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Ongoing Ethnic Cleansing

Karyn Becker defines ethnic cleansing on Model United Nations Far West as " the elimination of an unwanted group from a society, as by genocide or forced migration". Historically, Rohingya faced ethnic cleansing before and after Independence of Burma in 1942 and 1948, and on a number of state-sponsored occasions under former dictator, general Ne Win and now from the semi-quasi civilian government.

When it comes to Rohingya, Burmese society is influenced with malevolent propagandas against Rohingya as "Bengali", "Illegal Immigrant", "Influx virus",  "lower class" and even "terrorist" although Rohingya have history of being in Arakan state for hundreds of years, have been suffering untold discriminations and persecutions for more than 50 years, and considered by United Nations as one of the most persecuted people in the world.

The hostility has intensified after an alleged raping of a Buddhist girl by three Rohingya boys which has lead to killing of 10 Muslims by 100 Buddhist mobs and spread to all over Arakan state on 8th June causing numerous villages burnt down, countless mosques and historical monuments destroyed and demolished, various properties looted, thousands of innocent Rohingya killed, uncounted number of defenseless girls raped, and youths and educated Rohingya kidnapped.

Many prominent Burmese democratic activists from inside and outside of Burma who fought against the military junta have been calling the military to "wipe out" or "cleanse" Rohingya from Arakan and spreading anti-Rohingya sentiments through Burmese media which is playing a great role in hiding the real truth and propagating the biased news. Nonetheless, many monks including Association of Sittwe and Mrauk Oo called not to sell and communicate with Rohingya, blocked humanitarian aids reaching to homeless and starved Rohingya, and called to send all Rohingya "back to their native land". 

At the same time, Burmese president, Thein Sein who was a general in previous junta rule announced on July 13 that Rohingya as non-citizen of Burma and told visiting UNHCR chief, Antonio Guterres to be ready for the deportation of all Rohingya to a third country. He has given the ultimate power to military, police, border security forces and former Buddhist militant group in Arakan who have signed ceasefire agreement to deal strictly with Rohingya.

On the other side of Burma, Bangladesh government has closed the border and pushed back a lot of Rohingya boat people who were escaping the ethnic cleansing. And also it told foreign aid groups such as MSF, ACF Britain's Muslim Aid UK to suspend their services and leave the country.

It has become a silent field of ethnic cleansing in Burma where foreign media, investigation teams and aid groups are banned, Anti-Rohingya sentiment is ever increasing among Burmese people while military and ultra-nationalists are showing their importance in the newly formed democratic government by committing ethnic cleansing as well as democracy champion, Aung San Suu Kyi is watching the show by keeping silent and saying "I don't know" when asked about whether she considered Rohingya as citizen by forgetting the human rights abuses Rohingya have been suffering.

Rohingya were recognized as one of the ethnics of Burma and have enjoyed the full citizenship rights until the dictator Ne Win over took power in 1962 and implemented a discriminatory citizenship law in 1982 which has striped out Rohingya from being citizen of Burma and making vulnerable from persecutions and ethnic cleansing.  



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