The Rohingya Issue in Myanmar

NEMOTO, Kei

10 OCTOBER 2015

1. The Current Situation:

The Rohingya are a Muslim ethnic minority
group living in the northwest part of Rakhine
State in Burma ( Myanmar). Rakhine State is
situated on the western coast of Burma, and its
northwestern part shares a border with neighboring Bangladesh across the Naaf River. The Rohingya came to be internationally known through
their mass outflow to Bangladesh as refugees,
which took place twicethe first of which took
place towards the end of the 1970s and the second at the beginning of the 1990s. While the majority of Rohingya refugees later returned to their
homeland, there are still several refugee camps
remaining in the area between Teknaf and Coxs
Bazar in the southernmost part of Bangladesh.
Today, there are a number of Rohingya people
who were born and grew up within these refugee
camps.
Following the second mass refugee outf low
at the beginning of 1990, border security was
strengthened by both the Bangladesh and Burma
governments, which made it tough for the Rohingya to f lee to Bangladesh via land routes.
Therefore, they gave up using land routes and in01

stead began taking sea routes using ships, aiming

to reach Malaysia and Indonesia.
In May 2015, an incident occurred in which
thousands of Rohing ya refugees on several
wooden boats became stranded and drifted at
sea, as authorities around the region refused to
take them. This news shocked the world. Against
the backdrop of this incident was the existence
of a pernicious refugee business. An illegal organization ran by Thais targeted the Rohingya,
collected money from them and secretly let them
board wooden boats sailing towards the southern part of Thailand. After landing, they led the
Rohingya to Malaysia and Indonesia for profit.
However, the Government of Thailand cracked
down against such illegal activities and placed
severe restrictions on the organizations movements, which led to cases where the organization
killed or abandoned the Rohingya as they were
too much trouble. Inevitably, the human trafficking sea route also became restricted and the situation developed where refugees were left stranded
and drifting on boats.
The adamant refusal to take the refugees by
the authorities of Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia, the first choice countries for the refugees
to land, made the problem more serious. However, following an international conference on 29

May 2015, in which 17 countries participated and

two countries sat as observers, Malaysia and Indonesia changed their position and accepted the
responsibility for the protection of the refugees
with a one-year time limit. This, of course did
not resolve the issue at all. Rather, all the important issues associated with this incident have only
been postponed.

A Rohingya migrant rescued by

Acehnese fishermen after being left on the sea for weeks.
Photos: Henri Ismail. Thanks to Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia.
See more of Henri Ismails photos
from Rohingya migrants in Aceh, Indonesia

Firstly, none of the countries involved are

willing to take responsibility for this issue. It is
not difficult to imagine the difficult situation
for these countries in facing unwanted refugees. Yet even taking into account of this, the
responses to the drifting refugees by Thailand
and Malaysia, where mass murder of the refugees
by human trafficking organizations took place,
has been too cold-hearted in view of the weight
of the responsibility that should be assumed.
Secondly, the sense of irresponsibility by the Burmese government, which should be shouldering
the bulk of the responsibility, is highly prominent. Burma initially was not even intending to
participate in the above-mentioned international
conference and took the attitude that, this is a
human trafficking problem and is nothing to do
with our country. Later, they realized that such
an attitude would not be accepted by other countries and decided to participate in the conference.
However, Burma insisted that other participating
countries not use the name the Rohingya, persistently sticking to their claim that, the refugees
drifting at sea are Bangladeshi people, and flatly
refused to acknowledge their responsibility.
The attitude to exclude the Rohingya taken by
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the Burmese government has been supported by

public opinion in the country since the 1970s.
Although the government temporarily recognized
the existence of Rohingya people after Burma
became independent (see the later part of this
paper), the Burmese government has maintained
the view of them as illegal immigrants from
Bangladesh for over 50 years. The government
does not recognize them as indigenous to Burma,
nor does it give them nationality, and continues
to use the name Bengalis (Bengali in Burmese
pronunciation). Meanwhile, the government of
Bangladesh also does not recognize the Rohingya
as their people and claims that they are an ethnic
group belonging to Burma. In this way, the Rohingya have been excluded from both countries.
Burmas anti-Rohingya sentiment stems from
the following facts; the Rohingya people have a
darker skin color and a chiseled features, they do
not speak Burmese fluently, and above all, that
they are Muslims. In addition, the Rohingya are
seen as people who believe in a particularly conservative form of Islam, and this is regarded as
the evidence that they are Bengalese and illegal immigrants.
When the Rakhine Buddhists attacked the
Rohingya in June 2012, the Burmese government built a quarantine space similar to a ghetto
in Sittwe in northern Rakhine State in order to
protect them, and kept many Rohingya people
confined there. Other Rohingya people were
also strictly prohibited to move outside of the
northwest area of Rakhine State. This condition
still continues as of July 2015, and as a result the
future prospects for the Rohingya people are not
only restricted but they also cannot escape from
the harsh living conditions where they suffer
from malnutrition and poor sanitation, and where
their children are unable to receive education.

