“It’s reasonable now to talk about genocide prevention in Myanmar.”

The New York Times hasn’t let up on the Rohingya crisis, and it’s taken a nasty turn--as if it could get any nastier.  (Rohingya Women Flee Violence Only to Be Sold Into Marriage, August 2)

In true malicious-government fashion, Myanmar has forced so many Rohingya men to flee to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia that a new and nefarious demand has cropped up—Rohingya men want to start families where they live and so are paying traffikers (again, Rohingya) who see a good market and trick young women into traveling out of the country with their families—only to be sold to the Rohingya men.

For the Myanmar government, this is perfect.  Where have we heard this refrain before: “See? It isn’t our fault—they’re doing it to themselves.”  East Timor, Aceh . . . sound familiar?  You dehumanize a population to the point where it is impossible to act for the good of the group; everyone is relying on blind and desperate instinct, and morality falls away. As Matthew Smith of Fortify Rights says, “It’s reasonable now to talk about genocide prevention in Myanmar.”  And Rohingya activist Nur warns, “If this keeps up, in 30-40 years there will be no Rohingya culture.  Everything is shutting down on us.”

Ambiya Khatu, center, with her niece and mother, married a man in Malaysia who paid $1,050 for her release from smugglers. Credit Mauricio Lima for The New York Times

“I was allowed to call my parents, and they said that if I was willing, it would be better for all the family,” said Shahidah Yunus, 22. “I understood what I must do.”

She joined the hundreds of young Rohingya women from Myanmar sold into marriage to Rohingya men already in Malaysia as the price of escaping violence and poverty in their homeland.

Rohingya Update: As you can see, Myanmar is really taking the world’s message to heart . . .

The Burma Times seems to be the media outlet closest to the Rohingya crisis that is sticking its neck way, way out in reporting on what’s new in genocide-happy Myanmar.

Three reports appeared this week on its site, including reports of “barriers” imposed on Rohingya trying to leave the flood-affected area of Pungná cwéng, where already 9 people are missing, as well as prohibitions against entering the village with any type of aid.  (Rohingyas prevented from moving out of flood inundated village in Pungná cwéng)

 

 

Another article, No aid for Rohingyas, reports that “in Kyauktaw, Rohingyas were turned out of shelters while in Akyab they have been warned not to move out of their neighbourhoods even when they are submerged in flood water.”

“The Rohingya village in Pungná cwéng lies in the midst of hostile Rakhine territory and there has been a continuous blockade leading to chronic food shortages. 

“There was no food stored by the villages and in the midst of the floods, the Rohingyas are suffering from a lack of food and lack of drinking water.

"Much of the poultry and the livestock have also been washed away by the floods.

“In the last few days, the villagers are spending their times in knee deep water as they continue to be refused permission to reach the flood inundated village. At present, there is up to three feet of water.”

The articles note that “this is a crucial election year” and that possibly the government will provide at least some marginal, face-saving assistance to the Rohingya.

But I’m not holding my breath.  With a 90+ per cent Buddhist majority, who needs any other votes?  Let ‘em drown.

Finally: a new article on the Rohingya—and in the New York Times no less

Just when I was giving up hope that the story of the Rohingya would be forgotten by most of the world press after a month of good publicity, a great story comes out in the Times (July 5) called “A Migrant Mother’s

Anguished Choice.”  Read it here; it will give you nightmares.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/06/world/asia/myanmar-rohingya-refugee-crisis-malaysia.html?_r=0

There is also a good map of the route that refugees take from Myanmar; most end up in Malaysia but many, as we know, have arrived in Aceh, and on the map you can see why.

A July 4 Forbes article, “Do Myanmar’s Rohingya really need citizenship now?” reiterates what I’ve been saying about the Aceh people’s willingness to help the refugees: “The Bangladeshis and Rohingya couldn’t have chosen a better place to end up than Aceh, by the way. The welcome by the Acehnese people and Indonesian health services couldn’t be warmer; the Acehnese may even end up inviting the 900-plus Rohingya men, women and children to stay permanently; the approximately 900 Bangladeshis, all men, will be sent home.” [As explained in a previous post, this is because the refugees from Bangladesh are not considered to be in danger; rather they are seeking economic betterment outside Bangladesh.]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/susancunningham/2015/07/04/do-myanmars-rohingya-really-need-citizenship-now/

Also of note is JMD Board member Lilianne Fan, research fellow with the Humanitarian Policy Group of Britain’s Overseas Development Institute (ODI), being interviewed for this article regarding the perception of many in Myanmar (including other oppressed minorities) that the Rohingya are not citizens and are “coming in and taking their jobs and land.”  In order to address this, as well as the immediate crisis, “We have to shift the narrative a little bit to, “The Rohingya are people like us. We’re all part of this complex history.”

