Tag Archives: Myanmar

Bangladesh, Myanmar agree to draw up plan for refugee repatriation

A newly arrived Rohingya refugee waits to be transferred to a camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Cathal McNaughton TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

By Ruma Paul

DHAKA (Reuters) – Bangladesh and Myanmar agreed on Monday to set up a “working group” to plan the repatriation of more than half a million Rohingya Muslim refugees who have fled to Bangladesh to escape an army crackdown, the Bangladeshi foreign minister said.

The United Nations has called the exodus of 507,000 Rohingya since late August the world’s fastest-developing refugee emergency, and says Buddhist-majority Myanmar is engaging in ethnic cleansing against its Rohingya Muslim minority.

Myanmar denies that. It says its forces are battling Rohingya “terrorists” who triggered the latest wave of violence with coordinated attacks on the security forces on Aug. 25.

Myanmar says more than 500 people have been killed since, most of them insurgents, whom it has accused of attacking civilians and setting most of the fires that have reduced to ashes more than half of more than 400 Rohingya villages in the north of Rakhine State.

Bangladesh Foreign Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali said he and Myanmar official Kyaw Tint Swe had agreed in their talks to set up the working group to draw up plans for repatriation.

“We are looking forward to a peaceful solution to the crisis,” Ali told reporters.

Kyaw Tint Swe did not speak to the media and government spokesmen in Myanmar were not immediately available for comment.

Waves of Rohingya have taken refuge in Bangladesh over the years complaining of persecution, in particular in the late 1970s, the early 1990s and in October last year, following smaller insurgent attacks on the security forces.

The neighbors have agreed on repatriation plans before, but the fundamental problem – the status of Rohingya in Myanmar – remains unsettled.

The Rohingya are denied citizenship and classified as illegal immigrants, despite claiming roots in Myanmar that go back centuries, with communities marginalized and subjected to bouts of communal violence over the years.

Ali, asked about agreements in the past having little impact, said: “This time we want to be hopeful.”

In Geneva, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi told a meeting problems of statelessness had to be tackled.

“Nowhere is the link between statelessness and displacement more evident than with the Rohingya community,” he said.

Rohingya refugees queue for aid in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, October 1, 2017. REUTERS/Cathal McNaughton

Rohingya refugees queue for aid in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, October 1, 2017. REUTERS/Cathal McNaughton

RECOMMENDATION ON CITIZENSHIP

The crisis over the treatment of the Rohingya is the biggest problem Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has had to face since forming a government last year after winning a landmark 2015 election.

The Nobel peace laureate, in an address to the nation last month, said Myanmar was ready to start a verification process under a 1993 agreement with Bangladesh and “refugees from this country will be accepted without any problem”.

But many refugees are gloomy about the prospects of going back, fearing they will not be able to furnish the documents they anticipate Myanmar will demand to prove they have a right to return.

Myanmar has refused to grant access to a U.N. fact-finding mission but Suu Kyi last year appointed a team led by former U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan to draw up recommendations on solving problems in Rakhine.

The commission presented its recommendations on Aug. 24, a day before the insurgent attacks, among them a review of a law that links citizenship and ethnicity and leaves most Rohingya stateless.

The panel also recommended that the government punish rights violations, ensure the right to freedom of movement and invest in infrastructure to lift the state out of poverty.

Suu Kyi, in her address to the nation last month, said she was committed to the recommendations.

There were already about 300,000 Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh before the latest exodus.

Rohingya refugee sisters, who just arrived under the cover of darkness by wooden boats from Myanmar, hug each other as they try to find their parents at Shah Porir Dwip, in Teknaf, near Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh.

Rohingya refugee sisters, who just arrived under the cover of darkness by wooden boats from Myanmar, hug each other as they try to find their parents at Shah Porir Dwip, in Teknaf, near Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh.
REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

‘GHOST TOWN’

In Myanmar, the government took a group of diplomats and senior U.N. officials to Rakhine to let them see the situation.

