Rohingyas attempting anew for intrusion into Bangladesh

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Saturday, October 27, 2012

Rohingyas attempting anew for intrusion

Rohingyas attempting anew for intrusion

BGB officials inspect a boat carrying Rohingya people who fled the sectarian violence in Myanmar and crossed the Naf River into Teknaf on June 11. Photo: STAR
Star Online Report
In the backdrop of fresh ethnic violence in Myanmar’s western state of Rakhine, Rohingyas have been trying anew to intrude into Bangladesh, reports BBC Bangla Service.

Quoting local sources, the BBC Bangla Service reported on Friday that nearly 3,000 Rohingya refugees boarding on around 50 boats have been waiting on sea to cross the bordering Naff river from Myanmar.

Local administrator said they ordered the law enforcers to beef up vigilance and resist intrusion.

Meanwhile, Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) sources said they had been pushed back 52 Rohingya refugees during the last two days.

This is the second time in 2012 that a sectarian violence broke out in the Rakhine state of Myanmar, forcing the Rohingyas to flee the country.

At least 64 people were killed this week, officials said, in the first serious outburst of violence since June, when a state of emergency was declared in Rakhine.

The ethnic violence had broken out in the same state of Myanmar for the first time in June this year.

Shafique Mia, chairman of Teknaf upazila, said he has news that several boats with on board have been waiting on the sea.

“We have news that 50 to 60 boats are floating on the sea. If each boat carries 50 people, then there are 3,000 Rohingyas on those boats,” he said.

Lt Col Zahid Hasan, a BGB official of Cox’s Bazar, said they also have news that boats carrying Rohingyas were waiting on sea to intrude into Bangladesh.

He said the fishermen informed them that the Rohingyas were fleeing their home on boats as the violence-prone areas are island.

Mohammad Ruhul Amin, district administrator of Cox’s Bazar, said they had a meeting with officials concerned in the awake of the situation and decided to resist any kind of intrusion on the frontier.

The Bangladesh government earlier had decided not to allow any refugee from Myanmar and directed the administration and law enforcement agencies to beef up vigilance and resist intrusion.

The BGB officials said they would not allow any Rohingyas.

After the government stance to resist Rohingya in June, international community on many occasion urged Dhaka to allow them.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) urged the Bangladesh government in June to allow the people seeking refuge in the country from sectarian clashes in the Rakhine state of Myanmar.

“Bangladesh is a densely populated country and the Rohingyas have impacts on our society, law and order, and environment. Considering all aspects, it will create serious problems for us,” said Dipu Moni, the foreign minister.

She also added, “We are not interested in more people coming to Bangladesh.”

As many as 250,000 Rohingyas from Myanmar entered Bangladesh in 1991 following persecution. Later, most of them returned, but those registered by the UNHCR now reside in two camps -- Kutupalong and Nayapara -- in Cox's Bazar.

In 2009, police investigations found link of Rohingyas with some militant groups in Bangladesh.

Over the years, many of the Rohingyas living here managed to obtain Bangladeshi passport with support from local authorities and went abroad.

What sparked the violence in June?

The rape and murder of a young Buddhist woman in Rakhine in May set off a chain of deadly religious clashes.

Why was a state of emergency declared?

A state of emergency allows the introduction of martial law, which means the military can take over administrative control of the region reports BBC.

Who are the Rohingyas?

The United Nations describes Rohingya as a persecuted religious and linguistic minority from western Myanmar.

The Myanmarese government, on the other hand, says they are relatively recent migrants from the Indian sub-continent.

Neighbouring Bangladesh already hosts several hundred thousand refugees from Myanmar and says it cannot take any more.

The government has declared a curfew in the affected areas, but its response since the violence first broke out in June is being widely criticised as inadequate, says the BBC's Jonathan Head in Bangkok.

On Friday six towns were hit by clashes and a night-time curfew is in place in several locations including Min Bya and Mrauk Oo where the latest spate of violence began.

It is unclear what prompted the latest clashes. The Rakhine Buddhists and Muslims, believed to be mainly Rohingya, blame each other for the violence.

Muslims throughout Myanmar have abandoned plans to celebrate the festival of Eid al-Azha because of the violence.

There is long-standing tension between the ethnic Rakhine people, who make up the majority of the state's population, and Muslims, many of whom are Rohingya and are stateless.

