By @mir_sidiquee
Last years, in Singapore, at the 33rd summit of the
Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), the issue of Myanmar’s
Rakhine/Rohingya crisis was at the top of the agendas. The chairman’s closing
statement expressed the group’s readiness to support Myanmar in repatriating
refugees by conducting a needs-assessment overview in Rakhine State.
More than a million Rohingya Muslims had fled for ethnic
persecution - UN said ethnic cleansing and Rights Groups, some world powers,
common wealth countries and Rohingya Activists proved Genocide, Myanmar has blatantly
denied all - committed by the Myanmar Military and jointly with local Buddhists
(armed by the government).
A year later, as the 35th Asean biannual summit ended in
Thailand last week, only two paragraphs (very little) in the 17-pages
chairman’s statement — a summary
of the conference’s consensus — were devoted to the Rohingya crisis. While much
in those paragraphs repeated the language of the year before, the 2019 concluding
statement showed that ASEAN was heeding the urgent need to garner more
consistent political attention to the Rakhine problem.
In the last year, not a single Rohingya Refugee has
agreed voluntarily to join the official repatriation process while Myanmar has
claimed “everything prepared for returnees” but instead of rebuilding, bulldozing
the Rohingya villages, nothing developed infrastructure in Rakhine State rather
than more confiscation of Rohingya’s land for resettlement of Buddhist
community and barracks of security forces. Myanmar government has built some
concentration camps by demolishing Rohingya villages.
Bangladesh, which hosts more than a million Rohingya
refugees, has become increasingly frustrated at what it perceives to be a lack
of progress by Myanmar in creating conducive conditions for return, and Myanmar
has accused Bangladesh of delaying the repatriation process. Thus, instead of
confidence-building, over the last year more trust has been lost between
Myanmar and Bangladesh as well as between Myanmar and Rohingya refugees in the
camps in Cox’s Bazar.
ASEAN team must build mutual trust between Rohingya
Refugees and Myanmar as it has been broken for repeated manipulation.
The ASEAN has recognized the need to find comprehensive
and durable solutions to the crisis and to create conducive conditions for Rohingya
refugees to return and to rebuild the lives of returnees. The Myanmar (Burma)
was encouraged to carry out the recommendations of the Rakhine advisory
commission led by the late Kofi Annan.
Read: PDF: https://lnkd.in/gVUp6gB
Most significantly, ASEAN’s 10-member countries
unanimously supported the formation of an ad hoc support team to carry
out the recommendations of preliminary needs. That includes continued
communication and consultation with affected communities, such as the Rohingya
refugees in Bangladesh. However “the Rohingyas are willing to go back in early
date with their demands, guarantee for “Rights and dignity” unless they can
deny accepting any proposals of any one as they are the victims of the genocide
committed by Myanmar” activists said.
These statements are timely and welcome but ultimately it
will take renewed political and moral commitments from all ASEAN members to
ensure that the commitments are followed through in line with international
norms and standards, to support the restoration of stability, rule of law,
social cohesion and inclusive development for all the people of Rakhine State.
That goal must include the Rohingya, who wants so much to return home with
guarantees of basic human rights and dignity.
Read: https://t.co/nFk0uobuPR
@twitter: https://t.co/gzRyrf0u2g
Moreover the Myanmar government has never tried to solve
the Rohingya issue, even trying to end Rhingyas by using ill plans to drive out
remnants inside Rakhine state, about 1.5 lakhs of Rohingyas are still in
ghettos in dire situation. Myanmar government has done nothing to guarantee the
security and elementary rights of the Rohingya to persuade the Rohingyas to
return.
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| IDP Camps - Ghettos (Sittwe) |
If there are lessons to be learned for ASEAN is that
rushing into repatriation without building a foundation of trust is not
possible. ASEAN and Myanmar have done some things right in their engagement on
this complex crisis. Most significantly, in late July 2019, Myanmar sent a
delegation from its foreign ministry to hold a dialogue with Bangladesh
government officials and met with Rohingya refugees in the camps of Cox’s
Bazar.
Read: https://t.co/whTPHLrg1a
@twitter: https://t.co/cjTD715UJ1
While no agreement was reached between the Myanmar
delegation and the refugee representatives, the dialogue showed good will on
both sides to engage in much-needed discussions about the repatriation process
that Myanmar was offering and refugees articulated their concerns and
conditions for returning voluntarily. The Myanmar delegation promised to
communicate the requests of the refugees to their government but unfortunately
the dialogue has so far not been followed up. Instead, Myanmar decided to push
ahead with yet another attempt at repatriation on Aug. 22, which came as a
surprise to ASEAN and the refugees, none of whom agreed to return. The failed
attempt left Rohingya refugees feeling betrayed again and further strained
relations between Bangladesh and Myanmar.
Myanmar has blamed on Bangladesh as usual but the reality
was “humanity,” Bangladesh has promised not to force the Rohingya refugees for
repatriation. Myanmar has used many sources, invested into ill plans by
creating enmity between locals and refugees in Bangladesh, broken the lovely
relation between them - to force the Rohingya refugees for repatriation as
happened twice (1978 & 1992).
On the part of the refugees, the vast majority want to
return to Rakhine State and have even begun their own “Going Home Campaign”.
Their demands are clear: security, citizenship and access to education, among
other public services. They have also consistently asked for ASEAN to mediate
in a dialogue between the Myanmar government and Rohingya refugee
representatives. Myanmar will certainly need time to address fundamental issues
in Rakhine State. ASEAN team must offer – may not agree Myanmar - to facilitate
a process of “Going Home Talks” between Myanmar and Rohingya refugees in
Bangladesh.
ASEAN leaders must realize that the group’s credibility
is at stake in how it handles the Rohingya crisis and that for all the efforts
over the last year, the situation remains at an impasse while solutions will
not be found overnight, the process of trust-building between each other –
Rohingya and Myanmar - cannot wait. The way ahead is only “dialogue”,
can create good relationship and mutual-trust.