“Maungdaw feels like a ghost town,” Swiss ambassador Paul Seger said on Twitter, as he arrived in a main town in the north of Rakhine.

Myanmar has blocked most aid workers and the media from the area, despite calls from Western countries for access to deal with what aid groups fear is an unfolding humanitarian crisis.

The diplomats were taken to various places including the Rohingya village of Ah Nauk Pyin, which Reuters reported last month was cut off and threatened by hostile Rakhine Buddhist neighbors. An itinerary of the trip referred to the report.

After the visit, the United Nations repeated a call for an end to the violence, for access to the conflict zone for aid workers and for the safe return of refugees.

“The U.N. delegation reiterated the need for a greater access for humanitarian and human rights actors to conduct comprehensive assessments the situation,” it said in a statement. It also said the media should have access.

Suu Kyi has been accused by Western critics of not speaking out strongly enough on behalf of the long-persecuted minority and of defending the army action. She has no power over security policy under a military-drafted constitution.

 

(Additional reporting by Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay in GENEVA; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Nick Macfie and Clarence Fernandez)

 

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)

Eating leaves to survive in Myanmar’s ‘ethnic cleansing’ zone

Eating leaves to survive in Myanmar's 'ethnic cleansing' zone

MAUNGDAW, Myanmar (Reuters) – Along the main road that stretches nearly 40 kilometers north from Maungdaw town in Myanmar’s violence-riven Rakhine State, all but one of the villages that were once home to tens of thousands of people have been turned into smouldering ash.

Hundreds of cows roam through deserted settlements and charred paddy fields. Hungry dogs eat small goats. The remains of local mosques, markets and schools – once bustling with Rohingya Muslims – are silent.

Despite strict controls on access to northern Rakhine, Reuters independently traveled to parts of the most-affected area in early September, the first detailed look by reporters inside the region where the United Nations says Myanmar’s security forces have carried out ethnic cleansing.

Nearly 500 people have been killed and 480,000 Rohingya have fled since Aug. 25, when attacks on 30 police posts and a military base by Muslim militants provoked a fierce army crackdown. The government has rejected allegations of arson, rape and arbitrary killings leveled against its security forces.

“We were scared that the army and the police would shoot us if they found us … so we ran away from the village,” said Suyaid Islam, 32, from Yae Khat Chaung Gwa Son, near the area visited by Reuters north of Maungdaw. He was speaking by phone from a refugee camp in Bangladesh after leaving his village soon after the attacks.

Residents of his village told Reuters it had been burned down by security forces in an earlier operation against Rohingya insurgents late last year. Those that did not flee have been surviving since in makeshift shacks, eating food distributed by aid agencies.

Satellite photos showed that tens of thousands of homes in northern Rakhine have been destroyed in 214 villages, New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said. The U.N. detected 20 sq km (8 sq miles) of destroyed structures.

The government said more than 6,800 houses have been set on fire. It blames the Rohingya villagers and the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), which staged the Aug. 25 attacks.

“The information we obtained on this side is that terrorists did the burnings,” said Zaw Htay, spokesman for national leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Reuters reporters have made two trips to northern Rakhine, visiting the townships of Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung, and driving from Maungdaw through the most affected area along the main road north to the town of Kyein Chaung. (For a graphic of the area, click: http://tmsnrt.rs/2y8FgQ8)

The reporters talked briefly to residents but, because many were scared of being seen speaking to outsiders, most interviews were carried out by phone from outside the army operation area.

FOOD RUNNING LOW

Little aid has made it to northern Rakhine since the U.N. had to suspend operations because of the fighting and after the government suggested its food was sustaining insurgents. Convoys organized by the Red Cross have twice been stopped and searched by hostile ethnic Rakhines in the state capital Sittwe.

In U Shey Kya, where last October Rohingya residents accused the Myanmar army of raping several women, a teacher who spoke to Reuters from the village by phone said only about 100 families out of 800 households have stayed behind.

