The Stateless Rohingya Blog

File photo: Damaged materials are scattered on the floor at a NGO office after an attack in Sittwe, Rakhine state, western Myanmar. (AFP/Soe Than Win) By ROBIN McDOWELL Associated Press April 01, 2014 International relief organizations forced to flee western Myanmar after being targeted by Buddhist mobs say it will be almost impossible to return without strong diplomatic pressure on the government to depoliticize the distribution of aid: Until then, they say, the lives of more than 140,000 Rohingya Muslims in overcrowded, dirty camps will be at even greater risk. In the next two weeks food stocks will run out and at least 20,000 people will be without clean water, according to humanitarian aid workers who gathered with colleagues in the country's main city of Yangon on Monday to discuss the spiraling crisis. The heath situation is even more dire, they said, with almost no life-saving services such as emergency hospital referrals. "It's not that we do...

By KPN News March 27, 2014 Sittwe, Arakan State: Arkan State government again imposed Emergency Act 144 and dusk-to-dawn curfew today at about 4:00 pm after Rakhine mobs attacked all INGOs – aids working groups ‘offices and its residences, according to residents and official. Rakhine mobs were attacking all the INGOs office in Sittwe where the security force didn’t able to control the angry Rakhine mobs and the authority feared it will become more in later. So, the authority imposed the Emergency Act 144 and 6:00pm to 6:00am curfew, according to government officials and local residents. The security force – police – provided security for all NGOs staffs and had evacuated all the staffs from the offices and residents to a police station hall after INGOs offices and their private residences came under attack and will fly to Rangoon the tomorrow, said a source close to the NGO, who declined to be identified. Rakhine mobs violence behavior to INGOs office after a femal...

Ro Myo Chit Report and Aung Min Khant Report 27th March 2014 Rvisiontv.com Sittwe (Akyab), Arakan -  “Some Rakhine staffs of Malteser International [an International (Humanitarian) Non-Governmental Organization-INGO originated to Germany] office based at Kyaung Htet Hlan Quarter in Sittwe (Akyab) attached Buddhist Religious Flags on a vehicle belongs to the NGO. A Malteser International Staff, an Amrican citizen, removed the flag from the vehicle. Hence, Rakhine staffs started quarreling with her saying that they attached the flag as a symbol of their boycott against the population census in Arakan state. She replied “after a period of 30 years, a population census on par with international standard is to be carried out with the help of UN. Please cooperate in it instead of boycotting.” Hence, the dissatisfied Rakhine extremists spread a false news that she (the staff) insulted the religious flag by putting it on her waist. Therefore, Police from No.1 Police station of Sittwe ar...

Photos taken by Osman Sagirli, Turkish journalist, currently in the region with IHH team By Fatimah Carbonated.TV  March  11, 2014 Not only is the Rohingya Muslim minority of Myanmar (Burma) being persecuted, it’s also deprived of much-needed medical supplies that can help heal the physical wounds from the  ethnic genocide  that has been carried out against them for about two years now. International aid group “Doctors Without Borders” (aka in French as Medecins Sans Frontieres or MSF) stated last week that the Union Government of Burma ordered them to cease its operations over  accusations of biased relief efforts . Rohingya activists claim the ban will leave nearly 700,000 people without access to vital medical care in the Rakhine State – the country's second-most impoverished region which has also been plagued by ethnic rioting. Moreover, most of the clinics in western Rakhine have been shut down except a general hospital. However...

By Associated Press February 28, 2014 Doctors without Borders is being forced to stop caring for sick people in a Myanmar state torn by sectarian violence, in a move linked to the humanitarian group's work with the long-persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority. Myanmar's presidential spokesman Ye Htut said that the group's contract in Rakhine state would not be extended because they hired "Bengalis," the term the government uses for Rohingya, and lacked transparency in its work. He criticized the group over its handling of patients following an attack in the remote northern part of the state last month. The government has vehemently denied allegations that a Buddhist mob rampaged through a village, killing women and children. Doctors Without Borders said it treated 22 injured and traumatized Rohingya. The United Nations says more than 40 Rohingya were killed, but the government says only one Buddhist policeman died.  Ye Htut said that the group...

