The Stateless Rohingya Blog

Rohingya refugees at the Pauktaw camp in west Burma. Photograph: Kate Hodal for the Guardian Qutub Shah  RB News   January 20, 2013 (Edited by Mayu Thitsar) Pauktaw: Yesterday, the chief minister of Rakhine State, Hla Maung Tin, went to Dumfara village, Pauktaw Township, where about 8000 Rohingya refugees live. The chief minister said, “All of you must go back to your own homes.” The refugees replied, “Unless our houses are rebuilt and enough security forces are provided, we will not go back there because Rakhines will terrorize us again.” Then the chief minister said, “We cannot rebuild your houses as we don’t have any plan to do.” It sounds that Myanmar government wants to materialize the pre-hatched plan of Thein Sein as he said. “We will keep them as refugees in camps.”

                                         Photo Kutupalong unregistered refugee camp THAILAND - The people of Ranong will oppose the setting up of a refugee camp for Rohingyas in the southern coastal province, their leader said yesterday. Sucheep Patthong said his group would launch protests if there were reports indicating the government intended to open a Rohingya refugee camp in Ranong.

Iran is working to open an embassy in Myanmar, says a spokesman for Iran’s Majlis Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy. Seyyed Hossein Naqavi-Hosseini said on Saturday that the government of Myanmar has taken into consideration Iran’s offer to establish an embassy in the country and that initial preparation have been made for that matter. 

Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu JEDDAH: P.K. ABDUL GHAFOUR The Feb. 6-7 Islamic summit in Cairo will deal with major challenges facing the Muslim world including the Syrian crisis, the Palestinian issue and Rohingya and Mali issues, said Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, secretary-general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

A Muslim Rohingya man sits at his burnt home at a village in Minpyar in Rakhine state, Myanmar, on October 28, 2012. (file photo) An Iranian MP says the Islamic Republic plans to set up a camp in Myanmar to help the efforts to provide relief to the country’s Rohingya Muslims. On Saturday, Majlis (parliament) National Security and ForeignPolicy Committee Deputy Chairman Mansour Haqiqatpour said agreements have been reached with senior Myanmar officials to set up a camp in Rakhine state that can accommodate thousands of Rohingya refugees and where food can be provided for them. 

Maungdaw, Arakan State: Burma’s border security force (Nasaka), are looting valuable goods from the villagers and also committed sexual insults against Rohingya women and girls when the male villagers ran away from the village for fear of arbitrary arrest by the Nasaka personnel, said a local elder preferring not to be named.

A boy’s stare: A small boy looks at foreign visitors to his village in Pauktaw, Rakhine State. Earlier this month, Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa, accompanied by some of the ministry’s officials, toured several refugee camps in Rakhine State, in the western part of Myanmar, a Southeast Asian nation ravaged by communal conflict. During the visit, the foreign minister was accompanied by Myanmarese Minister of Border Affairs Thein Htay.