Those who remain are playing a cat-and-mouse game with the soldiers, who come to the village in the morning prompting the residents to hide in the forest and return at night.

“We don’t even have food to eat for this evening. What can we do?” said the teacher. “We are close to the forest where we have leaves we can eat and find some water to survive.” He refused to give his name because he had been warned by the authorities not to talk to reporters.

The man said escaping through bush in monsoon rain with his elderly parents, six children and pregnant wife was not an option.

Zaw Htay said the government has prioritized humanitarian assistance to the area.

“If there are any locations where aid has not reached yet, people should let us know, we will try to reach them as soon as we can,” he said.

About 30,000 non-Muslim residents of northern Rakhine have also been displaced.

Before the latest exodus there were around 1.1 million Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, mostly living in Rakhine, where they are denied citizenship and are regarded as interlopers from Bangladesh by the Buddhist majority.

“HAPPY THEY’RE GONE NOW”

Rohingya who have fled to Bangladesh and human rights organizations say ethnic Rakhine vigilantes have aided the military in driving out the Muslim population.

Kamal Hussein, 22, from Alel Than Kyaw, south of Maungdaw town said his village was destroyed in early September, after which he fled to Bangladesh, where he spoke to Reuters.

Hussein said Rakhine mobs “poured petrol on the houses. Then, they came out and the military fired a grenade launcher at a house to set it alight”.

Government spokesman Zaw Htay said some empty buildings in the area had been burned by ethnic Rakhines. “We told the regional government to take action on that,” he said.

The damage caused by the fires, Reuters interviews and satellite pictures show, is by far the largest in Maungdaw, where the bulk of insurgent attacks took place. Across the mostly coastal area, stretching more than 100 km (60 miles) through thick bush and monsoon-swollen streams, most villages have been burned.

Maungdaw town itself, until recently ethnically mixed with Rakhine Buddhists, Muslims and some Hindus, is now segregated, with the remaining Rohingya shuttered in their homes. Some 450 houses in Rohingya parts of the town were burned down in the first week after the attacks, HRW said citing satellite photographs.

“Those who stored food, sold it and raised money to flee to Bangladesh,” Mohammad Salem, 35, who used to sell cosmetics at the market, told Reuters by phone from the town.

In ethnically-mixed Rathedaung township, 16 out of 21 Rohingya villages have been burned, according to residents and humanitarian workers.

Of the remaining five, two villages in the south are now cut off from food and threatened by hostile Rakhine neighbors.

In many places people have no access to medicines, residents said.

Reuters talked to two Rakhine Buddhist officials who corroborated the scale of the damage.

Tin Tun Soe, a Rakhine administrator in Chein Khar Li, where a security post had come under attack, said the army response was rapid and all the Rohingya had been driven out. Nearly 1,600 houses were burned down a day after the attacks, he said, though he blamed the fires on the insurgents.

“They have so many people. If they are here, we’re afraid to live,” said Tin Tun Soe. “I am very happy that now all of them are gone.”

(Reporting by Wa Lone and Shoon Naing in Yangon; Additional reporting by Simon Lewis in Cox’s Bazar; Writing by Antoni Slodkowski; Editing by Alex Richardson)

Rights group accuses Myanmar of crimes against humanity

Rohingya refugees queue for aid at Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, September 26, 2017. REUTERS/Cathal McNaughton

By Shoon Naing

YANGON (Reuters) – Myanmar is committing crimes against humanity in its campaign against Muslim insurgents in Rakhine state, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday, calling for the U.N. Security Council to impose sanctions and an arms embargo.

The U.N. refugee agency called for a redoubling of international aid for the 480,000 refugees – 60 percent of them children – who have fled to Bangladesh since Aug. 25 to escape the violence.

A Myanmar government spokesman rejected the accusation of crimes against humanity, saying there was no evidence.

Myanmar has also rejected U.N. accusations that its forces are engaged in ethnic cleansing against Rohingya Muslims in response to coordinated attacks by Rohingya insurgents on the security forces on Aug. 25.

