Tag Archives: Rohingya

Rohingya insurgents open to peace but Myanmar ceasefire ending

A Myanmar soldier stands near Maungdaw, north of Rakhine state, Myanmar September 27, 2017. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun

By Robert Birsel

YANGON (Reuters) – Muslim Rohingya insurgents said on Saturday they are ready to respond to any peace move by the Myanmar government but a one-month ceasefire they declared to enable the delivery of aid in violence-racked Rakhine State is about to end.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) did not say what action it would take after the ceasefire ends at midnight on Monday but it was “determined to stop the tyranny and oppression” waged against the Rohingya people.

“If at any stage, the Burmese government is inclined to peace, then ARSA will welcome that inclination and reciprocate,” the group said in a statement.

Government spokesmen were not immediately available for comment.

When the ARSA announced its one-month ceasefire from Sept. 10, a government spokesman said: “We have no policy to negotiate with terrorists.”

The rebels launched coordinated attacks on about 30 security posts and an army camp on Aug. 25 with the help of hundreds of disaffected Rohingya villagers, many wielding sticks or machetes, killing about a dozen people.

In response, the military unleashed a sweeping offensive across the north of Rakhine State, driving more than half a million Rohingya villagers into Bangladesh in what the United Nations branded a textbook example of “ethnic cleansing”.

Myanmar rejects that. It says more than 500 people have been killed in the fighting, most of them “terrorists” who have been attacking civilians and torching villages.

The ability of the ARSA, which only surfaced in October last year, to mount any sort of challenge to the Myanmar army is not known but it does not appear to have been able to put up resistance to the military offensive unleashed in August.

Inevitably, there are doubts about how the insurgents can operate in areas where the military has driven out the civilian population, cutting the insurgents off from recruits, food, funds and information.

The ARSA accused the government of using murder, arson and rape as “tools of depopulation”.

‘NATIVE’

The ARSA denies links to foreign Islamists.

In an interview with Reuters in March, ARSA leader Ata Ullah linked the creation of the group to communal violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine in 2012, when nearly 200 people were killed and 140,000, mostly Rohingya, displaced.

The group says it is fighting for the rights of the Rohingya, who have never been regarded as an indigenous minority in Myanmar and so have been denied citizenship under a law that links nationality to ethnicity.

The group repeated their demand that Rohingya be recognized as a “native indigenous” ethnic group, adding that all Rohingya people should be allowed “to return home safely with dignity … to freely determine their political status and pursue their economic, social and cultural development”.

The Rohingya have long faced discrimination and repression in Rakhine State where bad blood between them and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists, stemming from violence by both sides, goes back generations.

The ARSA condemned the government for blocking humanitarian assistance in Rakhine and said it was willing to discuss ceasefires with international organizations so aid could be delivered.

Some 515,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh but thousands remain in Rakhine.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has faced scathing criticism for not doing more to stop the violence, although a military-drafted constitution gives her no power over the security forces.

Suu Kyi has condemned rights abuses and said Myanmar was ready to start a process agreed with Bangladesh in 1993 by which anyone verified as a refugee would be accepted back.

Many refugees fear they will not have the paperwork they believe Myanmar will demand to allow them back.

(Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Stephen Coates)

More than 60 Rohingya feared drowned as U.S. steps up pressure on Myanmar

More than 60 Rohingya feared drowned as U.S. steps up pressure on Myanmar

By Tommy Wilkes and Michelle Nichols

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh/UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – More than 60 Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar are believed to have drowned when their boat capsized, the latest victims in what the United Nations says is the world’s fastest-developing refugee emergency.

The refugees drowned in heavy seas off Bangladesh late on Thursday, part of a new surge of people fleeing a Myanmar military campaign that began on Aug. 25 and has triggered an exodus of some 502,000 people.

International anger over the crisis is growing.

In New York, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley called on countries to suspend providing weapons to Myanmar over the violence.

It was the first time the United States had called for punishment of Myanmar’s military, but she stopped short of threatening to reimpose U.S. sanctions which were suspended under the Obama administration.

Buddhist-majority Myanmar rejects accusations of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and has denounced rights abuses.

Its military launched a big offensive in response to coordinated attacks on the security forces by Rohingya insurgents in the north of Rakhine state on Aug. 25.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council the violence had spiraled into the “world’s fastest-developing refugee emergency, a humanitarian and human rights nightmare”.

Colonel Anisul Haque, head of the Bangladeshi border guards in the town of Teknaf, told Reuters more refugees had arrived over the past day or two after the number had seemed to be tailing off, with about 1,000 landing at the main entry point on the coast on Thursday.

The refugee boat capsized in driving rain and high seas as darkness fell.

An official with the International Organization for Migration said 23 people were confirmed dead and 40 were missing. Seventeen survived.

“We’re now saying 40 missing, which suggests the total fatality rate will be in the range of 63,” the official, Joe Millman, told a news briefing in Geneva.

One survivor, Abdul Kalam, 55, said his wife, two daughters and a grandson were among the dead, who were buried at tearful funerals on Friday.

Kalam said armed Buddhists came to his village about a week ago and took livestock and food. He said villagers were summoned to a military office and told there were no such people as Rohingya in Myanmar.