 

During Ramadan . . . remember the Rohingya

Not much to update re: the Rohingya refugee camp in Aceh Timur.  Local media and other sources report that ACT will still purchase land for rice fields to feed the refugees, but no details have been ironed out yet, and no purchase has happened.  The head of the military base at Aceh Utara, however, has stated publicly that he supported this and has promised that a officer from the base will work with ACT if the plan moves forward.

As Junaidi from JMD said, “We will watch and see this from afar.”

And as life in the camp continues, so does the discovery of more Rohingya victims of trafficking:

Malaysia buries another 24 human trafficking victims

06 July 2015

Total number of suspected Rohingya and Bangladeshi migrants given Muslim burials reaches 99 after 106 bodies found near Thai border 

http://www.aa.com.tr/en/news/550566--malaysia-buries-another-24-human-trafficking-victims  

And lest we forget:

Horrible Rohingya Muslims massacre by Buddhists supported by Burmese government

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sK0h7Zqs3k

BURMANIZATION & ROHINGYA GENOCIDE (Amnesty International)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0W2SrQL97U

It’s actually hard to find any new reports this month. Certainly nothing on Myanmar or its reaction to "threats" of sanctions.

See?  The world  is already forgetting the Rohingya . . . again . . . . 

2014 report: “Burma could be the site of the world’s next genocide”

And it seems that finally, the world is getting the message, although those chickens came home to roost long ago.

The January 2014 in-depth article in the New Republic, called “A Countryside of Concentration Camps,” reiterates what I’ve spoken about in this blog regarding President Obama’s less-than-forceful visit to Myanmar in 2012. http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116241/burma-2014-countryside-concentration-camps

The president praised the country’s “remarkable journey” towards democracy and civil rights, but realpolitik notwithstanding, had to sound “a brief note of concern, expressed in the mildest language.”

‘There is no excuse for violence against innocent people,’ Obama said. ‘And the Rohingya hold within themselves the same dignity as you do.’

“But he mentioned the Rohingya by name only once before returning, sunnily, to the subject of reform and Burma’s “potential to inspire” other formerly oppressed countries. Nice place, he said in effect, except for the attempted genocide.”

  More than 100,000 Rohingya were displaced after the riots of 2012.  (Photograph by Greg Constantine)

Democracy in Myanmar, it seems, has now allowed for some freedom of ethnic hatred that under military rule was at least kept to a dull roar. “The Rohingya are, so far, unlucky casualties of progress, and their ongoing ethnic-cleansing hasn’t been enough to sour Obama’s rapport with the Burmese president, Thein Sein. Nor, it seems, has it managed to stir the outrage of Aung San Suu Kyi, whose lack of comment has made activists, once piously reverent, now treat her as something between demoness and fool.”

Remember, this was written a year ago.

Plus ca change . . . 

“Obama closed his Rangoon speech in 2012 on what he no doubt meant as a cheery note: ‘I stand here with confidence that something is happening in this country that cannot be reversed.’ Increasingly, it sounds like a prophecy of doom.” 

If you are coming new to this discussion of Rohingya refugees and the policies of Myanmar, this article is a great place to start, outlining the beginning of the latest genocidal wave against Muslims in 2012, and the history of Buddhist violence in Myanmar, dispelling the notion of all Buddhists as peace-loving souls who teach love for one’s fellow man and respect for all creatures.

“Buddhists have, in some circles anyway, received a free pass from skeptics of religion, largely because of the good p.r. and fine examples of the Dalai Lama and his herbivorous Western celebrity proxies (Richard Gere, Uma Thurman). The last few years of resistance to Chinese occupation of Tibet have seen 124 self-immolations by protesting Tibetan Buddhists, and zero burnings of Chinese soldiers. By now the average American thinks that Buddhist extremists are less dangerous than Buddhist moderates (a pleasant contrast with certain well-known types of extreme Christians and Muslims) and that the most violent living Buddhist is Steven Seagal.