The Myanmarese authorities regard the Rohingya as illegal immigrants and correspondents say there is widespread public hostility to them.

In August, Myanmar set up a commission to investigate the violence between Buddhists and Muslims in the west of the country.

Authorities earlier rejected an UN-led inquiry.

RELATED NEWS

HRW satellite images 'show Rakhine destruction' - Online
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[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Muslim Rohingyas under "vicious" attack in Myanmar: rights group

Muslim Rohingyas under vicious attack in Myanmar: rights group | Top News | Reuters

Sat Oct 27, 2012 2:13am EDT*Print This Article [-] Text [+]

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SITTWE, Myanmar (Reuters) - A human rights group expressed concern for the safety of thousands of Muslims on Saturday after revealing satellite images of a once-thriving coastal community reduced to ashes during a week of violence in western Myanmar.

The images released by the New York-based Human Rights Watch show "near total destruction" of a predominantly Rohingya Muslim part of Kyaukpyu, one of several areas in Rakhine state where battles between Rohingyas and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists threaten to derail the former Burma's fragile democratic transition.

More than 811 buildings and houseboats were razed in Kyaukpyu on October 24, forcing many Rohingya to flee north by sea toward the state capital Sittwe, said Human Rights Watch.

"Burma's government urgently needs to provide security for the Rohingya in Arakan (Rakhine) State, who are under vicious attack," said Phil Robertson, the group's deputy Asia director. (Link to Human Rights Watch images: here related_material/2012_Burma_Satimage.pdf)

There were widespread unconfirmed reports of boatloads of Rohingyas trying to cross the sea border to neighboring Bangladesh, which has denied them refugee status since 1992.

Dozens of boats full of Rohingyas with no food or water had fled Kyaukpyu, an industrial zone important to China, and other recent hotspots were seeking access on Friday to overcrowded refugee camps around the state capital Sittwe, according to four Rohingya refugee sources.

Some boats were blocked by security forces from reaching the shore and few Rohingyas managed to reach the camps, the sources said by telephone.

Wan-lark foundation, an organization that has been assisting Rakhine Buddhist refugees, said no clashes in the state had been reported to them since Friday night, but dead bodies of Rakhines had been found.

"Around 6pm last night in Kyawtyaw, the bodies of 16 Rakhines were found in the sea. They had died during the attacks on Thursday. We're looking for more bodies," representative Tun Mein Thein said on Saturday.

The chaos suggests the reformist government is struggling to contain historic ethnic and religious tensions suppressed during nearly a half century of military rule that ended last year.

A Rakhine government spokesman put the death toll at 112 as of Friday. But within hours state media revised it to 67 killed from October 21 to 25, with 95 wounded and nearly 3,000 houses destroyed.

DEATH TOLL "UNDERESTIMATED"

The death toll could be far higher, said Human Rights Watch, citing "allegations from witnesses fleeing scenes of carnage and the government's well-documented history of underestimating figures that might lead to criticism of the state."

The clashes come just five months after communal unrest killed more than 80 people and displaced at least 75,000 in the same region.

A boat carrying 120 Muslims from Kyaukpyu was intercepted by Rakhines, who killed the men and raped the women, the advocacy group Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK said in a statement. This claim could not be verified.

"Ethnic cleansing is happening under the noses of the international community and they are doing nothing," said Tun Khin, the group's president. "We have confirmed reports that hundreds of people have been killed and the government must be aware of that."

Kyaukpyu is crucial to China's most strategic investment in Myanmar: twin pipelines that will carry oil and natural gas through the town on the Bay of Bengal to China's energy-hungry western provinces.

The United Nations has warned that Myanmar's fledgling democracy could be "irreparably damaged" by the violence.

Rohingyas are officially stateless. Buddhist-majority Myanmar's government regards the estimated 800,000 Rohingyas in the country as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, and not as one of the country's 135 official ethnic groups, and denies them citizenship.

But many of those expelled from Kyaukpyu are not Rohingya but Muslims from the officially recognized Kaman minority, said Chris Lewa, director of the Rohingya advocacy group, Arakan Project. "It's not just anti-Rohingya violence anymore, it's anti-Muslim," she said.

It was unclear what set off the latest arson and killing that started on Sunday. In June, tension flared after the rape and murder of a Buddhist woman that was blamed on Muslims, but there was no obvious spark this time.

