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Many Rohingya people wait for crossing the border to
Bangladesh near
Gaw Du Thar Ya village in Maungdaw, Northern Rakhine State of
Myanmar.-AFP Photo
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Brutal attacks on
Rohingyas in Rakhine have been well-organised, coordinated and systematic, with
the intent of not only driving out the population but preventing them from
returning to their homes, the United Nations said in a report on Wednesday.
The human rights
violation was committed by Myanmar security forces in concert with armed
Buddhist individuals in Rakhine, it added.
The report, which is
based on interviews with Rohingyas who have recently fled to Bangladesh,
details a campaign by Myanmar’s military to terrorize the Rohingya through
atrocities that range from indiscriminate killings to rape.
The UN Human Rights
Office made the report after conducting some 65 interviews with individuals and
groups in Cox’s Bazar.
It highlights a
strategy to “instill deep and widespread fear and trauma – physical, emotional
and psychological” among the Rohingya population.
Over half a million
of Rohingya people have fled to Bangladesh since Myanmar security forces
launched an operation on 25 August in response to alleged militant
attacks.
The report states
the “clearance operations” started before 25 August.
The UN Human Rights
Office is deeply concerned over safety of hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas
who remain in northern Rakhine State amid reports the violence is still
ongoing.
The UN office calls
on the authorities to immediately allow humanitarian and human rights actors
unfettered access to the stricken areas.
The report cites
testimony from witnesses that security forces scorched dwellings and entire
villages were responsible for extrajudicial and summary executions, rape and
other forms of sexual violence, torture and attacks on places of worship.
Eyewitnesses
reported numerous killings saying some victims were deliberately targeted and
others were killed through explosions, fire and stray bullets. A 12-year-old
girl from Rathedaung township described how “they [Myanmar security forces and
Rakhine Buddhist individuals] surrounded our house and started to shoot.
It was a situation
of panic – they shot my sister in front of me, she was only seven years’ old.
She cried and told me to run. I tried to protect her and cared for her, but we
had no medical assistance on the hillside and she was bleeding so much that
after one day she died. I buried her.”
The report states
that in some cases, before and during the attacks, megaphones were used to
announce: “You do not belong here – go to Bangladesh. If you do not leave, we
will torch your houses and kill you.”
Credible information
indicates that the Myanmar security forces purposely destroyed the property of
Rohingyas, targeting their houses, fields, food-stocks, crops, livestock and
even trees, to render the possibility of the Rohingya returning to normal lives
and livelihoods in the future in northern Rakhine almost impossible.
UN Human Rights
chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, who has described the Government operations in
northern Rakhine State as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing,” has urged
the government to immediately end its “cruel” security operation.
By denying the
Rohingya population their political, civil, economic and cultural rights,
including the right to citizenship, he said, the Government’s actions appear to
be “a cynical ploy to forcibly transfer large numbers of people without possibility
of return.”
The report indicates
that efforts were taken to effectively erase signs of memorable landmarks in
the geography of the Rohingya landscape and memory in such a way that a return
to their lands would yield nothing but a desolate and unrecognizable terrain.
The information
received also indicates that the Myanmar security forces targeted teachers,
cultural and religious leadership, and other people of influence of the
Rohingya community to diminish Rohingya history, culture and knowledge.
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