- Stars (0)
The Rohingya Issue : A Thorny Obstacle between Burma (Myanmar) and Bangladesh
By Kei NEMOTO — Nemoto Kei is Professor at the Faculty of Global Studies in Sophia University.
Though the political and economic relationships among the countries of the sub-region of Eastern South Asia have been strengthened since 1990s, the ties between Burma (Myanmar) and Bangladesh have often been disrupted by the Rohingya issue. The Rohingyas, a Muslim minority group residing in the northwestern part of the Arakan (Rakhine) State1 in Burma, have not been recognized as a national minority by the state since 1974 when the Ne Win government denied their citizenship officially. They have suffered from oppression under the Burmese government and the Burmese Army (Tatmadaw). They fled enmasse to Bangladesh twice by crossing the Naf River on the border. The Rohingya refugees numbered between 200,000 and 250,000 in 1978 and more than 250,000 in 1991. These exoduses largely were resolved through agreements on the repatriation between the two governments and relief operations by the United Nations as well as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
However, Burmese military government has no intention to accept those returnees as a national minority and instead classifies them as foreigners or illegal immigrants. The Government of Bangladesh which fears of accepting another mass exodus of refugees has been strengthening the border patrol system, but has actually not been able to stop the daily continuous trespassing of the Rohingyas from Arakan to Bangladesh. There seems no guarantee that another exodus may not happen in the future. Since the latter half of 1990s, the two towns, Maungdaw (of Arakan) and Teknaf (of Bangladesh) between the Naf River, have been identified by the two governments as the future strongholds for promoting the border trade2. However, it is evident that without any solutions to the Rohingya issue these two towns will never become a stable area for profitable border trade. It is symbolic that an expected gas pipeline route (which appeared in public in 2005) from Burma’s Shwe field to Kolkata (India) via the plain of Bangladesh passes through a circuitous way of the mountain area of the northern Arakan, Mizoram and Tripura of the northeastern India. It is expected to avoid passing by the shorter seashore route through Maungdaw and Teknaf where the Rohingya refugee problems exist as a serious matter.
Taking these facts into consideration, this article attempts to deal with the present situation of the Rohingyas by presenting a historical background of the issue, which is an obstacle in the normalization of relations between Burma and Bangladesh. I will first summarize some basic points about the issue and then look into the two confronting discourses on the identification of ”Rohingya” within the history of Arakan, which have been written by the Rohingya and the Arakanese protagonists respectively. Then I will make a comparison with the third person’s analysis on this matter, and point out how the confrontation between the Buddhists and Muslims in Arakan became serious, though they had been able to coexist generally for more than a few hundred years. Finally, as a conclusion, I will provide a suggestion for a solution of the problem.
What is the Rohingya Issue? The Rohingyas are a Muslim ethnic group residing in the Buthidaung and Maungdaw Townships of the northwestern part of the Arakan State, Burma. This area, which is adjacent to the Naf River as boundary from Bangladesh, is also called the Mayu region. They live here as the majority together with the Buddhist Arakanese and Burmese. Since no accurate census has ever been taken, the population of the Rohingyas is unknown. However, the numbers seems less than one million, though they themselves insist that it is between one to two million including the people living in exile (Smith 1991, p.30). Their occupations consist of rice farming peasants as the majority, and others such as traders, fishermen, woodsmen, craftsmen, mariners and sailors, and laborers. Though the naming of ”Rohingya” seems to have come about only recently5 (around the beginning of 1950s), the Muslims in Arakan have a long history since the beginning of the Mrauk-U dynasty (1430-1785) of the Arakan Kingdom. There is a possibility that they even resided there before the emergence of the Kingdom. However, since Arakan and Tenasserim were occupied by the British after the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824-26), the confrontation between the Muslims residing in the northwestern part of Arakan and the Buddhists as the majority in central and southern Arakan became tense, because a large scale Indian immigration was encouraged by the British.
Whether the exact beginnings of Muslim settlement in Arakan is still to be determined, it is reasonable to understand that they have been residing there since the period of the Arakan Kingdom (Mrauk-U dynasty). They were the origin of the Muslims in Arakan. Also it has been questioned whether those Muslims are equivalent to the present Rohingyas, Yegar’s discussion is convincing: that those Muslims who had resided since the days of Mrauk-U dynasty and the Muslims from Chittagong who immigrated into Arakan in 19th and 20th century were integrated to some extent and comprised the present Rohingyas. The naming of Rohingya by themselves is a relatively recent invention, but there is no reason to deny there existence as an ethnic group whether their naming was old or new.
Taking these understandings into consideration, the Rohingya have a right to be recognized as a national group in present Burma and to be treated equal to other ethnic nationals. Even if a strong image of the ex-immigrants from Chittagong sticks on them, it is meaningless to avoid those people as foreigners. There is no rational reason to put the year of 1823 as a criterion for dividing the people in Burma between indigenous and non-indigenous. In order to change the situation in the border of Burma and Bangladesh from an explosive area of another possible exodus to a stable area where the border trade can be increased and be prospered, the first step to be taken is to ”qualify” those Rohingyas as a Burmese national ethnic group. Without taking this measure, nothing will be improved and a thorny obstacle may remain for another uncountable decades. Not only the Government of Bangladesh but also the international community in all are expected to make efforts to persuade the military government of Burma to accept the Rohingyas into their national community.
