The solution of a
problem is the problem itself; we should know the main causes of problem,
analyze its effects on regional arena, then try to solve. A doctor can give
effective treatment after diagnosing the patient’s history and symptoms of
disease. Before we try to solve the Rohingya problem, we should know how it
started, why it did start, who created that problem, what are the reasons
behind the problem.
A Brief Historical Background of Rohingya
Francis
Buchanan’s eye-witness account who was a surgeon in 1795 to the British Embassy
in Ava, the Burmese capital, wrote about
three dialects spoken: “The first is that spoken by the Mohammedans [Muslims],
who have long settled in Arakan and who call themselves Roangiya[Rohingya]
or native of Arakan.
In March 1942, the Maughs,Rakhine Buddhists started the massacre and driving away the Rohingyas with
the intention of rooting out the Rohingyas of Arakan with the help of arms
distributed by U KyawKhine and arms received from the deserted Karen soldiers
who were on the way from Akyab persuaded by the Maughs to join them to root out
the Rohingyas. This was started from Myebontownship, Kyaukpyu district. U Chit
Pa, Ex-Member of Parliament of Minbya constituency in a speech in the
Parliament Session of the 17th September 1950 opposing the creation
of a new district comprising Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rahtedaung townships, had
admitted that this was started by the Maughs. In this massacre thousands of
Rohingyas( it is said that 80,000 of Rohigyas) were massacred and thousands of
them were driven away mercilessly.
In 1947 Bo Letya the then Defense
Minister paid a visit to Maungdaw, Buthidaung and he praised the Rohingyas for
their loyalty and devotion to the Union. The Deputy Commissioner of Akyab district asked some Rohingya
leaders and elders in the month of July 1948 to see the Mujahid leaders at
Kyaundaung village of Buthidaung township where they camped
and askedthem to withdraw their demand for State when the
government would be willing to concede to the other demands such as citizenship
as an indigenous race, their amnesty, establishment of their organization as a legal one.
On the 25th September 1954 U Nu
stated, in a speech made over the radio about the introduction of the Religious
lessons in the State schools, that in North Arakan there are two townships –
Maungdaw and Buthidaung where most of the people are Muslims known as Rohingyas
whose leaders asked him for arms to fight against the Mujahids.
Eradication of Rohingya Muslims
Actually, the
eradication of Rohingya Muslims campaign started from the early 1940s. In 1942,
nearly hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims were brutally murdered in
Myohaungtownship, Minbya township, Pauktaw township, Kyawktaw, and PunnaKyune.
As a result, a Rohingya Mujahidin Group raised voice against injustice attitude
of Rakhineand Government.
After Burmese
Independence in 1948, Rohingya got equal rights. Rohingyas were allowed in
army, civil servant, education and in all the government sectors. Even Sultan
Mahmud, our Rohingyas’ leader, had served
as a health Minister during U Nu’s Parliament democratic cabinet of
1950s. The period of 1950 to 1962 was
the golden era not only in Burmese history but also in Rohingyas’ history.
Unfortunately,
notorious dictator General Ne Win seized power from U Nu by force in 1962
military coup, from that period, our suffering of Rohingya has already started,
and persecution and oppression has been conducting by military dictators.
Firstly, the right of broadcasting of Rohingya programs was banned, more
over they were restricted and stopped issuing the National
Registration Identity for Rohingya people, movement of Rohingya were strongly
restricted even the social religious activities, traveling of
Rohingya people from one place to another freely was also restricted, they forced the
Rohingya people to flee to East Pakistan, Middle East, and Southeast Asia, they
sinister motive was that they wanted us homeless, and then
stateless.
The hardest time of Rohingya people in Arakan
history
The hardest time
for Rohingya people started when general Saw Maung seized power in 1988, in
August 1991, Rohingya people were strictly banned travelling Rohingya from one
place to another. Rohingya were kept widely solitary confinement, and denied
access to education, health care, justice, social welfare and religious
activities. The Government has consecrated the previously issued National
Registration cards into White Identity Cards which are the temporary stay
permits that denies our fully citizenship status. Then they so called
chauvinist generals together with ultranationalist Rakhine Buddhist monks
geared up persecution step by step. At
present, very few Rohingya are in government servants.
In 1982, a
draconian citizenship law was annexed to make the Rohingya Stateless. As a
result, you could find 2.5 lakhs Rohingyas in Pakistan, more than 5 lakhs in
Saudi Arabia, thousands are in jails and detention camps all over the world.
