By RSIS
Eurasia Review
February 26, 2013
The exodus of many Rohingya over the past year has brought
increased international awareness to their plight, as well as Southeast Asia’s
inability to deal effectively with forced migration. A regional approach is
needed to find a durable solution to the influx of Rohingya boat people.
By Eliane Coates
SINCE THE communal clashes began in Arakan State in June
2012, the scale of Rohingya fleeing by boat to neighbouring Southeast Asian
countries has increased significantly. According to a reliable source from the
human rights organisation The Arakan Project, it is estimated 19,500 registered
and unregistered Rohingya, including some Bangladeshis, have fled by boat from
Bangladesh and North Arakan State, with an estimated 100 people having drowned
during the process.
With an estimated 115,000 people in Arakan displaced by the
communal clashes, it is not surprising thousands more Rohingya have fled from
other parts of Arakan State not only by boat, but by air and overland too.
The boat people problem
Myanmar, a country once under a severely repressive regime,
is now considered a budding democracy. Yet the opening up of Myanmar has
re-ignited deep-seated and long-repressed inter-ethnic friction that has the
potential to consume Arakan State in continual civil unrest. With the
government of Myanmar showing little, if any, interest in the plight of
Rohingya and giving no sign of granting permanent residency to Rohingya in the
near future, the exodus of Rohingya to surrounding countries is unlikely to
relent in coming months with harassment, intimidation campaigns and arbitrary
arrests of Rohingya continuing today.
Along with the 200,000-400,000 unregistered Rohingya in
Bangladesh, many Rohingya have for years sought refuge in Malaysia which is viewed
by Rohingya as a welcoming destination due to the existing Rohingya community.
Malaysia is currently the only country where Rohingya receive a minimum of
protection. Rohingya now make up the second largest refugee group in Malaysia.
Yet, because Kuala Lumpur is not a signatory to the 1951
United Nations Convention on Refugees, nor the 1967 Protocol relating to the
Status of Refugees, Rohingya are technically illegal immigrants. Hence they
often remain urban refugees in cities, with the constant threat of arrest,
detention and deportation. However, in recent times no Rohingya have been
arrested or deported, especially since 2009 when Malaysia began allowing United
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) access to Immigration Detention
Centers to conduct refugee status determination processes.
Thailand’s unsustainable policy
In the last month Thailand seems to have become not solely a
transit country to Malaysia, but a destination country as well with increasing
arrivals of boats carrying Rohingya intercepted off the coast of Thailand.
Thailand’s current policy towards arriving boats of Rohingya is to ‘help them
on.’ Boats found near the Thai coast are not allowed to come ashore but are
escorted back out to sea with food, water, and fuel provided on the condition
that the boat continues its journey to Malaysia.
While official reports state that 6000 Rohingya have
illegally entered Thailand by sea since October 2012, the reality is there has
been many more Rohingya arriving on Thai shores in undetected boats.
Over the last three decades from 1975, Thailand has hosted
almost three million refugees, initially from countries such as Cambodia, Laos
and Vietnam, though mostly from Myanmar. Thai policy towards people from
Myanmar during this period has fluctuated, despite international pressure
urging Thailand to adopt a flexible policy towards displaced peoples. More
recently, Thailand has engaged in ‘soft deportation’ of Rohingya across the
Myanmar-Thai border as Myanmar refuses to re-admit Rohingya.
Rohingya, after being either handed directly to brokers,
enter a tangled human trafficking web where they often are forced to pay
brokers exorbitant fees or engage in forced labor in Thailand so as to
eventually be transported to the Malaysian border. Worse, there have even been
allegations against senior military officers of involvement in the smuggling
racket.
Recent Thai army raids on camps in Thailand’s southern
border province of Songkhla unearthed an estimated 900 Rohingya waiting to be
sent to work in Malaysia. This development prompted Thai Foreign Minister
Surapong Tovichakchaikul to state that those found, as well as a small group of
Rohingya rescued from unseaworthy boats, would be permitted to remain on Thai
soil for six months.
Although not upgrading their status to refugees, the
Rohingya will be given a daily allowance of 75 baht (US$2.50) while Thailand
talks with the UN, international agencies and seeks third countries willing to
accept them.
Rohingya boat people will continue to arrive on Thai shores
in the future. The strategy of soft deportation currently being employed will
likely become unsustainable as many of the newly arrived Rohingya boat people
will be unable to pay the high fees to traffickers, with many having lost their
property in the recent communal violence in Arakan State.
Need for concerted regional solutions
In sum, the Rohingya immigration issue can no longer be
regarded as an internal affair of the Myanmar government. Although many
Southeast Asian countries understandably wish to steer clear of the sensitive
debate on the Rohingya, the regional dimensions of this exodus of people seem
all too evident. It is hard to escape the conclusion that what is urgently
required is a concerted regional strategy aimed at coaxing the Myanmar
government to more effectively address the situation in Arakan State.
While addressing the root causes of the increasing outflows
of Rohingya boat people is important, it may not be sufficient. Regional
countries may have to seriously explore the option of allowing boats carrying
Rohingya to land on their shores and assist in the processing of people, giving
Rohingya the right to apply for asylum and go through a refugee status
determination process for eventual resettlement.
While undeniably only a temporary solution, this move may
still help deal with the unmistakable regional repercussions of such human
outflows arising from communal violence in Arakan State.
Eliane Coates is a Research Analyst at the Centre of
Excellence for National Security (CENS), a constituent unit of the S.
Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological
University.
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