The Stateless Rohingya Blog

Written by:   Kanbawza Win Looking at my beloved country, I recollect Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, the last Komissar of the Soviet Union who tried his level best to save the Communist system through long-necessary reforms, as what the Burmese regime is doing now in releasing hundreds of political prisoners. It also catches two birds with a stone in placating the maximum impression on European and American diplomats and “human rights” organizations to lift their punitive sanctions which they so crave in order to legalize their personal wealth. Not that I am predicting that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi will be the Boris Yektsin of Burma as she has famously put it: “It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it, and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to It.” But the system of the dictatorial regime is rotting beyond repair and is crumbling. The Nargis Constitution following the Nargis Cyclone of May 2008. exposed not

Press Release The below-named Rohingya organisations strongly disapprove the statement, dated 14 January 2012, of the Burmese Home Minister Lt. General Ko Ko where he said, “the 13 persons arrested form Arakan border last year, for having connection with Taliban and taking explosive training, will be further detained.”

BANGKOK, 19 January 2012 (IRIN) - An estimated 40,000 Rohingya children are believed to be unregistered in Myanmar, according to a new  report .   "Despite recent reform efforts in Myanmar, the government has reaffirmed its deeply discriminatory policies against the Rohingya, and the children bear the brunt of this," Chris Lewa, director of The Arakan Project and author of the report, told IRIN before a session of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in Geneva on 19 January.

The Rohingya Rohingya is a generic term referring to the Sunni Muslim inhabitants of Arakan, the historical name of a Myanmar border region which has a long history of isolation from the rest of the country. Since 1989, this region has been officially designated as the Rakhine State. However the majority of people of concern are from the northern part of the Rakhine State, from the three townships of Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung.

By Kaladanpress Maungdaw, Arakan State: Burma’s border security force (Nasaka) extorted Kyat 300,000 from a villager of Maungdaw Township on December 15, for buying  a housing land without giving information to Nasaka, said a close relative of the victim on condition of anonymity.

By Kaladanpress Buthidaung, Arakan State:  One minor Rohingya student, aged 9-year was killed,  another one aged 8 -year  was become  unconscious state by school guard (Rakhine community) on January 10, at about 8:00 pm, while on the way to home after finishing their annual  school farewell party of Myoma Zedidaung middle  school, said a close relative of the victim.

By DVB Rohingya children who fled to Bangladesh bathe using water from a pond at a refugee camp in Cox's Bazaar (Reuters) Despite recent tentative steps towards democratic reform in Burma, the government has continued with a discriminatory policy against the Rohingya ethnic group in the country’s western Arakan state that includes banning Rohingya children born out of wedlock from obtaining travel permits, attending school and, in the future, marrying.

By DVB Troops from the ABSDF during a training exercise in March 2008 (Source: ABSDF website) The armed All Burma Students’ Democratic Front, formed in the wake of a mass uprising in 1988, says 30 of its members remain behind bars in Burma despite a far-reaching amnesty of political prisoners last week. The group says 13 detainees that were jailed in connection with their ties to the ABSDF, which at its peak had some 10,000 troops, were freed in the 13 January release. Some of those who remain have been in prison since the early 1990s, and are serving sentences of more than 60 years. “It’s important to release all prisoners of conscience to create a political environment inclusive for all to take part in the reform programme and democratic transition,” said deputy chairman Myo Win. But since the amnesty, debate has taken place on who qualifies as a prisoner of conscience and political prisoner. Among those released last Friday were former military intelligence, customs and g

By Uznews.net Democratic reforms in Burma, the Southeast Asian country which for decades has been in the grasp of one of the world’s most brutal military dictatorships, continue to take the world by surprise.  Even moreso that these historic changes have been initiated by one of its longest-serving officials – once General, now President Thein Sein. General Tan Shwei took over as leader of the military junta in 1988. In 2011, he ceded power to the non-military government which was formed by former high-ranking servants of the regime, and which continues to wield its iron first over the Burmese people. The world’s media are now reporting that Burma’s opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, who has become an iconic figure in Burma’s war for democracy and freedom, will participate in parliamentary elections due to take place on 1 April 2012. A politician and head of the National League for Democracy (NLD), and under house arrest for 14 years out of the last 22, she will stand