After that he decided to leave and headed to the coast with his family, avoiding military camps on the way.

A spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency said a fifth of new arrivals were suffering from acute malnutrition.

The Bangladeshi Red Crescent said its clinics were treating increasing numbers of people with acute diarrhea. The World Health Organization has said one of the diseases it is particularly worried about is cholera.

“We’re seeing the absolute perfect breeding ground for a major health crisis,” said Unni Krishnan, director of Save the Children’s Emergency Health Unit.

‘BRUTAL CAMPAIGN’

In a ramping up of the pressure on Myanmar, also known as Burma, Haley echoed U.N. accusations that the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people in Rakhine state was ethnic cleansing.

“We cannot be afraid to call the actions of the Burmese authorities what they appear to be – a brutal, sustained campaign to cleanse the country of an ethnic minority,” Haley told the U.N. Security Council.

The United States said earlier the army response to the insurgent attacks was “disproportionate” and the crisis raised questions about Myanmar’s transition, under the leadership of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, after decades of military rule.

Suu Kyi has no power over the generals under a military-drafted constitution. She has nevertheless drawn scathing criticism from around the world for not stopping the violence.

The public in Myanmar, where Buddhist nationalism has surged over recent years, largely supports the offensive against the insurgents.

Haley said the military must respect rights and fundamental freedoms, and those who had been accused of abuses should be removed from command and prosecuted.

“And any country that is currently providing weapons to the Burmese military should suspend these activities until sufficient accountability measures are in place,” she said.

There was no ethnic cleansing or genocide in Myanmar, its national security adviser, Thaung Tun, said at the United Nations, adding that Myanmar had invited Guterres to visit.

China and Russia, which have veto powers in the Security Council, expressed support for Myanmar.

The U.N. Human Rights Council extended the mandate of a Myanmar fact-finding mission by six months, until September 2018, over the objections of Myanmar, China and the Philippines.

Myanmar’s representative said the mission was “not helpful, was not in line with the situation on the ground and would do no good to finding a solution to Rakhine issues”.

Myanmar says it will not grant visas to mission investigators.

(Additional reporting by Serajul Quadir in DHAKA, Nurul Islam, Rahul Bhatia in COX’S BAZAR, Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay and Tom Miles in GENEVA; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Nick Macfie)

Aid groups call for access to Myanmar conflict zone

Women carry children through the water as hundreds of Rohingya refugees arrive under the cover of darkness by wooden boats from Myanmar to the shore of Shah Porir Dwip, in Teknaf, near Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh, September 27, 2017. Picture taken September 27, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

By Simon Lewis

YANGON (Reuters) – International aid groups in Myanmar have urged the government to allow free access to Rakhine State, where an army offensive has sent 480,000 people fleeing to Bangladesh but hundreds of thousands remain cut off from food, shelter and medical care.

The latest army campaign in the western state was launched in response to attacks by Rohingya Muslim insurgents on security posts near the Bangladesh border on Aug. 25.

The government has stopped international non-government groups (INGOs), as well as U.N. agencies, from working in the north of the state, citing insecurity.

“INGOs in Myanmar are increasingly concerned about severe restrictions on humanitarian access and impediments to the delivery of critically needed humanitarian assistance throughout Rakhine State,” aid groups said in a statement late on Wednesday.

An unknown number of people are internally displaced, while hundreds of thousands lack food, shelter and medical services, said the groups, which include Care International, Oxfam and Save the Children.

“We urge the government and authorities of Myanmar to ensure that all people in need in Rakhine Sate have full, free and unimpeded access to life-saving humanitarian assistance.”

The government has put the Myanmar Red Cross in charge of aid to the state, with the help of the International Committee of the Red Cross. But the groups said they feared insufficient aid was getting through given the “enormous” needs.

Relations between the government and aid agencies had been difficult for months, with some officials accusing groups of helping the insurgents.

Aid groups dismissed the accusations, which they said had inflamed anger towards them among Buddhists in the communally divided state.

The groups said threats, allegations and misinformation had led to “genuine fears” among aid workers, and they called for an end to “misinformation and unfounded accusations” and for the government to ensure safety.

‘UNACCEPTABLE TRAGEDY’

The United Nations has accused the army of ethnic cleansing to push Rohingya Muslims out of Myanmar, and rights groups have said the army has committed crimes against humanity and called for sanctions, in particular an arms embargo.

The United States said the army response to the insurgent attacks was “disproportionate” and the crisis raised questions about Myanmar’s transition to democracy after decades of military rule.

British Minister of State for Asia and the Pacific Mark Field described the situation as “an unacceptable tragedy” after visiting Myanmar and meeting leaders including Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

“Burma has taken great strides forward in recent years. But the ongoing violence and humanitarian crisis in Rakhine risks derailing that,” Field said in a statement.

Britain, like other members of the international community, called for the violence to stop and humanitarian access to the area and for refugees to be allowed to return safely.

Suu Kyi has faced scathing criticism and calls for her Nobel prize to be withdrawn. She denounced rights abuses in an address last week and expressed concern about the suffering.