Analyzing the
President Statement, Buddhist monks’ propagation, Rakhine ultranationalist
political parties’ statement, it is crystal clear that they want to establish a
pure Buddhist Rakhine State excluding of Rohingya Muslims. This is very similar
to Hitler’s Nazi State, during last
couple of crisis, thousands of Rohingyas were murdered , more than
120,000 were displaced, thousands of Rohingya were in prisons and police
custody, hundreds of women were raped, killing and burning are happening
everyday as a norms, with no ending in future, people are dying because of starvation
and lack of medical care, we are completely helpless and hopeless waiting for
our last breaths, still not sure where and how we will be killed soon, and we
have no more place to bury.
There are thousands of
people Rohingya in prisons of Arakan State, authority treat those prisoners in
a inhumane way, torturing, beating, giving food without plate, let them to
sleep on the ground without blanket and mattress, no medication, and let them
to die, if they die, their family members are not allowed to bury their death
bodies, people are dying every day.
Ethnic Cleansing of Rohingya People
The ethnic
cleansing of Rohingya Muslim was started with a long time plan in the 1970s by
the dictator Ne Win. He used divide
and rule policy among the ethnic groups in order to keep his power . He
was extreme nationalist and his main mission was Barmanization. He implemented
that policy in the whole infrastructures of the country; religious, cultural,
traditional, and, social differences are his main tools for division,
discrimination, persecution, and cleansing.
There are three
main groups who have been persecuting Rohingya people:
1.
Myanmar dictators: in 1974, promoting the Rakhine State to
Rakhine Buddhists, Government gave favor to Rakhine and forced Rohingya to
resign all kinds of government staffs
and servants, soon banned all Rohingya organizations, restricted
Rohingya’s movements; social, political, and religious. Rohingya were not
allowed to express them as Rohingya. Firstly, Government changed their name
Rohingya to Muslim in the Family Registration Paper, later, changed it into
Bangali. No one has a right to oppose it; all the immigration officers are
Buddhists who write Rohingyas’ name whatever they want to write.
2.
Rakhine Buddhists of Arakan: there are two types of Rakhine Buddhists;
native Rakhine ,andAwakyunetha who came into Myanmar from Bangladesh after
independence of Myanmar. Native Rakhines call them Awakyunetha to those
BangaliRakhine in the beginning , there
were also conflicts among them which resulted
existence of different monasteries. Native Rakhine did not like the
influx of BangaliRakhine, Awakyunetha but three decades later, they unified by
highlighting the religion issue. Both Government and Awakyunetha persuade the
Buddhists that there are many Muslim
countries in the world but no Buddhist country, this country should be Buddhist
.Soon most of Awakyunetha became police officers, immigration officers, and
government servants. Awakyunetha brought with them hatred from Bangladesh, they
are very aggressive, pessimistic, and eager to establish independence Rakhine
Pray.
3.
Rakhine Buddhist of Bangladesh: all Rakhine Buddhists living in Bangladesh
have been working only for Rakhine State. They are strong supporters of Rakhine
Pray, independence Rakhine State. There are a lot of websites running by
BangaliRakhine such as Narinjarin, and Rakhita Media Group which main
propaganda is to clean Rohingya people from Rakhine’s ground and make Rakhine
Pray as non Muslim State.
These three groups have been continuously and
constantly persecuting Rohingya people with the support of polices
immigrations, government servants, and military for many decades. Some new
generation of Rohingya do not know that they are Rohingya, most of them do not
know the reason of being persecuted, and believe that being Muslim is the main
reason because Marma ,Sakmak, and Indian Hindu who are Buddhists get full
national right and safe. Marma, Sakmak, and Indian Hindu in the Arakan State
are identical with Rohingya in terms of language, culture, and complexion; only
religious difference , as all Rohingya are Muslims.
Rohingyas’ complaints
We due
respect, we would like to draw your kind and sympathetic attention, regarding
above mentioned matters.We are going to
appeal honestly regarding Rohingya issue
of Myanmar in order to find out a reasonable solution, which is very important
to save Rohingyas. Myanmar Government and Rakhine State
authority have been systematically annihilating Rohingya’s generation
since military coup of Dictator General Ne Win. We have been living in Arakan
State since 8th century but Myanmar government has been trying to
wipe out of Rohingyas from our ancestral
land, Arakan State. Without International help, Rohingyas’ existence will be
disappeared very soon. We appreciate your contribution and your kindly help for
our survival.
Current situation
of Rohingya in Arakan State is worse
than a Doomsday Scenario, more than genocide and ethnic cleansing. It is a
systematic planning of being Buddhist
State of Rakhine , non-Muslim State, by the ultranationalist Rakhine Buddhists.
Very recently, the President of Rakhine National Development Party(RNDP), Dr.