By Zin Linn OpEdNews February 21, 2014   Burma or Myanmar has a bad record concerning topic of human rights to date. Human Rights Watch criticizes Burma's lately formed National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) which has not take part in competent role to scrutinize human rights violations in conflict zones. In February 2012, the commission's chairman, U Win Mra, said that the commission would not look into allegations of abuses in the country's ethnic armed conflict areas due to the government's efforts to negotiate ceasefires. HRW has also made a recommendation to the parliament which needed to pass legislation that would bring Myanmar's NHRC in line with the Paris Principles on national human rights institutions in order to establish it as an independent and effective institution. However, people do not satisfy with the NHRC's activities since it has made little progress for citizen's rights protection. Recently, the Network for Human Rig...

Rohingya men who were shot by the police during a riot on Friday rest in Dapaing district clinic, outside of Sittwe, on 11 August 2013. (Reuters) By Naw Noreen Democratic Voice of Burma November 04, 2013 The Burmese government on Monday gathered a group of international humanitarian agencies working in the restive Arakan state to remind them that they must distribute aid “fairly” to local communities. It follows the latest eruption of violence in the western state, where communal clashes between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims have claimed hundreds of lives since last year. On Saturday, at least four people, including three Rohingyas, were killed in Pauktaw township, an area about two hours northeast of the state capital Sittwe. Local Buddhists later accused Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) of “bias” for taking three injured Muslim men to hospital. Government spokesperson Hla Thein told DVB that a group of 18 major aid groups, including UN agencies, were subse...

Qatar Charity CEO, Yusuf bin Ahmed Al Kuwari (second left) exchanges documents with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Imran Rida, at Qatar Charity Headquarters in Doha yesterday. Kammutty VP The Peninsula Qatar: May 1, 2013 DOHA: Qatar Charity (QC) will donate $2m (QR7.3m) in relief funds for the displaced Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine state. The aid comes following an agreement signed between Qatar Charity (QC) and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) yesterday, which will directly benefit some 10,000 people in the region. The QC donation is part of the humanitarian assistance worth $17m that has been provided by the UNHCR to provide shelter to the displaced. The agreement was signed by Imran Rida, UNHCR regional representative to the GGC, and Yusuf bin Ahmed Al Kuwari, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of QC in Doha. The UNHCR project will build 1,360 housing units, two multi-purpose facilities, 11 polyclinics, 115 kitchens and 1...

PressTV: April 24, 2013 Myanmar has been the scene of deadly clashes over the past twelve months. According to reports by the I-H-H, Humanitarian Relief Foundation, a large number of villages were torched and thousands of Muslims were killed brutally. Tens of thousands were also displaced. Those who were able to escape the country, went to neigboring Bangladeshi refugee camps where they are trying to survive depending on what humanitarian relief groups like the IHH provides for them. Recently the violence has spread to 12 different cities in Arakan Region, only 3 of which NGOs can enter, which actually makes it impossible to come up with accurate numbers of Muslims who have been killed, tortured or displaced. The massacre the Arakanese people have been subjected to is unbelievable. Reports of Muslims being burned alive, buried alive, womenbeing raped, people being tortured to death keep coming in from those who have visited the region. Many humanitarian rel...

A UNHCR member of staff discusses accommodation with colleagues and displaced people at the Ohn Taw Gyi IDP camp near Sittwe, capital of Rakhine state  © UNHCR/P.Behan IRIN News: April 16, 2013 BANGKOK, 16 April 2013 (IRIN) - Ongoing tensions between Buddhist and Muslim communities in Myanmar's western Rakhine State have created a threatening environment for aid workers, hindering assistance to more than127,000 displaced persons.  “Access to IDPs [internally displaced persons] is being seriously hampered by ongoing intimidation [of aid workers] by some members of the local community,” noted the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Yangon.  Humanitarian organizations, including medical NGO Médecins Sans Frontières, report aid staff have faced accusations by the local Rakhine community - who are mostly Buddhist - that their assistance favours the Muslim Rohingya minority.  The majority of the displaced are Rohingya, b...

Khalifa Foundation has distributed urgent aid totalling 5,200 tonnes Gulf News  March 04, 2013  Burma: The Khalifa Bin Zayed Humanitarian Foundation (KZHF) has distributed another 2,600 tonnes of food aid to Myanmar Muslims, completing its third and last phase of the urgent aid totalling 5,200 tonnes of relief items among 850,000 beneficiaries. As per directives of President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the assistance was purchased from the local markets of Myanmar in cooperation and coordination with the Embassy of Kuwait to be shipped by sea to “Rakhine (Arakan)” for distribution among the affectees there.