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In this Dec. 2, 2016, photo,
Rohingya from Burma
move through an alley at an unregistered refugee
camp in
Teknaf, a southern coastal district
183 miles south of Dhaka, Bangladesh. (AP)
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Burma’s Rohingya Muslims mourn the end of the Obama era —
and worry about Trump
Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims have
been described as the most friendless people in the world. But for the past
four years they had one powerful friend — and he lived in the White House.
President Obama, who gave a
teary farewell to the nation on Tuesday in Chicago, spoke up often for the
persecuted Muslim minority. His vocal support followed Hillary Clinton’s
historic visit to the Southeast Asian country in 2011, the first by a secretary
of state in 50 years, and his own trip a year later, the first by a sitting
U.S. president.
The government in this
Buddhist-majority nation does not recognize the very term “Rohingya,” and it
sees them as newcomers from Bangladesh rather than natives.
But during that first
appearance in 2012, Obama used the word “Rohingya”
while delivering a speech at Rangoon University, saying members of the minority
group “hold
within themselves the same dignity as you do, and I do.” http://reut.rs/XUfFRR
He used
the word again during a visit in 2014, and in 2015 he hosted prominent Rohingya activist Wai Wai Nu
at the White House for dinner. Many believe he helped raised the international
profile of the Rohingya cause.
Europe-based activist Nay San
Lwin, who communicates with a network of activists on the ground in Burma,
wrote in an email that “Obama's speeches are historic for Rohingya. He
highlighted about the dignity of our people while the Burmese do not consider
us human beings.”
Since 2012, more than 120,000
Rohingya Muslims have lived in camps for internally displaced people in the
state of Rakhine after religiously motivated violence there killed hundreds of
people.
The community's plight got
worse after a group of Rohingya militants attacked police outposts in the north
of the state last year, killing nine people and setting off a military
crackdown that Amnesty International said could amount to crimes against
humanity. The government has denied allegations its soldiers committed rape and
arson, but there is mounting evidence to the
contrary.
[Rohingyas are fleeing a scorched-earth
campaign in Burma. Bangladesh is sending them back.]
With Obama departing, the
Rohingya fear losing an influential ally in Washington, and are concerned by
President-elect Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim remarks. Hard-liners in Burma celebrated Trump's election victory, and the
country seems to be a blank spot on the president-elect's agenda.
Unlike other countries in the
neighborhood, such as Indonesia, Malaysia and India, Trump appears to have few
strong ties or business interests in Burma. He has also not taken much of a public
stance on the country's concerns.
Andrew Selth, a Burma expert
who teaches at Griffith University in Australia and Australian National
University, wrote in a recent column that
one of Trump’s only nods to the country was a tweet expressing his “thoughts
and prayers” to victims of an earthquake in Burma back in August. http://s.nikkei.com/2hvcMYf
“That gesture aside, he has
shown no interest in the country, nor demonstrated any knowledge of its complex
problems,” Selth wrote.
He added there could be
“greater distance between the White House and the Rohingya cause” if links
between the attacks against police in October and outside extremist support are
better established.
Optimists point to the fact
that there has been bipartisan support for Burma as it emerges from five
decades of military rule. But support for the new government of Aung San Suu
Kyi, the democratic activist-turned-politician who led her party of dissidents
to election victory in 2015, and support for the Rohingya, who feel abandoned
by her, is far from the same thing.
Obama illustrated this tension
himself when he lifted the remaining U.S. sanctions on Burma last year to
bolster Suu Kyi's new government, which officially came to power in April 2016.
The move dismayed activists who saw sanctions as crucial leverage against the
military's actions in places like Rakhine and other conflict zones.
Nay San Lwin said that even
though activists in Rakhine “all think Trump won't speak for Rohingya like
Obama,” he will wait and see.
In any case, he added, the
Rohingya need more than words now.
Read more:
Another crisis
for one of the most persecuted peoples in the world:
The battle over
the word 'Rohingya': http://wpo.st/Yz4R2
Source: http://wpo.st/ey4R2