“But violent Buddhist wack-jobbery is real—just ask the victims of Japanese fascism, which the Japanese Buddhist clergy supported rabidly—and in Burma it is flourishing.”

The article also gives some background on Ang San Suu Kyi and her perplexing silence regarding the Rohingya.

All in all, and article just as relevant today as it was over a year ago.

Maybe now someone will do something about it.

A Rohingya panel discussion in Bangkok . . . with both JMD AND Matt Dillon? Too good to be true!

JMD Board Member Lilianne Fan sent us some pretty impressive photos this morning. She was a panelist in Bangkok at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand’s (FOCCT) discussion “Boatloads of misery: Southeast Asia and the Rohingya pushback.” https://www.fccthai.com/TheBulletin.html#1656  Lilianne’s co-panelists were Matthew Smith, Director of Fortify Rights, Chutima Sidasathian, a journalist tracking Rohingya refugees for Phuketwan, an online newspaper, and Htike Htike Rohingya co-founder of Bangkok based Equal Harmony Together, who recently returned from working with refugees and migrants in Aceh. Lilianne has been a Board member since JMD was founded in 2005 and is a Research Associate with the Overseas Development Institute and founder of Geutanyue Yayasan in Aceh.  She was also recently in Aceh with Chris Lewa, Director of the Arakan project.

So there they were, and Matt Dillon popped in. (Lilianne is on the far right.)

  

His presence at the well-attended discussion, along with yesterday’s visit to a camp in Aceh by Ann Richard, Assistant Secretary of State (of what we used to call BPRM—Bureau of Populations, Refugees and Migration), seem to have turned the tide, if you’ll pardon the expression, against Myanmar being able to continue the pretense of uninvolved onlooker.

Still, Myanmar government officials persist in denying that the people adrift somewhere in the area, possibly the Bay of Bengal, are not Rohingya, or if they claim to be, they’re not from Myanmar.  Nearly every other organization and individual on the planet believes otherwise, including the Arakan project which has been tracking them for 10 years.

“Speaking at a news conference in Bangkok Tuesday, Arakan Project Director Chris Lewa said it appears that with smugglers' transit camps now exposed by authorities and shut down along the Thai-Malay border, arrangements are being made for more people to land near the origin of their risky trips.”

That will mean that Burma better get ready to welcome its citizens back and have some decent living conditions ready.

And I’d better prepare my coronation speech for when I’m crowned Queen of Scotland.

“A tally from [Lewa’s] grassroots nongovernmental organization monitoring the situation showed at least 5,600 Rohingya and Bangladeshis coming ashore in five countries last month. . . . Myanmar’s government said authorities are escorting a boat carrying more than 700 migrants to what it calls a "safe" location where their identities can be determined.”

Subtext: none of them will be determined to be from our country, no siree.

“The office of Myanmar's president said the hundreds of migrants aboard the boat, who were abandoned by their smugglers, have been given food and water and have expressed a preference to go to Bangladesh.”

The creepy logic of this country is astounding. “See, they said they wanted to go somewhere else, so they’re not our problem.” Of course they wouldn’t want to go back home, if that meant the same inhumane treatment they’d always been getting. 

“The internally displaced Rohingya, a Muslim ethnic minority in predominately Buddhist Myanmar, have received scant international attention.

That has been changing in recent weeks since mass graves of migrants were discovered in Thailand and Malaysia and warnings by aid agencies that those stranded at sea with little food and water were in peril with no country eager to accept them.”

But then at the end of May, along came Matt Dillon and out came the crying towels in Myanmar.

“In response to a VOA question at the briefing in Bangkok for correspondents [the press dinner where Lilianne was speaking] , Dillon characterized the plight of the Rohingya as a “sad and heartbreaking” man-made problem that is solvable.

‘The people aren't living in camps because of some disaster, natural disaster. This is a humanitarian situation that is caused by human beings' intolerance, fear, an unwillingness to allow people to co-exist,’ Dillon said.

The actor said he decided to go to the camp after hearing a desperate appeal a month ago from a Rohingya activist.

Dillon said, ‘Ultimately, they can't be stateless.’”  EXACTLY my point!

“U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday called on Myanmar to stop discriminating against the stateless Rohingya. The president said this is crucial for the successful transition to democracy in Myanmar.