Aye Maung said in an interview with Venus Journal that Rakhine State will be similar
to Israel very soon, Rakhine State should be
for Rakhines only.
We are deprived
of all fundamental human rights including social, religious, educational,
political ,health
care ,and cultural rights. We are not allowed to attend the schools, to travel
one place to another.
Authentic
historical evidences has acknowledged our existence since 8th
century, all of our historical monuments, and historical Mosques were destroyed
and attempted to clear our history.
Arakan State
should be for all Arkanese ; all ethnic groups should live peacefully,
harmoniously, and respect each other, recognize each other, everyone in the
Arakan State should contribute for the development of Arakan State.
Arakan is a Persian word which is still living in
Rohingya language, Arkanese includes all ethnics groups living in Arakan State.Arakanese Muslims were called in many different ways; Muslims,
Mohamaden, Muhamedan, Bagalis, Chittagonian,Rohan, Roshan but the word Rohingya
was used in 1732 for the first time.
Ref: 1.
Churchill, collection of voyages and travels London 1732, Vol-6, page-697
2. The Classical Journal for September and
December 1811, vol-4, London, Page- 107
Before
Myanmar independence, Rakhine were called Magh, Mog,andRakasha, the word
Rakhine was used officially after 1974 when they were promoted to Rakhine
State, they changed Arakan to Rakhine. Thousands of RakhineBangali Buddhist
entered Rakhine State illegally and were
legalized by Rakhine immigrations.
According to
historical facts, Rohingya population should be 4 million based on 1% natural
rate but now, UN estimated Rohingya population nearly one million.
There were
several operations in which Myanmar immigration officers took Rohingyas’
identity cards and Family Registration Papers , as a result, thousands of
refugees fled to Bangladesh, several time,
Myanmar government received those refugees as Myanmar citizens. Border
are strictly closed for Rohingya , Na Sa Ka, Military, and special polices are
kept along the border. Rohingya are not allowed to move one village to another.
There are thousands of Rohingya refugees all over the world; Bangladesh,
Pakistan, India, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Middle East.
We are Rohingya ,Rakhine and dictators have
been trying to make us Bangali but have not succeeded yet. Magh became Rakhine
after 1974. Thousands of ethnic groups in world gave their name by themselves,
we have right to give the name of our own children. That is our natural right.
Myanmar history proved thousands of evidences that origin of Myanmar ancestors
were from Indian subcontinent, later Mogolians and Tibeto- Barman occupied
Myanmar. The names of more than 140
ethic races did not come down from the sky.
There should
be two types of solutions; immediate
solution and long term solution:
Nearly one
million Rohingyas in 14 townships
ofArakan State, Myanmar ,are starving; they are not allowed to buy
anything from the markets, they are not allowed to move one place to another,
some aid groups could hardly reach to provide limited ration only in Sittwe,
NGOs, and other groups who want to help
Rohingyas in other parts of Arakan State are not allowed to go there by local
authority, and Rakhine Buddhists. Rohingyas have no way to survive; especially
children and aged people are dying every day. No reliable media group gets
permission to discover the destiny of Rohingyas. At least UN Peace Keeping forces
should intervene to save Rohingya people.
We appreciate international
organizations wholeheartedly for their material and spiritual aids, and their
contribution to find out the solution but we are quite sure that materials and
spiritual help could not solve our problem permanently, it could be only
temporary solution. It is not a humanitarian crises but a political crises
created by the central government of Myanmar together with ultranationalist
Rakhine Buddhist monks and regional Rakhine political parties in order to push
out of us from our ancestral land of Arakan.
Rohingyas’ outcry and demand
In above points
of views, we came to a conclusion that without international peace keeping
forces, these crises will never be solved and no internal peace will be
maintained here in our Arakan State.
We are also very
much afraid that another Bosnia will be born in Arkan State very soon. Could
you please consider our case sincerely and profoundly? We need UN and
International Communities’ assistance , without their contribution,Rohingyas’
existence will be uncertainty.
We appeal for
immediate action to rescue the victims from this serious genocide, ethnic
cleansing especially US, UN, and Asian should consider to send international peace keeping force and an
independent and impartial inquiry commission
to investigate the crime against humanity and restore our Rohingya
ethnic rights.
Before independence,
Burmese people did not belong to any identity card, there were two types of
identity cards after independence: citizen and foreigner, after the military
coup of 1962 by dictator Ne Win he classified many groups; in the name of
ethnic, discrimination and oppression were initiated by the dictators. In
Myanmar, there should be only two types of identities; citizen and foreigner,
if the government classifies into three such as ethnic, citizen, and foreigner,
then Rohingya should be in the ethnic group, otherwise the problem will never
stop in future.
Zaw Lwin Oo
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