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Recent Rohingya Crisis and Environmental Concern in Bangladesh
By K.M. Mushfiqul Alam and 13 Fellow Students, Department of Environmental science and Management, North South University, Dhaka.
This project is about the recent Rohingya issue and the genocide and due to it what the impacts are globally and why it is unethical and a human rights concern.
Rohingya people are a stateless people from Rakhine State, Myanmar. They are the victims of ethnic cleansing as they are indigenous and minority in Myanmar (Mahmood, 2016). They face discrimination because of their different race and Muslim religion in a country of Buddhist majority. As they are being killed by government and military it became evident that it is one of the biggest genocides of this era hence, they are fleeing to Bangladesh as it is a neighboring country. UN describes them as one of the persecuted minorities in the world (David 2009). Since 1982, the Rohingya population is denied citizenship under Myanmar nationality law as govt. claims they cannot trace the history of the population (Human rights watch, 2017). In our country, they are deprived from all sources of fundamental rights that the citizens deserve such as job, education, housing and even their movements are restricted (BBC, 2017). This one of the biggest injustices as country wants to remove entire Rohingya population. But according to the historians and Rohingya ancestors they are indigenous to western Myanmar with heritage of a millennium and influenced from Arabs, Mughals and Portuguese. Myanmar part of south East Asia was an independent kingdom and Rohingyas were accepted before even they were given position in the parliament in the 20th century (The Independent, 2017). But the recent government claims they are illegal immigrants who came from Bangladesh and so the Government plans to call them “Bengalis” instead of Rohingyas. As a result, the Rohingya campaign groups notably Arakan Rohingya national organization demand rights and self-determination within Myanmar. This issue as a result took a toll on the population by means of execution, disappearances, ill-treat, discrimination, rapes and so on as UN found evidence and religious intolerance by “ultra nationalist Buddhists”. Military launched clearing operation in Rakhine state as a result the population of 1.3 million decreased to 300000 as rest fled to nearby countries and took shelter. In 2017, UN backed international court where Myanmar was found guilty. (Amnesty international, 2017)
The Rohingya denied citizenship because they do not fall within the defined ethnicities of Myanmar. Bangladesh is facing another exodus of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, but this time with a force that was not seen since the crisis began in 1978. There have been at least two large scale Rohingya migrations since that year. The largest number, counting up to three hundred thousand refugees, was reached in the year 1992. However, small scale migration or infiltration of Rohingyas never ceased. Now the flood gates of refugees are open once again, it seems like the Rohingya exodus from Rakhine State will continue in the foreseeable future, at least till the Myanmar authorities relent.
Rohingya migration into Bangladesh and other neighboring countries including India and Thailand has been going on for the last five decades, for reasons that are well documented. The Rohingya were denied citizenship because they do not fall within the defined ethnicities of Myanmar, nor are they descendants of ancestors who settled in the country before 1823, at the beginning of British occupation of Arakan State. The Rohingya claim that they are descendants of people who had settled in the country since ninth century. But their claim falls on deaf ears as the Rohingya are not one of the thirteen recognized national races.
The festering citizenship issue is further complicated by their religion (Muslim) and their language (a dialect derived from Bengali). This has prevented the Rohingyas from blending with the Arakanese, who are mainly Buddhists by religion. This difference also made the Rohingyas somewhat politically ambitious since the independence of Myanmar (then Burma) from the British. The Rohingyas formed clandestine political groups, hoping to establish a state of their own, when Myanmar was fighting guerrilla groups along the Chinese and the Thai border, including in the Arakan State.
The frequent clashes between the Burmese army and the guerrilla groups had led to the first eviction of the Rohingyas by the government in 1978, although technically on grounds of them being non-citizens.
The first repatriation of the Rohingya refugees in 1979 was possible for three reasons. First, Bangladesh chose not to escalate the crisis to the international level but dealt with the issue on a bilateral level. Second, the Myanmar government responded positively to resolve the problem by not only agreeing to accept all refugees, but also by ensuring security for them. Third, the clandestine political organization of the Rohingyas did not obstruct to the repatriation.
Unfortunately, the Rohingya issue has grown much larger in scale and complexity in recent times. While at one level, the issue can be viewed as a humanitarian crisis, the reason why the international community is anxiously watching the events unfold. At another level, the issue is intermixed with terrorism. Ironically, what was originally a state sponsored terror against a helpless minority, has now gone full circle to a terror group attacking the state. Myanmar authorities now cite the recent attack by the secretive Rohingya political group as the main cause of Rohingya sufferings.
There are more than a million Rohingyas living in Arakan. If all of them leaves, will India be spared? The best thing going on for Bangladesh now, is that the international community is viewing our plight with understanding and compassion. The crisis needs to be portrayed as a humanitarian support that Bangladesh is extending to the nationals of a foreign country who have fled their homes for civil unrest. But we will also need to categorically point out to Myanmar and the outside world, that we cannot offer a permanent home to the Rohingyas.
They belong to their country. Myanmar will need to change their citizenship laws, to facilitate the return of the Rohingyas to their true home. (Choudhury, 2017).