Refugees arriving in Bangladesh have accused the army and Buddhist vigilantes of trying to drive Rohingya out of Buddhist-majority Myanmar.

“The Burmese military is brutally expelling the Rohingya from northern Rakhine state,” said James Ross, legal and policy director at New York-based Human Rights Watch.

“The massacres of villagers and mass arson driving people from their homes are all crimes against humanity.”

Myanmar, also known as Burma, says its forces are fighting terrorists responsible for attacking the police and the army, killing civilians and torching villages.

The International Criminal Court defines crimes against humanity as acts including murder, torture, rape and deportation “when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack”.

Human Rights Watch said its research, supported by satellite imagery, had found crimes of deportation, forced population transfers, murder and rape.

The U.N. Security Council and concerned countries should impose targeted sanctions and an arms embargo, it said.

Government spokesman Zaw Htay said no Myanmar government had ever been as committed to the promotion of rights as the current one.

“Accusations without any strong evidence are dangerous,” he told Reuters. “It makes it difficult for the government to handle things.”

A coordinating group of aid organizations said the total number of refugees who have fled to Bangladesh since Aug. 25 had been revised up to 480,000 after 35,000 people in two camps were found to have been missed out of the previous tally.

“The massive influx of people seeking safety has been outpacing capacities to respond, and the situation for these refugees has still not stabilized,” Adrian Edwards, a spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said in Geneva.

“UNHCR is calling for a redoubling of the international humanitarian response in Bangladesh.”

LITTLE SYMPATHY

The violence and the refugee exodus is the biggest crisis the government of Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has faced since it came to power last year in a transition from nearly 50 years of military rule.

Myanmar regards the Rohingya as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and bouts of suppression and violence have flared for decades. Most Rohingya are stateless.

Suu Kyi has faced scathing criticism and calls for her Nobel prize to be withdrawn.

She denounced rights violations in an address to the nation last week and vowed that abusers would be prosecuted. She also said the government was trying to determine why so many people fled.

Seven U.N. experts, including Yanghee Lee, special rapporteur on rights in Myanmar, called on Suu Kyi to meet Rohingya to hear for herself the reasons for their exodus.

“No one chooses, especially not in the hundreds of thousands, to leave their homes and ancestral land, no matter how poor the conditions, to flee to a strange land to live under plastic sheets and in dire circumstances, except in life-threatening situations,” they said.

They called on Myanmar to provide humanitarian access to Rakhine state, where the military has been restricting entry.

Suu Kyi has little, if any, control over the security forces under a military-drafted constitution that also bars her from the presidency and gives the military veto power over political reform.

Myanmar has seen a surge of Buddhist nationalism in recent years, and the public is supportive of the campaign against the insurgents.

Since Sunday, the army has unearthed the bodies of 45 members of Myanmar’s small Hindu community who authorities say were killed by the insurgents soon after the violence erupted.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, which has claimed attacks on the security forces since October, denied killing the villagers.

Some Hindus have fled to Bangladesh. Others have taken refuge in Myanmar towns, accusing the insurgents of attacking them on suspicion of being government spies.

(This refiled version of the story fixes garble in figure in paragraph two).

(Additonal reporting by Tom Miles and Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay in GENEVA; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Michael Perry and Paul Tait)

U.S. seeks urgent action on Myanmar, while U.N. eyes $200 million for refugees

A woman reacts as Rohingya refugees wait to receive aid in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, September 21, 2017. REUTERS/Cathal McNaughton

By Antoni Slodkowski and Rahul Bhatia

YANGON/DHAKA (Reuters) – The United States wants Myanmar to take urgent action to end violence in Rakhine state, where a military offensive has created a crisis that could jeopardize its economic and political transition, a U.S. official said on Friday.

Bangladesh and aid organizations are struggling to help 422,000 Rohingya Muslims who have arrived since Aug. 25, when attacks by Rohingya militants triggered a Myanmar crackdown that the United Nations has branded ethnic cleansing.

