Opinion by The Nation
The Rohingya are suffering genocide, and the regional
bloc must tackle this root cause of the crisis
Asean must address the root cause of the Rakhine crisis
before a move to repatriate thousands of refugees to the strife-torn state in
Myanmar gets underway.
Last week, Malaysian Foreign Minister Saifuddin Abdullah
said colleagues from Singapore and Thailand would travel to Myanmar to thrash
out a deal for the safe repatriation of the more than 700,000 Rohingya refugees
in Bangladesh.
Malaysia and Thailand share a concern that unless a
sustainable solution for the crisis in Rakhine is found, Rohingya refugees will
continue to pour into the two Asean countries.
More than 700,000 Rohingya have fled violence in their
home state since August last year, when a militia’s attack on Myanmar security
outposts triggered a “clearance operation” by the Myanmar military to eradicate
the Muslim Rohingya from the predominantly Buddhist country.
The fleeing Rohingya joined hundreds of thousands who had
sought refuge from violence in previous years, taking the number in Bangladesh
camps to more than one million. Displaced into miserable temporary shelters in
camps rife with disease, they are now desperately seeking better lives either
in their homeland or elsewhere.
Resettlement abroad won’t be easy but returning home to
the threat of violence is more daunting still.
News of the Rohingyas’ plight gets bleaker by the month.
United Nations investigators last week presented a report
to the Security Council that detailed an “ongoing genocide” against the Muslim
minority in Rakhine.
There has been some scepticism over whether the Rohingya
are being targeted by genocide, but any doubts are dispelled by several
detailed reports by the UN and human rights defenders. The UN investigators
called for those responsible to face international justice.
The genocide in Rakhine state is marked not only by
massacre of civilians but also by ostracisation of the Rohingya population,
preventing them from having children, and interring them in camps, according to
Marzuki Darusman, chairman of the UN Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar.
Its 444-page report, first made public last month, called
on the council to refer the issue to the International Criminal Court in The
Hague, or to create an ad hoc tribunal.
Leaders of Asean, of which Myanmar is a member, know very
well that many in the country – including the elite – harbour negative
attitudes toward the Muslim minority in Rakhine. Calling them Bengali, the
country denies them citizenship.
Asean has however turned a blind eye to the deep root of
Rakhine genocide, pretending the issue is merely a humanitarian crisis and
trying to force the Rohingya back into danger.
While the regional bloc has made several attempts over
the past year to mediate the repatriation of Rohingya, the government in Nay
Pyi Taw has been reluctant to welcome them back.
The negotiating task now falls to Singapore, as the
current chair of the Asean, before Thailand takes the rotating chairmanship
next year.
The attitude of the powers-that-be in Thailand towards
the Rohingya issue is no better than that of their counterparts in Myanmar. Deputy
Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan said last year that the Thais should call the Muslim
minority “Bengali”, to show solidarity with Nay Pyi Taw.
It is not difficult to imagine how the Thai government
will approach the issue when it chairs Asean next year.
Some Rohingya refugees might indeed return to Rakhine,
either voluntarily or by force. But that will not be the end of the story.