Rights groups such as Amnesty International have called on Myanmar to amend or repeal a 1982 citizenship law to end the Rohingyas' stateless condition.

(Reporting by Reuters staff reporters; Writing by Andrew R.C. Marshall; Editing by Jonathan Thatcher)

 

[Luka]

Migration is big problem , When Muslim itself killing minorities in their country they can't blame other, it's double policy

 

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Migration is big problem , When Muslim itself killing minorities in their country they can't blame other, it's double policy

But there is no comparison with the brutality of Burmese Janta and hindutva terror. Earlier India set record and nowmyanmar is setting up record though they were carrying it for a while.

 

[UKBengali]

Migration is big problem , When Muslim itself killing minorities in their country they can't blame other, it's double policy

Well Hindu India has a proud history of massacre of minorities.

Do you want specific examples spelt out?

 

[Kesang]

 

[Android]

Well Hindu India has a proud of massacre of minority.

Do you want specific examples spelt out?

you guys should stop giving us lecture on minority rights although our record is not clean but still tratment of minorities in india are much better than any countries in subcontinent where they reach high offices like president, prime minister, army chief, air force chief, chief ministers, cabinet ministers, billionaires, head of nuclear programmes, cricket captains of national team( a very important position in subcontinent ) etc etc etc

 

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Saturday, October 27, 2012

Death toll tops 100 in Myanmar ethnic strife

Death toll tops 100 in Myanmar ethnic strife

The BBC's David Loyn says the violence looks like ethnic cleansing. Photo: BBC
AP, Sittwe
The death toll from recent ethnic violence in Myanmar's western state of Rakhine has surpassed 100, an official said Friday, as the government warned that the strife risks harming the country's reputation as it seeks to install democratic rule.

Rakhine state spokesman Win Myaing said 112 people had been killed in six townships in clashes that began Sunday between members of the Buddhist Rakhine and the Muslim Rohingya communities. He said 72 people were reported injured, including 10 children.

The government announced earlier that almost 2,000 homes had been burned down in the conflict.

In June, ethnic violence in the state left at least 90 people dead and destroyed more than 3,000 homes. About 75,000 have been living in refugee camps ever since.

A resident of another township, Ramree, said there also was violence there Friday morning.

"There were some clashes between the two sides in Ramree this morning," Kyaw Win, 30, said by phone.

"Residents are very fearful of imminent attacks by the Muslim community because security presence is very little. We don't feel safe. We want the Bengalis to be moved away from the Rakhine community," Kyaw Win said.

Rakhine prefer to use the term Bengali for Rohingya, whom they contend are not a distinct ethnic group.

Kyaw Win said that a few houses had been burned down but that no casualties were reported.

The mob violence has seen entire villages torched and has drawn calls worldwide for government intervention.

"As the international community is closely watching Myanmar's democratic transition, such unrest could tarnish the image of the country," said a statement from the office of President Thein Sein published Friday in the state-run Myanma Ahlin newspaper.

Thein Sein took office as an elected president last year, and has instituted economic and political liberalisation after almost half a century of repressive military rule.

"The army, police and authorities in cooperation with local people will try to restore peace and stability and will take legal action against any individual or organization that is trying to instigate the unrest," the statement warned.

The long-brewing conflict is rooted in a dispute over the Muslim residents' origin. Although many Rohingya have lived in Myanmar for generations, they are widely denigrated as intruders who came from neighboring Bangladesh to steal scarce land.

The UN estimates their population in Myanmar at 800,000. But the government does not count them as one of the country's 135 ethnic groups, and so — like neighboring Bangladesh — denies them citizenship. Human rights groups say racism also plays a role: Many Rohingya, who speak a Bengali dialect and resemble Muslim Bangladeshis, have darker skin and are heavily discriminated against.

A statement issued late Thursday by the office of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon described the latest violence as "deeply troubling." Ban called on Myanmar authorities "to take urgent and effective action to bring under control all cases of lawlessness."

"The vigilante attacks, targeted threats and extremist rhetoric must be stopped," Ban said. "If this is not done, the fabric of social order could be irreparably damaged and the reform and opening up process being currently pursued by the government is likely to be jeopardised."

In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the US was deeply concerned about the reports and urged restraint.