A senior U.N. official said an estimated $200 million would be needed to help the refugees in Bangladesh for six months. Aid workers fear a humanitarian crisis is also unfolding in Rakhine state, though Myanmar has restricted access.

“We think, urgently, actions need to be taken to stop this violence and facilitate humanitarian assistance, lower the rhetoric, lower the tension and … start doing the hard work to solve the longer-standing problems,” U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Patrick Murphy told reporters.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has faced a barrage of international criticism over the plight of the Rohingya, for not speaking out more forcefully against the violence or doing more to rein in security forces over which she has little power.

Tension between majority Buddhists and Rohingya, most of whom are denied citizenship, has simmered for decades in Rakhine, but it has exploded several times over the past few years, as old enmities, and Buddhist nationalism, surfaced with the end of decades of harsh military rule.

Murphy, who spent three days in Myanmar this week, said there were “many points of responsibility” and he wanted to see everyone follow through on commitments Suu Kyi made to uphold rights and the law in an address to the nation on Tuesday.

“There’s the elected government, there are the security forces which have authorities that don’t fall under the purview of the civilian elected government, there are local leaders and there is the broader population, among which there are many emotions and many tensions,” he said.

“Significant responsibility sits with security authorities and local officials in Rakhine state and we are looking for their cooperation to make these commitments a reality,” Murphy told reporters on a conference call from Bangkok.

Myanmar dismisses accusations of ethnic cleansing, saying it has to tackle the insurgents, whom it accuses of setting fires and attacking civilians as well as the security forces.

While the United States has urged action to halt the violence, China, which has close economic and political ties with Myanmar, has welcomed measures by the government to alleviate the situation in Rakhine state.

‘INCENTIVE FOR TERRORISTS’

Murphy said the military’s response to the August insurgent attacks had been disproportionate and the country risked a terrorist backlash.

The attacks were claimed by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, which Murphy referred to as a “so-called group” of which little was known. It denies links to foreign militants but the government says it is connected to global terrorism.

“Whether or not this organization has ties elsewhere is not particularly germane, given the fact that it could be creating an incentive for foreign terrorists to look at a new opportunity and this is among the risks that we have shared with Burmese stakeholders,” he said.

Bangladesh was already home to some 400,000 Rohingya who fled earlier bouts of violence and persecution.

Given the “massive numbers” arriving in the past few weeks, the United Nations was expected to launch an appeal for $200 million to help them for the next six months, an official said.

“It has not been confirmed, but it is a ballpark figure, based on the information we have,” Robert D. Watkins, U.N. resident coordinator in Bangladesh, told Reuters in an interview in Dhaka.

Watkins said the situation had not stabilized in terms of new arrivals so it was difficult to say how many people to plan for, or how long.

“We don’t want to plan a 10-year operation, obviously, because we want to maintain hope that there will be a way for negotiating a return of the population,” he said.

“We can’t plan too far in the future, because it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy … politically, it sends a strong signal, which we don’t want to send, which is that people are going to be here for a long time.

“And our donors are not prepared to respond to anything beyond a one-year time frame, given the massive amounts of money we are asking for.”

Aid groups in Bangladesh have warned of a public health disaster unless help is increased massively.

“We need to scale up quickly,” said Dr N. Paranietharan, the World Health Organisation representative in Bangladesh.

“If we don’t drastically improve water and sanitation we will face water-borne diseases including cholera.”

(For a graphic on Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh click http://tmsnrt.rs/2xTAOon)

(Additonal reporting by Serajul Quadir in DHAKA, tommy Wikes in COX’S BAZAR; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

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)

As North Korea threat looms, Trump to address world leaders at U.N.

U.S. President Donald Trump participates in a session on reforming the United Nations at UN Headquarters in New York, U.S., September 18, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – North Korea’s nuclear threat looms large this week over the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations in New York, where diplomats are eager to hear U.S. President Donald Trump address the 193-member body for the first time.

