Rohingya Genocide 1942 - Present (part of The Darkness Visible series)
Thousands of the Muslim Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh have not been registered and have received little assistance. A woman sits on the side of the road with her grandchild at the old Tal Camp near Teknaf. The government has since relocated the camp residents to a safer and less congested area. © UNHCR/G.Constantine.
Alders Ledge:
April 15, 2013
How long should the
a people have to suffer before the world decides to act? How often do they have
to be killed in senseless pogroms and orgies of violence? Why do they have to
grow-up in a culture of oppression and fear? Why do they have to raise their
children without food or education? When will the cycle of neglect and abuse
end?
Since the days of
British colonialism in Myanmar the Rohingya people have been been subject to
systemic racism in the governments that have come and gone over the years. The
British gave them just enough to keep them alive, to make them useful, but
never the rewards for loyalty that the United Kingdom had promised them. The
Japanese both paid their murderers for each dead Rohingya and engaged in
massacres of the Rohingya themselves. And then there came the Rakhine... the
Buddhists... the supposed peaceful monks.
In 1942 the British
were forced out of the Arakan state as the Japanese continued to spread out
over Asia. Able to hold onto Bengal, the Brits were just near enough to the
Rohingya to keep them alive under the horrific rule of the Japanese. Yet this
was just the next chapter in a long history of suffering for the Rohingya
people. This was the start of the modern genocide of the Rohingya people.
Japanese forces fed
the Rakhine peoples' hatred for the Rohingya people. They goaded on the wrath
of the Buddhists as they rewarded each passing massacre of Rohingya. And yet
the rate of death amongst Rohingya communities was not enough to satisfy
Japanese lust for blood. The Japanese decided that their forces had to use the
modern weapons of war to annihilate the Rohingya. Bullets were more efficiently
distributed from modern rifles rather than those of homemade Rakhine mobs.
Around 22,000
Rohingya fled the Japanese's wrath in the Arakan. Their families and friends
had fought the invasion. They had remained loyal to the British. So clearly the
old master, no matter how miserable, was clearly better than this new tyrant.
Upon arriving the
British suddenly realized what a stroke of luck they had just been given. The
Japaneses' excesses had driven a small army across the border. The abuses of
the Japanese had given the British a group of people that had lost everything
and therefore could be promised everything. And that was just what the British
began to do... they promised the Rohingya a "national area" in the
Arakan if they would simply fight for the British.
In times of
upheaval the Rohingya had fought for the British before. So why should they set
this one out? After all, the land they would be going back to was their
homeland. This was the place they had raised their children. This was the home
where they had been born. And this was the only land where they could ever
envision their future generations living for the rest of time.
When the Japanese
massacres were ended and the invader was driven out the Rohingya were seen by
the Rakhine as traitors. They had once again sided with the British. They had
once again gone against the original goal of expelling the colonialist. And
thus the genocide of the Rohingya would continue.
So when the British
pulled out of Pakistan and Myanmar the Rohingya were faced with few options.
They had established an army to defend themselves against Rakhine aggression.
But now, as the Arakan was drawn into Burma rather than Bengal, the Rohingya
were trapped. Their homeland was once again given away to someone else. Their
land was once again taken out from underneath their own feet. Thus in 1947 the
Rohingya approached the government of Pakistan and pleaded for a desperate
solution to a desperate situation. It was then that the Rohingya asked to be
incorporated into East Pakistan (Bangladesh).
From that point on
the Rohingya sealed their fate in Myanmar. Pakistan would never allow the
Rohingya into Pakistan due to their own innate bigotry. And the Rakhine, along
with the rest of Myanmar, would forever see the Rohingya as outsiders. This act
of asking to leave Burma and take their homeland with them was another act of
treason in the eyes of their Rakhine neighbors.
In response, upon
Burmese independence in 1948, the leaders of Myanmar began to impose countless
limitations upon the Rohingya. In direct response to the move to leave Burma
and join Pakistan the Rohingya were given limitations upon their movement
within Burma. Then to add to this the Burmese wrote laws that allowed Rohingya
to be used as slave laborers within the Arakan. And those who had fled Burma
during the war with Japan, around 13,000, were not given the right to return to
their homes after the war.
In effect, the
Rohingya were stripped of their nationality and their citizenship to their own
homeland.
The next chapter of
the Rohingya genocide began with the military coup that led to the Junta rule
of Myanmar in 1962. Under the military rule the generals began initiating
programs that would "encourage the Rohingya to leave Burma". These
included the total withdraw of Rohingya citizenship and severe restrictions
upon their freedoms. From the 1970's the Rohingya were forced out of the
military and none have been allowed to join the military since. Then in 1974
when the citizens of Burma were required to carry National Registration
Certificates the Rohingya were forced to carry Foreign Registration Cards
(which few were even allowed to have).
And finally came the Nagamin programs (Kingdom of Dragons) that were
meant to increase harassment of Rohingya and allow for their deportation.
In 1991 the
Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh from Myanmar began to tell the West about vast
human rights abuses in the Arakan. This was the largest migration of Rohingya
across the border since the Junta took power. In May of 1991 nearly 10,000
Rohingya fled the Arakan. They told reporters of summary executions, rape
camps, vast amounts of torture used by the Burmese military and Rakhine mobs in
the Arakan. They told of forced labor in which the Rohingya were worked till
they either died or could be of little use once they collapsed. And yet their
stories remained muted even as 270,000 Rohingya fled by March of 1992.
The same atrocities
continue to this day. The main weapon used to justify the ongoing atrocities is
the 1982 race laws (actually called the Citizenship Law) that were designed to
restrict citizenship of the Rohingya who fled in 1978. Though today they are
still employed to deny all Rohingya their due citizenship. They are also used
to clarify that the Rohingya are not Burmese but rather foreign invaders.
Today the Rohingya
face starvation as they are forced into concentration camp style ghettos and
refugee camps. Nasaka, the Burmese gestapo, kill the Rohingya who attempt to
flee the mobs that carry out the massacres of Rohingya. In addition, the government
of Burma continues to deny the Rohingya access to food, water, and medical
treatment.
All of this leaves
me, the main author here at Alder's Ledge, to ask just how much different
history would have been if those who have used and abused the Rohingya had
simply kept their promise? Would the Rohingya been spared this seemingly
endless genocide? Or would they simply been subjected to some other form of
neglect and abuse by those who have helped ensure their current plight?
Better yet, the
question still remains...
How much longer
should the Rohingya be left to suffer before the world acts to save their
lives?
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