In a hospital in Sittwe, the state capital not yet hit by the latest round of violence, an Associated Press photographer talked to four wounded people brought in from the affected areas. Aung Moe Khaing, 25, was wounded in an arm and a leg, saying he was shot Tuesday when soldiers dispersed the crowd.

Phyu Thein Maung, 39, from Yathetaung township, said he was shot in the buttocks.

"Muslims provoked us from inside their village and challenged us from their community, guarded by soldiers," he said. "People were very angry as they shot iron spikes at us with catapults and made abusive gestures. I was hit by a gunshot when soldiers dispersed the crowd."

There have been concerns in the past that soldiers were failing to protect the Rohingya community, but accounts this time from Rakhine villagers suggest that Myanmar's military may have been defending the Rohingya.

The crisis has proven a major challenge to Thein Sein's government and to opposition leader and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been criticized by some outsiders as failing to speak out strongly against what they see as repression of the Rohingya.

The UN warned Thursday that the crisis had sent a new wave of refugees to seek shelter in camps already overcrowded with 75,000 people from the June violence.

Bangladesh has put its border guards on alert, fearing a new influx of Rohingya refugees.

On Thursday, Bangladesh border guards turned away 45 Rohingya trying to enter into Bangladesh by boats, said Lt Col Khalequzzaman, a border commander. Local police chief Selim Mohammad Jahangir said Friday that at least another 3,000 Rohingya Muslims had been spotted on about 40 boats on the Naaf River off Bangladesh's Tekhnaf coast.

He said the boats may try to enter Bangladesh, but "we have instructions not to let them come here."

Bangladesh says it's too poor to accept more refugees and feed them. Bangladesh is hosting about 30,000 Rohingya who fled Myanmar to escape government atrocities in 1991.

 

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Fun with everything is not good when it is a matter of life and death to many. No wonder this is only possible with the Indians.

For information the Muslim those who were targeted, burned and killed were not even rohingya as the article stated. This is a full scale anti muslim activity to drive the Muslim out from this important industrial city and from where china will build the pipeline to carry gas.

Rohingyas are officially stateless. Buddhist-majority Myanmar's government regards the estimated 800,000 Rohingyas in the country as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, and not as one of the country's 135 official ethnic groups, and denies them citizenship.

But many of those expelled from Kyaukpyu are not Rohingya but Muslims from the officially recognized Kaman minority, said Chris Lewa, director of the Rohingya advocacy group, Arakan Project. "It's not just anti-Rohingya violence anymore, it's anti-Muslim," she said.

 

[Luka]

what you say about Massacre in Baluchistan towards Bloch ethnicity


http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/215621-q-baloch-groups-unite-against-pakistan-3.html

 

[peep]

Why are the muslims killing the minorities in Burma ?

 

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

what you say about Massacre in Baluchistan towards Bloch ethnicity


http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/215621-q-baloch-groups-unite-against-pakistan-3.html

Dalit Bombay dude go and talk about it in the respective thread. No one supports targeting innocent balochi people. But the balochis those who are creating problem with the help of India and other countries are only targeted.


There is no comparison with balochistan to what happen in India and what is happening in Myanmar where they are conducting religious hate filled crime towards the minorities.

Go talk about it on that thread and prepare to get another ban.

 

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

Why are the muslims killing the minorities in Burma ?

Muslims arenot killing the minorities in burmar but apartheid Burmese authorities are killing the minority muslims.

DEATH TOLL "UNDERESTIMATED"

The death toll could be far higher, said Human Rights Watch, citing "allegations from witnesses fleeing scenes of carnage and the government's well-documented history of underestimating figures that might lead to criticism of the state."

The clashes come just five months after communal unrest killed more than 80 people and displaced at least 75,000 in the same region.

A boat carrying 120 Muslims from Kyaukpyu was intercepted by Rakhines, who killed the men and raped the women, the advocacy group Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK said in a statement. This claim could not be verified.

Human right watch said today they have got satellite images which is showing 35 acre of land has been burnt to ashes where Muslims used to live.

 

[peep]

But why are the muslims being killed all of a sudden ?

 

[Sashan]

But why are the muslims being killed all of a sudden ?

Not suddenly - they were being persecuted for the past 250 years in that region. We can't isolate the one off incidents but have to look at the issue in totality.