North Korean diplomats will have a front-row seat in the U.N. General Assembly for Trump’s speech on Tuesday morning, which will touch on the escalating crisis that has seen Trump and Pyongyang trade threats of military action.

Despite his skepticism about the value of international organizations and the United Nations in particular, Trump will seek support for tough measures against North Korea, while pressing his “America First” message to the world body.

“This is not an issue between the United States and North Korea. This is an issue between the world and North Korea,” Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, said on Friday.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres – who, like Trump, took office in January – plans to meet separately with “concerned parties,” including North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho, on the sidelines of the 72nd General Assembly.

“The solution can only be political. Military action could cause devastation on a scale that would take generations to overcome,” Guterres warned on Wednesday.

A week ago, the 15-member U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted its ninth sanctions resolution since 2006 over North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said U.N. sanctions had banned 90 percent of the Asian state’s publicly reported exports, saying of Pyongyang on Friday: “This is totally in their hands on how they respond.”

Haley told CNN’s “State of the Union” program on Sunday that Washington had “pretty much exhausted” its options on North Korea at the Security Council.

Ri is due to address the General Assembly on Friday.

 

IRAN

Some leaders will also push Trump not to give up on a 2015 deal curbing Iran’s nuclear ambitions in return for a lifting of U.N., U.S. and European sanctions, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was time to “fix it – or cancel it.”

The foreign ministers of Iran, the United States, Britain, Germany, Russia, China and France – the parties to the agreement – are due to meet on Wednesday ahead of an October deadline for Trump to tell Congress if he believes Tehran is sticking to what he has described as “the worst deal ever negotiated.”

When asked on Friday what Moscow’s message would be for Washington, Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, said: “Stay in the JCPOA (the nuclear deal).”

A senior U.N. Security Council diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “We are faced with real uncertainties with respect to North Korea and it’s a bit dangerous … to add another source of uncertainty with respect to Iran.”

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Sunday his country would not be bullied by the United States and would react strongly to any “wrong move” by Washington on the nuclear deal.

Iran and North Korea will also feature heavily during a ministerial Security Council meeting on Thursday, at the request of the United States, to discuss the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

 

MYANMAR, CLIMATE, U.N. REFORM

While leaders and diplomats are also due to meet on longer-running crises including Libya, Syria, South Sudan, Mali, Central African Republic, Yemen and Iraq, a last-minute addition has been Myanmar, where the United Nations has branded violence against Rohingya Muslims as “ethnic cleansing.”

Britain is due to host a ministerial meeting on Monday to seek a way to get Myanmar authorities to end a military offensive in the country’s Rakhine state that has sent more than 400,000 minority Rohingya Muslims fleeing to Bangladesh.

Following Trump’s announcement that the United States would withdraw from a landmark 2015 global agreement to fight climate change, several high-level gatherings are planned on the sidelines of the General Assembly to bolster the deal.

“Climate change is a serious threat,” Guterres told reporters. “Hurricanes and floods around the world remind us that extreme weather events are expected to become more frequent and severe, due to climate change.”

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson appeared to hold the door open for the United States to remain in the Paris climate accord “under the right conditions.”

“The president said he is open to finding those conditions where we can remain engaged with others on what we all agree is still a challenging issue,” Tillerson said on CBS’ “Face The Nation” program on Sunday.

Trump will seek to boost support for reforming the United Nations, which he once called “a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time.”

The United States is the largest U.N. contributor and Trump has complained that Washington pays too much.

“The United Nations, of course, holds tremendous potential to realize its founding ideals, but only if it’s run more efficiently and effectively,” McMaster said on Friday.

 

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Editing by Yara Bayoumy and Peter Cooney)

 

Bangladesh warns Myanmar over border amid refugee crisis

A Rohingya refugee woman looks on in a newly built makeshift camp, in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

By Ruma Paul

DHAKA (Reuters) – Bangladesh has accused Myanmar of repeatedly violating its air space and warned that any more “provocative acts” could have “unwarranted consequences”, raising the risk of a deterioration in relations already strained by the Rohingya refugee crisis.

