army invaded Burma from Thailand with the help of the Burma Independence Army (BIA), a military force made-up of 4,000 Burman nationalists led by 30 officers (the so-called Thirty Comrades) who had been trained and equipped in Japan since 1940. As the British forces quickly retreated to India, nearly 400 Karen villages were torched and destroyed while 1,800 Karen civilians were reportedly murdered by the BIA troops in the first two months of the invasion (January-March, 1942).

As they started their massacre of the Indian population, more than half a million Indians, Anglo-Burman and other ethnic groups, who were considered pro-British, fled on foot, heading towards India between March and April. Their dramatic exodus through western Burma's dense jungles left tens of thousands of victims dead. More than a hundred thousand Rohingya Muslims were massacred by Arakanese Buddhists that were allied with the BIA and the fascist Japanese occupation forces during the pogroms of 1942; another 80,000 Arakanese Muslims fled to Bengal. The Muslim population was depopulated in the south and pushed north, close to today's Bangladesh-Burma border. The pogrom of 1942 against the Arakanese Muslims (Rohingya) almost permanently destroyed any possibility of reconciliation with the Arakanese Buddhists (Rakhine).

In April 1942, the British had built up a guerrilla force – the V Force – which operated along the whole front line between the British and the Japanese armies. The Arakanese Muslims (Rohingyas) were heavily recruited into this force and played an important role in gaining information, guiding troops, and rescuing pilots when they were shot down by the Japanese forces. In January 1944, the British took Maungdaw, with V Force playing an important supporting role. It was not until December 1944, however, that the British forces finally took Buthidaung. Once this stronghold had been captured the Japanese position rapidly collapsed, and by early January 1945 most of the Arakan was in British hands.

According to Kurt Jonassohn and Karin Solveig Björnson, "During World War II the Rohingyas remained loyal to the British, even when they retreated to India. They paid dearly for this choice: advancing Japanese and Burmese armies tortured, raped, and massacred thousands of Rohingyas ... After reconquering the region in 1945, the British rewarded the Rohingyas for their loyalty by setting up a civilian administration for the Rohingyas in Arakan." The dream of Rohingya autonomy was rather short-lived as Arakan was incorporated into Burma which gained independence in January 4, 1948.

With General Aung-San and his entire cabinet killed on July 19, 1947 (by the Buddhist extremists that were affiliated with his political opponent U Saw) before Burma gained independence and the Burman-Rohingya relationship rather jittery from the past experience, the Rohingyas faced severe discrimination in the new state. They were barred and removed from the Military, Police and civil services and their leaders were placed under arrest. Rohingya refugees who had fled to India (British Bengal) during the pogroms of 1942 were not permitted to return to their ancestral homes. Considered illegal immigrants by the highly racist and xenophobic Burmese government, their properties were seized and resettled by Burman and Rakhine Buddhists.

The Rohingya Identity

It has been sometimes argued, especially amongst the anti-Rohingya demagogues, and the numerous suppositions which some biased scholars have made, that since the designation "Rohingya" did not appear in the Baxter Report and some of the papers associated with it in the National Archives and the British Library in the UK, it was an invented term used by the Arakanese Muslims to claim ethnic status in Burma. In so doing, as if suffering from selective amnesia, they forget to state that the term 'Rakhine' was not used for the Arakanese Buddhists in many such reports either. Instead, we find the use of the words like 'Mugs' (see, e.g., Charles Paton's work) and 'Magh' to refer to the Rakhine Buddhists. The Rohingya Muslims of Arakan were similarly referred as Arakanese Musselmans and Mohamedans.

British reports have often mentioned Muslims in various parts of India as Mohamedans, Mahommedans and Musselmans. In some reports, all those terms were used interchangeably. Similar kinds of names were also used by the colonial administration for other communities, which served either their policies or whims.

There are numerous examples in our world where even the same place is called by different names by different communities. For example, Bangladesh is commonly known as Manjala (Mangala) in Chinese. In ancient times, Bangladesh was known as Banga, which later came to be known as Bangala by Arab and Persian geographers.

In the ancient times the land of Arakan was known as Arakan Desh, which in the pre-Burman annexation period, in the writings of writers and poets of Arakan and Chittagong, like Quazi Daulat, Mardan, Shamser Ali, Quraishi Magan, Alaol, Ainuddin, Abdul Ghani and others, came to be referred to as 'Roshang', 'Roshanga', 'Roshango Shar', and 'Roshango Desh'. However, in the local tongue Arakan was called Rohang by its Muslim population and as Rakkhapura or Rakhinepray or Rakhine Pye by its local Buddhists. In the Rennell's map (1771 CE), Arakan is shown as 'Roshawn'. The Tripura Chronicle Rajmala mentions it as 'Roshang'. The Chakmas and Saks of the 18th century called the country 'Roang'. [Note that words which sound like 'sha' are often changed to 'ha' by many people living in adjacent areas north and south of the Naaf River demarcating today's Rakhine state from southern part of Chittagong in Bangladesh. That is, Roshang and Rohang mean the same thing.]

To most Bengali speaking people America and Britain are known as Markin and Bilat in Bangla. The British colonizers also anglicized many of the local names of towns and cities. Chatga, for instance, came to be known as Chittagong in British records. Sri Lanka, which was known by ancient Greek geographers as Taprobane and as Serendib (or Saran Dip) by Arab geographers, came to be known as Ceilão by the Portuguese when they arrived on the island in 1505, which was transliterated into English as Ceylon.

Can such use of altered forms of the name of a country, place or people by outsiders obliterate their original names? Surely, not! What is important here is to realize that such changes or uses of nomenclature do not and cannot alter how the people identify or feel about themselves and their places.

Calling a people based on the region or district that they come from is a common practice in many parts of south Asia. For example, a person from Sylhet is commonly known as a Sylheti (speaking a dialect which is not quite understood by most Bangalis); a person who is from Faridpur is called Faridpuri and a person from Dhaka is called Dhakaiya. And yet, the British records did not make that distinction between these peoples. They were all lumped as Bengalis in spite of their colloquial differences.

It is worth noting from the Baxter report that the British census records originally mentioned only religion, and that only much later they tried to classify people by any of the 40 races or ethnic groups for the entire Indian population. As to the classification by races in 1921 and 1931, the report says, "For these years the Indian constituent of the population is taken to be the number of persons who then returned themselves as belonging to one of the forty specified Indian races, or who were tabulated as "Indians of unspecified race" where their records though indefinite showed they belonged to an Indian race."

It is, thus, understandable why the British authority would rather classify the Rohingya Muslims under Bengali or Chittagonian race because of their cultural similarity with people living on the other side of the Naaf River. It is also obvious from the report that many of the inhabitants were concerned about the 'hidden' agenda of such census reporting, and did not feel comfortable in sharing such information about their race or origin.

So, the mere debate around why the Arakanese Muslims were not called Rohingya people in the Baxter report sounds like raising tempest over teapots.

====? To be continued

For part 1: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/11/24/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

For part 2: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/01/letter-america-rohingya-ques... ;

For part 3: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/08/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

For part 4: http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2012/12/15/letter-america-rohingya-ques...

- Asian Tribune -