Displaced Rohingya people in Rakhine State. Photo: UK Foreign &

Commonwealth Office. flickr stream

2. The History of the Rohingya:

Who are the Rohingya as an ethnic group
and what sort of history do they have? They are
indeed an ethnic group with a mysterious background, and this section will look into their history to the extent possible.
The Rohingya as a name appears in documents and historical materials only from1950. Towards the end of the eighteenth century, in 1799,
Dr. Francis Buchanan-Hamilton, a Scottish doctor working for the British East India Company,
recorded that there were people called Rooinga
in Rakhine, when he visited the then Kingdom
of Burma (the Konbaung Dynasty) via the Bengal region. However, it has not been proved as to
whether these Rooinga were the same group as
the present Rohingya. Dr. Buchanan-Hamilton
was a doctor with many talents, but his specialty
was medicine and he was not trained as a linguist
or ethnologist. Since the name Rooinga does
not appear in any other relevant literature written
by westerners other than him, the validity of his
claim is difficult to judge.

dhists and Muslims were observed. Incidentally,

the capital of this kingdom was called Mrohaung,
and the previously described Rohingya intellectuals claim that Rohang, the etymology of Rohingya, originated from this name.
Following the collapse of the Arakan Kingdom
in 1785 due to Burmese Kingdoms aggression,
the Barmar people governed the land for the following 40 years, while Muslims who did not appreciate this change fled to the Bengal side (some
Rakhine Buddhists also fled). Later, however, the
situation changed completely. There was an outbreak of the First Anglo-Burmese War in 1824.
When the Rakhine area became a British colony
following the defeat of the Burmese kingdom in
1826, Muslims started migrating on masse from
the Bengal side, which led to their resettlement
through several generations.

Meanwhile, Rohingya intellectuals who are

scattered around the world provide comments
on their own history going back as early as the
eighth century. However, it seems implausible
to think that Islam, which was established in
the Arabian Peninsula in the seventh century,
reached a distance place such as the west coast of
Burma in a mere100 years. Islam reached India
only in the ninth century.
Later, in the Arakan Kingdom (the Mra-U
Dynasty [also spelt Mrauk-U Dynasty], 14301785), which flourished from the first half of the
fifteenth century until the late eighteenth century, it is known that Muslims lived together with
Buddhists. Whereas this kingdom was a Buddhist
dynasty, the first to the eleventh kings were tolerant of Islam and Muslims to the point that they
introduced themselves using their Islamic names
when engaging in trade with Muslim merchants
at the Bay of Bengal. Historical records also confirm that there were Muslims with titled positions
within the royal palace. Muslim people within
the kingdom mainly consisted of the descendants
of people who had been brought in as prisoners
as well as mercenaries and their families. During
this period, no religious conflict between Bud03

This sudden inflow of immigrants destroyed

the coexisting relationship between Rakhine
Buddhists and Muslims. By the twentieth century, the confrontation between these two groups
was gradually becoming more serious. In Burma,
the whole of which became a British colony in