Nearly 400,000 Rohingya Muslims from western Myanmar have crossed into Bangladesh since Aug. 25, fleeing a Myanmar government offensive against insurgents that the United Nations has branded a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing”.

Bangladesh said Myanmar drones and helicopters had violated its air space three times – on Sept. 10, 12 and 14 – and it had called in a top Myanmar embassy official in Dhaka to complain.

“Bangladesh expressed deep concern at the repetition of such acts of provocation and demanded that Myanmar takes immediate measures to ensure that such violation of sovereignty does not occur again,” the ministry said in statement late on Friday.

“These provocative acts may lead to unwarranted consequences.”

A Myanmar government spokesman said he did not have information about the incidents Bangladesh had complained about but Myanmar had denied an earlier accusation.

The spokesman, Zaw Htay, said Myanmar would check any information that Bangladesh provided.

“Our two countries are facing the refugee crisis. We need to collaborate with good understanding,” he told Reuters.

Bangladesh has for decades faced influxes of Rohingya fleeing persecution in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where the Rohingya are regarded as illegal migrants.

Bangladesh was already home to 400,000 Rohingya before the latest crisis erupted on Aug. 25, when Rohingya insurgents attacked about 30 police posts and an army camp, killing a dozen people.

The Myanmar security forces and Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes responded with what rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say is a campaign of violence and arson aimed at driving out the Muslim population.

Bangladesh has said all refugees must go home. Myanmar has said it will take back those who can verify their citizenship but most Rohingya are stateless.

Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was leaving on Saturday for the U.N. General Assembly where she would call for pressure to ensure Myanmar takes everyone back after stopping its “ethnic cleansing’, her press secretary, Ihsanul Karim, told Reuters.

The conflict has led to a humanitarian crisis on both sides of the border and raised questions about Myanmar’s path under the leadership of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi after nearly 50 years of strict military rule.

The generals still control national security policy but nevertheless, Suu Kyi has been widely criticized abroad for not stopping or condemning the violence.

There is little sympathy for the Rohingya in a country where the end of military rule has unleashed old animosities and the military campaign in Rakhine State is widely supported.

‘STRONGHOLD’

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

Ethnic cleansing is not recognized as a separate crime under international law but allegations of it as part of wider, systematic human rights violations have been heard in international courts.

Myanmar rejects the accusations, saying its security forces are carrying out clearance operations to defend against the insurgents of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), which claimed responsibility for the Aug. 25 attacks and similar, though smaller, attacks in October.

The government has declared ARSA a terrorist organization and accused it of setting the fires and attacking civilians.

The ARSA says it is fighting for the rights of Rohingya and has denied links to foreign Islamists.

Myanmar’s army chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, said the violence – 93 clashes since Aug. 25 – was a bid by the insurgents to “build a stronghold”, according to speech to officer trainees, posted on a military Facebook page.

More than 430 people have been killed, most of them insurgents, and about 30,000 non-Muslim villagers have been displaced, Myanmar has said. Human Rights Watch said satellite imagery showed 62 Rohingya villages had been torched.

The United States has called for the protection of civilians and a deputy assistant secretary of state, Patrick Murphy, is due in Myanmar next week.

China, which also vies for influence in Myanmar, joined a U.N. Security Council call for an end to the violence while its ambassador in Myanmar expressed his support for the government’s action, Myanmar media reported.

Separately, the Committee to Protect Journalists has called on Bangladesh to release two Myanmar journalists detained last week while covering the refugee crisis. A police official told Reuters the two were found to be working on tourist visas and police were investigating.

(For a graphic on ‘Rohingya refugee crisis’ click http://tmsnrt.rs/2eS8B9B)

(Additional reporting by Shoon Naing in YANGON, Serajul Quadir in DHAKA; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)