She also said any refugees verified as coming from Myanmar would be allowed to return.

‘NO JUSTICE’

Myanmar is getting ready to “verify” refugees who want to return, the government minister charged with putting into effect recommendations to solve problems in Rakhine said.

Myanmar would conduct a “national verification process” at two points on its border with Bangladesh under terms agreed during a repatriation effort in 1993, state media quoted Win Myat Aye, the minister for social welfare, relief and resettlement, as saying.

“After the verification process, the refugees will be settled in Dargyizar village,” the minister said, referring to a Rohingya village that was razed after Aug. 25, according to satellite imagery.

It is unclear how many refugees would be willing to return.

Previous government efforts to verify the status of Muslims in Rakhine were broadly rejected as under the process, Muslims would not be recognized as Rohingya, an ethnic identity they prefer but which Myanmar does not recognize.

Most Rohingya are stateless and regarded as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

“As we’re Muslim, the government hates us. They don’t want our Rohingya community,” said refugee Zafar Alam, 55, sheltering from the rain under an umbrella near the Balukhali settlement in Bangladesh.

“I don’t think I’d be safe there. There’s no justice.”

The government would take control of fire-gutted land, Win Myat Aye said this week. Rights groups say about half of more than 400 Rohingya villages were torched.

Officials have announced plans for resettlement camps for the displaced, while U.N. officials and diplomats are urging the government to let people rebuild homes.

(Additonal reporting by Tommy Wilkes in COX’S BAZAR; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Michael Perry)

Hindus fleeing Myanmar violence hope for shelter in Modi’s India

FILE PHOTO: A Hindu family is seen at a shelter near Maungdaw, Rakhine state, Myanmar September 12, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo

By Krishna N. Das and Rupam Jain

KUTUPALONG, Bangladesh/NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Caught in the crossfire between Myanmar’s military and Rohingya insurgents, hundreds of Hindus who have fled to Bangladesh are placing their hopes on the Hindu nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in neighboring India.

Nearly 500 are sheltered in a cleared-out chicken farm in a Hindu hamlet in Bangladesh’s southeast, a couple of miles from where most of the 421,000 Rohingya Muslims who have also fled violence in Myanmar since Aug. 25 are living in makeshift camps.

The Hindu refugees say they are scared of going back to their villages in Buddhist-majority Myanmar’s restive Rakhine state, but also wary of staying in mostly Muslim Bangladesh.

Modi’s government, meanwhile, is making it easier for Hindus, Buddhists, Christians and other minorities from Bangladesh and Pakistan to gain citizenship in India.

“India is also known as Hindustan, the land of the Hindus,” said Niranjan Rudra, sitting on a plastic sheet in the chicken farm flanked by his wife, who sported a large vermilion red dot on her forehead typical of married Hindu women.

“We just want a peaceful life in India, not much. We may not get that in Myanmar or here,” he said. Fellow refugees nodded in agreement, stating that they wanted the message to reach the Indian government through the media.

The Indian government declined to comment on the Hindu refugees’ hopes. A government source said it was waiting while the Supreme Court hears an appeal against the home ministry’s plans to deport around 40,000 Rohingya Muslims from the country.

But Achintya Biswas, a senior member of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), or the World Hindu Council, which has close ties with the ideological parent of Modi’s ruling party, said India was the natural destination for the Hindus fleeing Myanmar.

“Hindu families must be allowed to enter India by the government,” Biswas said by phone. “Where else will they go? This is their place of origin.”

Biswas said the VHP and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the umbrella group that mentors Modi’s ruling party, would submit a report to the home ministry on the refugees and demand a new policy allowing Hindus from Myanmar and Bangladesh to seek asylum in India.

The Hindu right who form the bedrock of Modi’s support have long believed India is the home for all Hindus.

India’s Home Ministry spokesman K.S. Dhatwalia declined to comment.

A senior home ministry official in New Delhi, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that no Hindu in Myanmar or Bangladesh affected by the violence had approached Indian authorities.

“At this juncture we have no SOS calls from Hindus,” said the official. “Also, the Supreme Court is yet to decide whether India should deport Rohingya Muslims or not. The matter is sub-judice and any policy decision will be taken only after the court’s order.”

“WANT TO FEEL SAFE”

Hindus make up a small but long-standing minority in both Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Refugee Rudra, a barber from Myanmar’s Thit Tone Nar Gwa Son village, showed Reuters what he said was a temporary citizenship card issued in 1978 by the authorities there. The card listed his race as “Indian” and religion as “Hindu”.

Rudra and other Hindu refugees said they had fled soon after Rohingya insurgents attacked 30 Myanmar police posts, triggering a fierce military counteroffensive.

Since then, rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say the army and Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes have mounted a campaign of arson aimed at driving out the Muslim population, leaving many villages in northern Rakhine empty.

“Our village in Myanmar was surrounded by hundreds of men in black masks on the morning of Aug. 25,” said Veena Sheel, a mother-of-two whose husband works in Malaysia.

“They called some men out and asked them to fight the security forces … a few hours after we heard gunshots.”

Sheel left the next day with eight other women and their families, walking for two days to reach Bangladesh.