Obama commended Indonesia and Malaysia for giving temporary refuge to thousands of those displaced and he said the United States will also take some of the Rohingya.”

Finally!

See the entire article here: http://m.voanews.com/a/myanmar-escorting-700-migrants-on-boat-to-safe-location/2804144.html

And as for Lilianne?  She writes: “All I can say is, I am not one to get star struck but Matt was so compassionate and genuine that I am officially in love.”

Matt Dillon: Our Hero, and currently the Rohingya’s best friend

Today’s media outlets are buzzing with news that Matt Dillon visited Myanmar’s Rakhine state and sent a blistering commentary—to the world, thanks to his celebrity status-- on the state of the Rohingya both in the camps and fleeing as refugees.

"No one should have to live like this, people are really suffering," said Dillon, one of the first celebrities to get a look at what life is like for Rohingya in the western state of Rakhine. "They are being strangled slowly, they have no hope for the future and nowhere to go."

"A lot of people are suffering," he said. "I'm really glad I had a chance to come, to see for myself what's happening here." http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/matt-dillon-puts-rare-celebrity-spotlight-rohingya-31436291

Although there is a short video that accompanies his visit, it’s apparent he did not do this as a publicity stunt for himself, but carefully used his status to, as the AP reported “put a rare celebrity spotlight” directly on where it should be: the brutal treatment of the Rohingya by Myanmar.

"I know [genocide]'s a very touchy word to use," said Dillon. "But there's a very ominous feeling here."

See the short clip here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx5V3O-i0qM&list=PLr1-FC1l_JLEKbawV7vKt1qt-BD5HQcm_

Although this was maybe Mr. Dillon’s first public advocacy of the Rohingya specifically, it is not his first foray into human rights advocacy; in early May he was Master of Ceremonies, along with Queen Nur of Jordan, at the Refugees International fundraiser, where he was implored by a Rohingya in attendance to help other Rohingya fleeing Myanmar or languishing in their camps.

RI's star-studded gala dinner raises $750,000 to alleviate worldwide refugee crisis
Diplomatic Pouch / May 7, 2015

http://www.luxner.com/cgi-bin/view_article.cgi?articleID=2392

At the event, the Richard C. Holbrooke Leadership Award went to Rohingya activist Tun Khin, who was born in Burma but now lives in London. “Myanmar passed a law in 2002 excluding Rohingyas as a legitimate minority population and made Tun Khin and almost a million of his fellow Rohingyas an illegitimate community unable to claim Myanmar citizenship. . . . The brutal treatment of the Rohingyas is a terrible stain on Myanmar, a country we hear so much good news about. Many of us were deluded into thinking that all was well in Myanmar. Well, it’s a long way from becoming a humane and just society. Tun Khin’s presence tonight is a reminder to all of us that we can’t call a victory in Myanmar and leave the scene. We have to stay engaged until there are no more people living in these concentration camps.”

So Matt Dillon, Our Hero, decided to do something about it.

While he’s in Southeast Asia we hope he finds time to come to Aceh where, although conditions are still grim, the Rohingya are treated humanely and with dignity.

Junaidi and I wrote to his manager and his agent, asking them to thank him for us.  He is a blessing.

If a small Acehnese livelihoods agency could start a fan club, we would.

Who needs Angelina Jolie?

Really? I mean . . . REALLY?????

Buddhists in Myanmar deny boat people are Rohingya

Of course they do.

Silly me. I guess those 200 Rohingya men we took care of in Aceh in 2009 were all ghosts or figments of our imagination. It gets crazier and crazier. Those monks (shown in the photo, telling people that the world is “making up stories”) must be doing some really good drugs.  And again I ask, where is our “Goodwill Ambassador” Angelina Jolie???????

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — Several hundred protesters in Myanmar's main city denied Wednesday that boat people arriving on Southeast Asian shores are Rohingya Muslims, a religious minority the government and many others in the predominantly Buddhist nation say does not exist. About 30 radical Buddhist monks led the rally in Yangon.

"The boat people are not from Myanmar" one banner carried by the demonstrators said. [Those crafty monks finally caught on to them!  They're not Rohingya--they're actually members of Monte Carlo royalty hiding from their gambling debt.]

Another read, "The United Nations and the international media are making up stories!"

