By THE IRRAWADDY
Myanmar government officials use “Bengali” to
refer to Rohingya, whom they do not consider an ethnic group but illegal
immigrants from Bangladesh.
Myanmar’s religious affairs and culture
minister said on Tuesday that his recent remarks branding an unspecified faith
an “extreme religion” did not refer to all Muslims but only to “Bengalis.”
At a funeral ceremony for a prominent
Buddhist monk last month, Minister U Aung Ko said “the followers of an extreme
religion take three or four wives and have families with 15 or 20 children,”
posing a risk to Myanmar’s monogamous Buddhists.
Although the minister did not name the
religion he was referring to, an Islamic organization based in Yangon, the
Society of Enlightening Quranic Knowledge, took offense and issued a statement
rebuking U Aung Ko for calling any religion “extreme.”
Myanmar religion minister says Rohingya 'brainwashed' to
'march' on the country: https://lnkd.in/g-z6eBE
Read also: Myanmar's Islamophobic Minister
of Religious Affairs, Thura Aung Ko's Remarks in English: https://lnkd.in/g3FU7eE
On Friday, the Ministry of Religious Affairs
and Culture released a public announcement claiming that U Aung Ko was not
targeting any one religion but “‘religious extremists’ from every faith in the
country” and asked the public for a tolerant interpretation of the minister’s
remarks.
When asked about his remarks by reporters on
Tuesday, U Aung Ko said he did not mean to offend the Muslim community in
Myanmar.
“In fact I mean to say Bengali as another
religion,” he said, claiming that “Bengali” youth in refugee camps in Bangladesh
were being pressured to go to Myanmar.
“With an exploding population, their ambition
is to march to Rakhine [State] and Myanmar. That’s what I want to say,” the
minister said.
More than 700,000 Rohingya have fled Rakhine
for Bangladesh since August 2017, when coordinated attacks on security posts by
the militant Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army triggered a military crackdown. The
UN and others have accused Myanmar’s military of ethnic cleansing by unleashing
a campaign of arson, rape and murder against the Rohingya. The military says it
was carrying out legitimate operations against a terrorist organization.
Most of the refugees now live in sprawling
camps in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar District.
More than 1 million Rohingya were estimated
to be living in northern Rakhine before the military crackdown and constituted
nearly 90 percent of the local population.