“There are so many people all around us. No peace here, no peace back in Myanmar,” said Sheel. “We should be taken to Hindustan, that’s our land. Wherever we stay, we want to feel safe.”

Since taking office in 2014, Modi’s government has issued orders stating that no Hindu or member of another minority from Pakistan or Bangladesh would be considered an illegal immigrant even if they entered the country without valid documents on or before Dec. 31, 2014. (http://bit.ly/2f61Qxr)

It also plans to nearly halve to six years the period Hindus, Christians and other minorities from those countries need to have lived in India to be granted citizenship by naturalization.

“We are regularizing only those who have come due to religious persecution in Bangladesh and Pakistan,” junior home minister Kiren Rijiju told Reuters last month, adding that there was no policy on refugees from Myanmar.

It will not be easy for secular India to accept the Myanmar Hindu refugees’ demand while the government is pushing for the deportation of Rohingya Muslims.

Modi’s government has already been criticized by activists for not speaking out against Myanmar’s military offensive, and accused of vilifying the Rohingya in the country to seek legal clearance for their deportation.

(Reporting by Krishna N. Das and Rupam Jain; Editing by Alex Richardson)

Rohingya Muslims trapped after Myanmar violence told to stay put

Rohingya refugees sit inside their temporary shelter as it rains at a camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh September 19, 2017. REUTERS/Danish Siddiqui

By Wa Lone and Andrew R.C. Marshall

SITTWE, Myanmar (Reuters) – Thousands of Rohingya Muslims trapped by hostile Buddhists in northwestern Myanmar have enough food and will not be granted the safe passage they requested from two remote villages, a senior government official said on Tuesday.

The Rohingya villagers said they wanted to leave but needed government protection from ethnic Rakhine Buddhists who had threatened to kill them.

They also said they were running short of food since Aug. 25, when Rohingya militants launched deadly attacks in Rakhine state, provoking a fierce crackdown by the Myanmar military.

At least 420,000 Rohingya have since fled into neighboring Bangladesh to escape what a senior United Nations official has called a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing”.

Tin Maung Swe, secretary of the Rakhine state government, said requests from the two villages for safe passage had been denied, since they had enough rice and were protected by a nearby police outpost.

“Their reasons were not acceptable,” he said. “They must stay in their original place.”

Residents of Ah Nauk Pyin, one of the two Rohingya villages, said they hoped to move to the relative safety of a camp outside Sittwe, the nearby state capital.

About 90,000 Rohingya displaced by a previous bout of violence in 2012 are confined to camps in Rakhine in squalid conditions.

But such a move was “impossible,” said state secretary Tin Maung Swe, since it might anger Rakhine Buddhists and further inflame communal tensions.

In a nationally televised speech on Tuesday, Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi vowed to punish the perpetrators of human rights violations in Rakhine, but did not address U.N. accusations of ethnic cleansing by the military.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate said that many Muslims had not fled and urged foreign diplomats to study why certain areas of Rakhine state had “managed to keep the peace”.

“We can arrange for you to visit these areas and to ask them for yourself why they have not fled … even at a time when everything around them seems to be in a state or turmoil,” she said.

The Rohingya residents of Ah Nauk Pyin say they have no other choice but to stay, and their fraught relations with equally edgy Rakhine neighbors could snap at any moment.

About 2,700 people live in Ah Nauk Pyin, which sits half-hidden among fruit trees and coconut palms on a rain-swept peninsula.

Its residents said that Rakhine men have made threatening phone calls and recently congregated outside the village to shout, “Leave, or we will kill you all”.

On Tuesday morning, Rakhine villagers chased away two Rohingya men trying to tend to their fields, said Maung Maung, the leader of Ah Nauk Pyin.

The Rakhine deny harassing their Muslim neighbors, but want them to leave, fearing they might collaborate with militants from the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), which carried out the Aug. 25 attacks.

Khin Tun Aye, chief of Shwe Laung Tin, one of the nearby Rakhine villages, said they had chased away the two Rohingya men in case they were “planning to attack or blow up our village”.

“They shouldn’t come close during this time of conflict situation. People are living in constant fear,” he said.

The Office of the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Myanmar told Reuters it was “aware and concerned” about the situation and was discussing it with the Myanmar government.

State secretary Tin Maung Swe said Reuters could not visit the area for security reasons, but said the authorities were assessing needs of those living there.

“If they need food, we are ready to send it,” he said. “Don’t worry about it.”

(Reporting by Andrew R.C. Marshall; Editing by Alex Richardson)

U.N. seeks ‘massive’ help for Rohingya fleeing Myanmar ‘ethnic cleansing’

U.N. seeks 'massive' help for Rohingya fleeing Myanmar 'ethnic cleansing'

By Serajul Quadir and Wa Lone

DHAKA/YANGON (Reuters) – The United Nations appealed on Thursday for massive help for nearly 400,000 Muslims from Myanmar who have fled to Bangladesh, with concern growing that the number could keep rising, unless Myanmar ends what critics denounce as “ethnic cleansing”.

The Rohingya are fleeing from a Myanmar military offensive in the western state of Rakhine that was triggered by a series of guerrilla attacks on Aug. 25 on security posts and an army camp in which about a dozen people were killed.