Myanmar has experienced a surge in Buddhist nationalism since it began moving from dictatorship toward democracy four years ago. [Buddhist nationalism in this case translates to “kill anyone who is not a Buddhist.”]

Up to 280 Rohingya have been killed by machete-wielding mobs and tens of thousands have taken to the seas in wooden trawlers, hoping to find better lives elsewhere. [the numbers are more likely far greater than that.]

In recent weeks, more than 3,000 Rohingya and Bangladeshis fleeing persecution and poverty have landed in Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia.

"This is not Myanmar's problem, this is a global issue now," said Thuda Nanda, a Buddhist monk. "These boat people have made up the name 'Rohingya.' They are pretending to be refugees so they can find a way to come to Myanmar. We cannot accept them." [Now this . . .this is insane.  This is hard-line Madrassa-like brainwashing of people who will say and believe anything that their authority tells them.]

Myanmar's 1.3 million Rohingya are denied citizenship by national law, rendering them stateless. The government calls them "Bengalis," implying all are illegal migrants from neighboring Bangladesh, though many of their families arrived generations ago.

http://news.yahoo.com/buddhists-myanmar-deny-boat-people-rohingya-093437003.html?soc_src=mediacontentstory&soc_trk=ma  

Related Stories

1. Hundreds rally in Myanmar over 'boat people' crisis Reuters
2. Myanmar nationalists rally against pressure over boat people AFP
3. The Latest on Rohingya: US envoy says address root causes Associated Press
4. The Latest on Rohingya: UN estimates 3,000 still adrift Associated Press
5. Myanmar says it's not to blame for migrant crisis Associated Press

Why no condemnation of Myanmar from the US and others? Bad for business, of course!

Why does the US remain nearly silent in condemning Myanmar?  Take a guess, and if it doesn’t include a dollar sign, it’s wrong. 

In 2012 the Obama administration “authorized U.S. companies to invest in Myanmar for the first time since 1997.”  In late 2014 President Obama visited our pal, opposition leader Aung San “What Rohingya?  I don’t see any Rohingya here” Suu Kyi, at her home and “warned” her (over tea, I’m sure) that  “Myanmar’s steps toward democracy are far from complete.”   

But in the meantime, let’s do business! 

To be fair, there is still a prohibition on “ventures with businesses connected to the country’s former junta.”  But let’s face it, where there are billion-dollar contracts, there’s a way, and in November 2014 Bloomberg reported that  “U.S. companies registering in Singapore to skirt sanctions on Myanmar helped the city state trump China as the country’s number one investor this year, Myanmar’s deputy finance minister said.” Meaning that while US investors may not be dabbling in Myanmar on paper (and staying away from those nasty former junta members, also on paper), they are certainly there taking advantage of what Amnesty International calls “the perfect storm of a rich natural resource base, a weak legal system and an economy dominated by military and special interests. The government has forcibly evicted people, crushed all attempts at peaceful protest and displayed a complete unwillingness to hold companies to account.” (Meghna Abraham, Amnesty International’s Corporate Crimes Researcher.)

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-11-17/u-s-companies-skirting-myanmar-sanctions-fuel-record-investment   

Businessmen from other powerful nations, it seems, are not as sneaky when it comes to hiding their slime trail, and so get exposed:

Myanmar: Foreign mining companies colluding in serious abuses and illegality

In a report released Tuesday, “Canadian and Chinese mining interests have profited from, and in some cases colluded with the Myanmar authorities in serious human rights abuses and illegal activity around the Monywa copper mine complex, which includes the notorious Letpadaung mine.”

Amnesty International’s report describes how Canadian and Chinese mining companies have benefited financially from large-scale, forced evictions and serious pollution linked to the Monywa mining complex, which have destroyed local people’s livelihoods and exposed thousands of people to health risks.

 “The Monywa project is a cautionary tale for the government of Myanmar and investors,” it said in the report titled “Open for Business? Corporate Crime and Abuses at Myanmar Copper Mine.”

 

 “Foreign investment cannot benefit Myanmar when such contexts prevail.”

https://www.amnesty.org/en/articles/news/2015/02/myanmar-foreign-mining-companies-colluding-serious-abuses-and-illegality/

http://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/amnesty-international-report-on-mine-project-02102015144815.html

So, um, now we might know why we in North America are keeping the lowest of profiles when it comes to holding Myanmar responsible for the genocide of thousands of its rightful citizens.

It’s just not profitable.