The Stateless Rohingya Blog

Ref. DK000304 Date. 23.02.2013 PRESS RELEASE URGING INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY TO TAKE URGENT AND EFFECTIVE ACTIONS TOPREVENT THE FURTHER ATROCITIES AGAINST ROHINGYAS AND KAMANS Atrocities against the Rohingya and Kaman minorities have become the daily and leisure activities of Rakhine extremists and government apparatus in Arakan, Burma (Myanmar). Killing, arbitrary arrest, rapes, extortion and disappearance under detention has been going on in daily basis but these have been going on unnoticed by international community’s because of the blockades and restrictions imposed on aid organizations and observers by both central and local authorities. Besides aid organizations are being harassed and threaten by local extremist militia. However, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights to Burma, Mr. Tomas Ojea Quintana, who visited Burma from February 11, 2012 to February 16, 2012, could see some of the ongoing atrocities despite various travel restrictions and limited access ...

BDnews24.com February 24, 2013 Bangladesh's Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, supported by former Timor-Leste president Ramos-Horta, has pitched in strongly for the persecuted Rohingyas of Myanmar. "There is evidence that the Rohingya have been in present-day Myanmar since the 8th century,” the two wrote in Huffington Post. “It is incontrovertible that Muslim communities have existed in [Rakhine] State since the 15th century, added to by descendants of Bengalis migrating to Arakan [Rakhine] during colonial times.” “The minority Muslim Rohingya continue to suffer unspeakable persecution, with more than 1,000 killed and hundreds of thousands displaced from their homes just in recent months, apparently with the complicity and protection of security forces,” the two Nobel laureates wrote. Ramos-Horta and Yunus also criticised Myanmar’s 1982 Citizenship Law which denied Rohingyas citizenship of Myanmar and forced on them severe restrictions of travel, marriage...

 (  Photo: Pyithu Hluttaw Page  )  Eleven Myanmar:  February 24, 2013 No Rohingya is included in Myanmar's more than 100 national races, says a government deputy minister. The Deputy Minister for Immigration and Population, Kyaw Kyaw Tun replied to a question of Khin Saw Wai, an MP representing Rakhine State, during a parliamentary session of the Lower House on Wednesday. "There has never been a Rohingya race in Rakhine State. According to the censuses collected in the colonial period, in 1973 and in 1983, the country's ethnic groups include no Rohingya. That term was not mentioned either in the British gazettes," the deputy minister said. He added that according to the 1973 and 1983 censuses, non-ethnic citizens in Myanmar include Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, Bengali and Nepalese. According to the deputy minister, when the Myanmar was ruled by the caretaker Government in 1958, related departments mentioned people coming from Bangl...

Freely moving Rakhine terrorists in Arakan Mayu Press: February 24th, 2013 By Mohamed Farooq Last 21 February night at about 09 PM, numbers of Rakhine youths gather and shouted near the gate of Mohammad Gani, 42 years old, an educated Rohingya person in Boumo Para, Maungdaw. He shut down all his windows and doors of home for his family safety and to be free of attack. Unfortunately, the Rakhine terrorists entered his home jointly with arm force Hlun Tin. When they tried to rape his daughters and wife, Mohammad Gani requested them not to do. Then they hit critically and brought him altogether. The Rakhine took him a picture with a camera by making him to hold a gallon of kerosene and lighter as he went to torch up Rakhine Village. But the officer of Intelligent Police (Sarapa) found that he was innocent to the created false event then released him. He is still senseless with severe pain and injured. The doctor said to his relatives as one of h...

UNHCR : Briefing Notes February 22, 2013 This is a summary of what was said by UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at the press briefing, on 22 February 2013, at the Palais des Nations in Geneva. UNHCR is concerned about a rising numbers of deaths in the Indian Ocean involving people fleeing their countries for safety and better lives elsewhere. This includes many Rohingya from Myanmar. Already in 2013, several thousand people are believed to have boarded smuggler's boats in the Bay of Bengal, among them Rohingya from Rakhine state or from Bangladesh's refugee camps and makeshift sites.  Most are men, but there are also increasing reports of women and children on these often-rickety boats making the journey southwards. We estimate that of the 13,000 people who left on smugglers' boats in 2012, close to 500 died at sea when their boats broke down or capsized. While UNHCR is still gathering data from 2012 on deaths ...

Rescued Rohingya Muslims sit at a Sri Lankan immigration detention center in Colombo on Wednesday.(Eranga Jayawardena / Associated Press / February 20, 2013) Los Angeles Times  February 22, 201  By Emily Alpert  By the time their rickety boat was rescued last week off the eastern coast of  Sri Lanka , nearly a hundred of the weakened passengers had lost their lives – roughly three times as many as survived. The starving people had endured nearly two months at sea, trying to flee the western state of  Myanmar  where hundreds were slain last year, the  United Nations  refugee agency said Friday. The Rohingya Muslims say they undertook the arduous journey out of fear for their lives. The outpouring of Rohingya from western Myanmar and  Bangladesh  refugee camps has made the Indian Ocean “one of the deadliest stretches of water in the world,” the U.N. refugee agency said Friday. It estimated that last year, nearly 50...

Muslim refugees gather at Thechaung camp refugee camp upon arrival in Sittwe, Rakhine State, western Myanmar, Sunday, Oct. 28, 2012. (AP / Khin Maung Win) 9News World February 22, 2013 Australia will boost aid by $2.5 million to Myanmar's (Burma's) displaced ethnic communities, but has ruled out an "open door" policy to ethnic Muslim Rohingya seeking asylum in Australia after fleeing sectarian violence. Foreign Minister Bob Carr, after meeting Thai counterpart Surapong Tovichakchaikul, said Australia ruled out allowing the Rohingya to be part of its resettlement policy after advice by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). "We don't want to give the impression that for Rohingya, (those) desperate people (who) come to Thailand, they have a route to Australia because the settlement, the settlement of this displacement lies in changing policies to (give) effect to changed policies within Rakhine province," Senator...