The United Nations has called for a massive intensification of relief operations to help the refugees, and a much bigger response from the international community.

“We urge the international community to step up humanitarian support and come up with help,” Mohammed Abdiker, director of operations and emergencies for the International Organisation for Migration, told a news conference in the Bangladeshi capital. The need was “massive”, he added.

The violence in Rakhine and the exodus of refugees is the most pressing problem Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has faced since becoming national leader last year.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday urged Myanmar to end the violence, which he said was best described as ethnic cleansing.

The government of Buddhist-majority Myanmar rejects such accusations, saying it is targeting “terrorists”.

Numerous Rohingya villages in the north of Rakhine have been torched but authorities have denied that security forces or Buddhist civilians set the fires. They blame the insurgents, and say 30,000 non-Muslim villagers were also displaced.

Smoke was rising from at least five places on the Myanmar side of the border on Thursday, a Reuters reporter in Bangladesh said. It was not clear what was burning or who set the fires.

“Ethnic cleansing” is not recognized as an independent crime under international law, the U.N. Office on Genocide Prevention says, but it has been used in U.N. resolutions and acknowledged in judgments and indictments of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

A U.N. panel of experts defined it as “rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of given groups”.

The crisis has raised questions about Suu Kyi’s commitment to human rights, and could strain relations with Western backers supporting her leadership of Myanmar’s transition from decades of strict military rule and economic isolation.

Critics have called for her to be stripped of her Nobel prize for failing to do more to halt the strife, though national security remains firmly in the hands of the military.

Suu Kyi is due to address the nation on Tuesday.

‘INTERNAL AFFAIR’

China, which competes with the United States for influence in Myanmar, endorses the offensive against the insurgents and deemed it an “internal affair”, Myanmar state media said.

“The counterattacks of Myanmar security forces against extremist terrorists and the government’s undertakings to provide assistance to the people are strongly welcomed,” the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper quoted China’s ambassador, Hong Liang, as telling government officials.

But at the United Nations in New York, China set a different tone, joining a Security Council expression of concern about reports of violence and urging steps to end it.

The Security Council met on Wednesday to discuss the crisis and later “expressed concern about reports of excessive violence … and called for immediate steps to end the violence in Rakhine, de-escalate the situation, re-establish law and order, ensure the protection of civilians … and resolve the refugee problem”.

This week, the Trump administration called for protection of civilians.

Bangladesh says the refugees will have to go home and has called for safe zones in Myanmar. Myanmar says safe zones are unacceptable.

The IOM’s Abdiker declined to say how many refugees he thought might end up in Bangladesh.

“The number may rise to 600,000, 700,000, even one million if the situation in Myanmar does not improve,” he said.

The most important thing was that the refugees be able to go home safely, said George William Okoth-Obbo, assistant high commissioner for operations at the U.N. refugee agency.

“The international community has to support to ensure their return … peacefully and with safety,” he told the news conference.

On Wednesday, the Myanmar government said 45 places had been burned. It did not provide details, but a spokesman said out of 471 villages in the north of Rakhine, 176 had been deserted and at least some people had left 34 more.

The spokesman, Zaw Htay, said the people going to Bangladesh were either linked to the insurgents, or women and children fleeing conflict.

Government figures show 432 people have been killed, most of them insurgents, since Aug. 25.

There are also fears of a humanitarian crisis on the Myanmar side of the border. The government has accused some aid groups of helping the insurgents and has restricted access.

(Additonal reporting by Simon Lewis In COX’S BAZAR, Ruma Paul in DHAKA, Michelle Nichols in NEW YORK; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Nick Macfie and Clarence Fernandez)

‘Alarming’ surge in Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh: UNHCR

Rohingya refugees carry their child as they walk through water after crossing border by boat through the Naf River in Teknaf, Bangladesh, September 7, 2017. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

By Krishna N. Das

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) – An alarming and unprecedented influx of 270,000 Rohingya has sought refuge in Bangladesh over the past two weeks from violence in Myanmar, the U.N. refugee agency said on Friday, a dramatic jump in the total as new pockets of people are found.

A rights group said satellite images showed about 450 buildings had been burned down in a Myanmar border town largely inhabited by Rohingya, as part of what the refugees say is a concerted effort to expel members of the Muslim minority.

Vivian Tan, a spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said the estimated number of Rohingya who fled to Bangladesh since violence erupted on Aug. 25 had surged from 164,000 on Thursday because aid workers doing a survey had found big groups of uncounted people in border areas.

“This does not necessarily reflect fresh arrivals within the past 24 hours but that we have identified more people in different areas that we were not aware of,” she said, adding that the number was an estimate and there could be some double-counting.

But she added: “The numbers are so alarming – it really means that we have to step up our response and that the situation in Myanmar has to be addressed urgently.”

The surge in the number of refugees, many sick or wounded, has strained the resources of aid agencies and communities which are already helping hundreds of thousands displaced by previous waves of violence in Myanmar. Many have no shelter, and aid agencies are racing to provide clean water, sanitation and food.

Two days ago, UNHCR had said the worst-case scenario was 300,000 refugees.

“We need to prepare for many more to come, I am afraid,” said Shinni Kubo, the Bangladesh country manager for the agency. “We need huge financial resources. This is unprecedented. This is dramatic. It will continue for weeks and weeks.”

Rohingya have been fleeing their homes in Myanmar since at least 400 people were killed after insurgent attacks in Rakhine State two weeks ago were followed by an army counter-offensive.

Myanmar says its security forces are fighting a legitimate campaign against “terrorists” it blames for a string of attacks on police posts and for burning homes and civilian deaths.

It says about 30,000 non-Muslims have been displaced by the violence.

About 1.1 million Rohingya Muslims living in Myanmar have long complained of persecution and are seen by many in the Buddhist-majority country as illegal migrants from Bangladesh.

“While most Rohingya refugees arrive on foot, mostly walking through the jungle and mountains for several days, thousands are braving long and risky voyages across the rough seas of the Bay of Bengal,” the UNHCR said.

At least 300 boats arrived in Cox’s Bazar on Wednesday, the International Organisation for Migration said.

BURNED BUILDINGS

U.S.-based Human Rights Watch said satellite images taken last Saturday showed hundreds of burned buildings in Maungdaw, a district capital in Rakhine State, in areas primarily inhabited by Rohingya.

“The Burmese government has an obligation to protect everyone in the country, but if safety cannot even be found in area capitals, then no place may be safe,” said Phil Robertson, the deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch said in a statement.

Several thousand people held a protest in Dhaka, the Bangladesh capital, after Friday prayers against the crackdown on the Rohingya.

Similar protests were held in Indonesia and Malaysia, also Muslim-majority countries. Scores of people also staged protests outside the Myanmar embassies in Tokyo and Manila.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said he was considering raising the Rohingya issue when he holds talks with U.S. President Donald Trump next week.

Earlier, the head of Malaysia’s coastguard said it would not turn away Rohingya and was willing to provide them temporary shelter, although it is unlikely any refugees would travel hundreds of kilometers south by sea during the monsoon season.

Najib told reporters the Rohingya issue had to be resolved “at the source”.

“It is unfair for affected parties to inflict more cost to Malaysia to manage and to receive these people when they should be allowed fundamental and universal rights that have been denied to them,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Kanupriya Kapoor in Jakarta, Rozanna Latiff in Kuala Lumpur and Tom Miles in Geneva; Writing by Raju Gopalakrishnan; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Myanmar’s Suu Kyi under pressure as almost 125,000 Rohingya flee violence

Rohingya refugees walk on the muddy path after crossing the Bangladesh-Myanmar border in Teknaf, Bangladesh, September 3, 2017. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

By Simon Lewis and Krishna N. Das

SHAMLAPUR, Bangladesh/DHAKA (Reuters) – Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi came under more pressure on Tuesday from countries with Muslim populations to halt violence against Rohingya Muslims that has sent nearly 125,000 of them fleeing over the border to Bangladesh in just over 10 days.

Reuters reporters saw hundreds more exhausted Rohingya arriving on boats near the Bangladeshi border village of Shamlapur on Tuesday, suggesting the exodus was far from over.

Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi, in Dhaka to discuss aid for the fleeing Rohingya, met her Bangladeshi counterpart, Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali, a day after urging Suu Kyi and Myanmar army chief Min Aung Hlaing to halt the bloodshed.

“The security authorities need to immediately stop all forms of violence there and provide humanitarian assistance and development aid for the short and long term,” Retno said after her meetings in the Myanmar capital.

The latest violence in Myanmar’s northwestern Rakhine state began on Aug. 25, when Rohingya insurgents attacked dozens of police posts and an army base. The ensuing clashes and a military counter-offensive have killed at least 400 people and triggered the exodus of villagers to Bangladesh.

The treatment of Buddhist-majority Myanmar’s roughly 1.1 million Muslim Rohingya is the biggest challenge facing Suu Kyi, who has been accused by Western critics of not speaking out for the minority that has long complained of persecution.

Myanmar says its security forces are fighting a legitimate campaign against “terrorists” responsible for a string of attacks on police posts and the army since last October.

Myanmar officials blamed Rohingya militants for the burning of homes and civilian deaths but rights monitors and Rohingya fleeing to neighboring Bangladesh say the Myanmar army is trying to force them out with a campaign of arson and killings.

“Indonesia is taking the lead, and ultimately there is a possibility of ASEAN countries joining in,” H.T. Imam, a political adviser to Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, told Reuters.

He was referring to the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations that includes both Myanmar and Indonesia.

“If we can keep the pressure on Myanmar from ASEAN, from India as well, that will be good … If the international conscience is awakened, that would put pressure on Myanmar.”

Malaysia, another ASEAN member, summoned Myanmar’s ambassador to express displeasure over the violence and scolded Myanmar for making “little, if any” progress on the problem.

“Malaysia believes that the matter of sustained violence and discrimination against the Rohingyas should be elevated to a higher international forum,” Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman said in a statement.

Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan, who has said the violence against Rohingya Muslims constituted genocide, told Suu Kyi the violence was of deep concern to the Muslim world, and he was sending his foreign minister to Bangladesh.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi begins a visit to Myanmar on Tuesday, during which he will meet top officials, including Suu Kyi.

Pakistan, home to a large Rohingya community, has expressed “deep anguish”.

FULL CAMP

The latest estimate of the numbers who have crossed into Bangladesh since Aug. 25, based on calculations by U.N. workers, is 123,600.

That takes to about 210,000 the number of Rohingya who have sought refuge in Bangladesh since October, when Rohingya insurgents staged smaller attacks on security posts, triggering a major Myanmar army counteroffensive and sending about 87,000 people fleeing into Bangladesh.

Refugees arriving in Shamlapur, and residents of the village, said hundreds of boats had arrived on Monday and Tuesday with several thousand people.

Reuters reporters saw men, women, children and a few possessions, including chickens, disembark from one boat.

“The army set fire to houses,” said Salim Ullah, 28, a farmer from Myanmar’s village of Kyauk Pan Du, gripping a sack of belongings.

“We got on the boat at daybreak. I came with my mother, wife and two children. There were 40 people on the boat, including 25 women.”

The new arrivals – many sick or wounded – have strained the resources of aid agencies and communities already helping hundreds of thousands of refugees from previous spasms of violence in Myanmar.

Vivian Tan, a spokeswoman for the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, said one camp in Bangladesh, Kutupalong, had reached “full capacity” and resources at others were being stretched.

“We are doing what we can, but will need to seek more resources,” Tan said.

Bangladesh is concerned about Myanmar army activity on the border and would lodge a complaint if Bangladeshi territory was violated, an interior ministry official said.

A Bangladesh border guard officer said two blasts were heard on Tuesday on the Myanmar side, after two on Monday fueled speculation Myanmar forces had laid land mines.

One boy had his left leg blown off near a border crossing before being brought to Bangladesh for treatment, while another boy suffered minor injuries, the officer, Manzurul Hassan Khan, said, adding the blast could have been a mine explosion.

The Myanmar army has not commented on the blasts near the border but said in a statement on Tuesday Rohingya insurgents were planning bomb attacks in Myanmar cities including the capital, Naypyitaw, Yangon and Mandalay to “attract more attention from the world”.

(Reporting by Simon Lewis and Nurul Islam in COX’S BAZAR, Wa Lone and Shoon Naing; in YANGON and Ruma Paul in DHAKA; Writing by Antoni Slodkowski; Editing by Robert Birsel and Clarence Fernandez)

Rohingya Muslims flee as more than 2,600 houses burned in Myanmar’s Rakhine

Rohingya refugees rest after travelling over the Bangladesh-Myanmar border in Teknaf, Bangladesh, September 1, 2017. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) – More than 2,600 houses have been burned down in Rohingya-majority areas of Myanmar’s northwest in the last week, the government said on Saturday, in one of the deadliest bouts of violence involving the Muslim minority in decades.

About 58,600 Rohingya have fled into neighboring Bangladesh from Myanmar, according to U.N. refugee agency UNHCR, as aid workers there struggle to cope.

Myanmar officials blamed the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) for the burning of the homes. The group claimed responsibility for coordinated attacks on security posts last week that prompted clashes and a large army counter-offensive.

But Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh say a campaign of arson and killings by the Myanmar army is aimed at trying to force them out.

The treatment of Myanmar’s roughly 1.1 million Rohingya is the biggest challenge facing leader Aung San Suu Kyi, accused by Western critics of not speaking out for the Muslim minority that has long complained of persecution.

The clashes and army crackdown have killed nearly 400 people and more than 11,700 “ethnic residents” have been evacuated from the area, the government said, referring to the non-Muslim residents.

It marks a dramatic escalation of a conflict that has simmered since October, when a smaller Rohingya attack on security posts prompted a military response dogged by allegations of rights abuses.

“A total of 2,625 houses from Kotankauk, Myinlut and Kyikanpyin villages and two wards in Maungtaw were burned down by the ARSA extremist terrorists,” the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar said. The group has been declared a terrorist organization by the government.

But Human Rights Watch, which analyzed satellite imagery and accounts from Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh, said the Myanmar security forces deliberately set the fires.”New satellite imagery shows the total destruction of a Muslim village, and prompts serious concerns that the level of devastation in northern Rakhine state may be far worse than originally thought,” said the group’s deputy Asia director, Phil Robertson.

FULL CAPACITY

Near the Naf river separating Myanmar and Bangladesh, new arrivals in Bangladesh carrying their belongings in sacks set up crude tents or tried to squeeze into available shelters or homes of locals.

“The existing camps are near full capacity and numbers are swelling fast. In the coming days there needs to be more space,” said UNHCR regional spokeswoman Vivian Tan, adding more refugees were expected.

The Rohingya are denied citizenship in Myanmar and regarded as illegal immigrants, despite claiming roots that date back centuries. Bangladesh is also growing increasingly hostile to Rohingya, more than 400,000 of whom live in the poor South Asian country after fleeing Myanmar since the early 1990s.

Jalal Ahmed, 60, who arrived in Bangladesh on Friday with a group of about 3,000 after walking from Kyikanpyin for almost a week, said he believed the Rohingya were being pushed out of Myanmar.

“The military came with 200 people to the village and started fires…All the houses in my village are already destroyed. If we go back there and the army sees us, they will shoot,” he said.

Reuters could not independently verify these accounts as access for independent journalists to northern Rakhine has been restricted since security forces locked down the area in October.

Speaking to soldiers, government staff and Rakhine Buddhists affected by the conflict on Friday, army chief Min Aung Hlaing said there is no “oppression or intimidation” against the Muslim minority and “everything is within the framework of the law”.

“The Bengali problem was a long-standing one which has become an unfinished job,” he said, using a term used by many in Myanmar to refer to the Rohingya that suggests they come from Bangladesh.

Many aid programs running in northern Rakhine prior to the outbreak of violence, including life-saving food assistance by the World Food Programme (WFP), have been suspended since the fighting broke out.

“Food security indicators and child malnutrition rates in Maungdaw were already above emergency thresholds before the violence broke out, and it is likely that they will now deteriorate even further,” said Pierre Peron, spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Myanmar.

More than 80,000 children may need treatment for malnutrition in northern Rakhine and many of them reported “extreme” food insecurity, WFP said in July.

In Bangladesh, Tan of UNHCR said more shelters and medical care were needed. “There’s a lot of pregnant women and lactating mothers and really young children, some of them born during the flight. They all need medical attention,” she said.

Among new arrivals, 22-year-old Tahara Begum gave birth to her second child in a forest on the way to Bangladesh.

“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” she said.

(Reporting By Reuters staff; Editing by Nick Macfie and Jacqueline Wong)

U.N. wants to negotiate with U.S., Canada to resettle Rohingya refugees

Rohingya refugee children

By Krishna N. Das

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) – The United Nations’ refugee agency has asked Bangladesh to allow it to negotiate with the United States, Canada and some European countries to resettle around 1,000 Rohingya Muslims living in the South Asian nation, a senior official at the agency said.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya live in Bangladesh after fleeing Buddhist-majority Myanmar since the early 1990s, and their number has been swelled by an estimated 69,000 escaping an army crackdown in northern Rakhine State in recent months.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) would push for resettlement of those most in need, despite growing resistance in some developed countries, particularly the United States under President Donald Trump, UNHCR’s Bangladesh representative, Shinji Kubo, told Reuters on Thursday.

“UNHCR will continue to work with the authorities concerned, including in the United States,” Kubo said.

“Regardless of the change in government or government policies, I think UNHCR has a clear responsibility to pursue a protection-oriented resettlement program.”

Kubo said 1,000 Rohingya refugees had been identified as priorities for resettlement on medical grounds or because they have been separated from their family members living abroad.

“Resettlement will always be a challenging thing because only a small number of resettlement opportunities are being allocated by the international community at the moment,” Kubo said in an interview. “But it’s our job to try to consult with respective countries based on the protection and humanitarian needs of these individuals.”

H.T. Imam, a political adviser to Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, said the resettlement proposal was “unrealistic” due to reluctance in the United States and Europe to take further Muslim refugees.

Reuters reported this month that officials at an Australian immigration center in Papua New Guinea were increasing pressure on asylum seekers to return to their home countries voluntarily, including offering large sums of money, amid fears a deal for the United States to take refugees had fallen through.

Canada, Australia and the United States were the top providers of asylum to Rohingya Muslims who came to Bangladesh from Myanmar before Dhaka stopped the program around 2012. A Bangladesh government official said it was feared the program would encourage more people from Myanmar to use it as a transit country to seek asylum in the West.

Canada has said it would welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war, after Trump put a four-month hold on allowing refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries into the United States, an order since suspended by a U.S. district judge.

HOPING FOR ACCESS

The UNHCR supports around 34,000 refugees living in two government-registered camps in the Bangladesh coastal district of Cox’s Bazar, but a greater number of Rohingya live in makeshift settlements nearby, unregistered and officially ineligible to receive international aid.

Kubo said he had asked Bangladesh to give the UN access to all the refugees who have recently arrived, adding that UNHCR and other international agencies were also willing to provide aid to poor Bangladeshis living near the refugee settlements to counter local resentment at the influx.

Hasina adviser Imam said providing aid to the new refugees and its citizens was the responsibility of the government.

Myanmar said late on Wednesday that a security operation that began after nine police officers were killed in attacks on border security posts on Oct. 9 had now ended.

A report released by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on Feb. 3 gave accounts of mass killings and gang rapes by troops during the operation, which it said probably constituted crimes against humanity.

Two UN sources have separately told Reuters that more than 1,000 Rohingya may have been killed in the crackdown.

Northern Rakhine has been locked down since October, and Myanmar has not said when aid groups or reporters might be allowed in.

“We’re now hoping for immediate access to the affected areas in northern Rakhine as soon as possible with our resources, our protection expertise,” Kubo said. “That will also have a positive impact on what is happening in Bangladesh at the moment.”

(Reporting by Krishna N. Das in COX’S BAZAR; Additional reporting by Serajul Quadir in DHAKA; Editing by Alex Richardson)