1886, many immigrants originating from India

also flowed into the capital Rangoon (Yangon).
Regardless of the status of these people, Hindus
or Muslims, they came as lower class workers,
and most came as short-term workers planning to
return to India in three to four years. In contrast,
the Muslims who immigrated to the northwest
of Rakhine settled there and indigenized themselves. This was the cause of creating gradual but
serious frictions between the Muslims and the
Buddhists.
The conflict between Buddhists and Muslims
was further exacerbated during the Second World
War. This was because the Japanese Army who
invaded this land armed some Buddhist Rakhines
and let them fight against Muslim forces, which
were armed by the British Army. The fight between the two groups developed into a religious
war, at a separate level from the battle between
Japan and Britain, and the conflict between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine ended up reaching an irreparable point as a result of this.
After the war, Burma gained independence in
1948. However, the northwest part of the Rakhine State, which shares the national boarder with
the then East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh),
remained as a region beyond the full control
of the central government until the beginning
of the 1950s. Bengalese Muslims who suffered
from food shortages in East Pakistan flowed into
Rakhine, intensifying the conflict between Buddhists. This new cluster of immigrants included
an armed rebel group called the Mujahideen led
by Pakistanis (which was suppressed by the Burmese Army at the beginning of the 1960s). During this period, the Rohingya came forward to
declare that Rohingya was the generic term for
the Muslim living in the region.
Today, the oldest document that includes the
name Rohingya that can be traced is a letter from
the Rohingya addressed to Prime Minister U Nu
in 1950. They handed a two-page letter under the
name of the Rohingya Elders of North Arakan
to the Prime Minister when he visited Maungdaw
(a town with a concentrated Rohingya population) in the northwest part of the Rakhine State.
Possibilities of the name of Rohingya being used
prior to this letter cannot be denied, but so far,
reliable historical sources on this matter have not
been found. Official documents (administrative
documents) produced by the British side, which
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was the suzerain state of Burma at that time, almost exclusively contain the term Chittagonians,
and neither Rohingya nor any names whose pronunciation (spelling) was close to Rohingya appear in these documents.
In fact, along with the ambiguity in the timing that these people began using the name Rohingya, it is also unclear how the three historical
layers of Muslims in this regionresidents since
the Arakan Kingdom period, immigrants from
Bengal during the British colonial period, and
new immigrants from around the period when
the country gained independencemingled and
for what reasons they began to hold the Rohingya
identity. Without solving this mystery, however,
the majority of public opinion will continue to
label them as illegal immigrants from Bengal.
This is because the Burmese public focuses only
on the third group, the layer of Muslim immigrants who came in the period immediately after
the war. To the Burmese public memory, it was as
if there had been no Muslim immigrants prior to
the influx of this third group.
Interestingly, a fact that is likely to have been
forgotten is that the the Burmese government
intended to accept the Rohingya for a certain
period of time following its independence. In the
post-independent Burmese Parliament (House of
Representatives), there were two Muslim members of parliament elected from the Akyab north
constituency in northern Rakhine. Their names
were Sultan Ahmed and Abdul Ghaffar, and they
were active as members belonging to the AntiFascist Peoples Freedom League (AFPFL). There
is no evidence to suggest that these two Muslim
members identified themselves Rohingya. Nonetheless, in part because they were members of the
ruling party, the Burmese government accepted
their claim and planned to make the Mayu region,
which includes Buthidaung town and Maungdaw
town where many Rohingya people lived, under
the central governments direct to prevent the
Buddhist Rakhines from intervening in order to
protect the Muslims in the northwest part of the
Rakhine State. In addition, during the late 1950s,
the government also permitted shortwave radio
broadcasting in the Rohingya language (to be
precise, the Chittagong dialect of Bengalese language) during a designated time of the day.
These considerations for the Rohingya disappeared in 1962 when the Burmese Army took

power from Prime Minister U Nu in a coup.

The new government aggressively promoted the
centralization of power under the slogan of the
Burmese Way to Socialism and escalated the
logic of excluding the Rohingya. The Buddhists
within the country supported this approach. Burmese nationalism which emerged during the British colonial period was developed by the middle
class Barmar people, and it emphasized the Burmese language and Theravada Buddhism,
which had continued to have a significant influence on many Burmese nationals in post-independence Burma. For this reason, people who did
not speak the Burmese language and did not believe in Theravada Buddhism were looked down
on by Barmar Buddhists, the majority, and the atmosphere in which these people were targeted for
exclusion became established in the country. The
anti-Rohingya sentiment became intensified in
particular due to the fact that Rohingya consisted
of immigrant Muslims, and this situation made it
more difficult to resolve the Rohingya issues.

of threads.
Ironically, following the change in the political
system from the military regime to a civil administration in March 2011, freedom of speech
was eased and religious discourse also became
liberalized. In this new environment, some
extremist Buddhist monks began conducting
sermons attacking Islam (de facto hate speech).
Previously under the military regime, this type of
sermon was regarded as a disturbance to peace
and monks were even imprisoned for such acts.
However, this is no longer the case in the present Burma. While the political use of religion is
prohibited in the constitution, there is little action taken today against these sermons, which are
almost the same as hate speech. Some Buddhists,
influenced by these malicious preachings, sometimes engage in dangerous actions such as physically attacking Muslims. Conscious of the majority of public opinion, Burmas domestic media
also hesitate to report critically the issue of antiIslam sermon conducted by monks.
The more we look at the reality, the more
difficult it becomes to find the clue to the fundamental solution to the Rohingya issue. The
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) and several other international NGOs,
which recognize this issue as a genuine human
rights issue, are taking actions to provide material
support for Rohingya people. However, the reality is that even these actions serve to antagonize
the majority of Buddhists within Burma.

Taung Paw Camp in Rakhine State, Burma. Photo: Foreign &

Commonwealth Office. flickr stream

3. Clues to Resolution:
The exclusive public opinion toward the Rohingya within Burma originated from the antiIndian immigrant sentiment, which developed
during the British colonial period. On top of this,
the Buddhist sides fear, which assumed that the
Muslims were trying to expand their population
in Burma, overlapped with this anti-Indian immigrant sentiment, and racist feelings based on their
skin color and the different look on their face
further hunched over it. It is most probably impossible to erase these feelings of fear and sentiments from the country in a short period of time.
It requires time-consuming and patient efforts, as
the process is like disentangling a complex web
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Meanwhile, it is also true that steady efforts

towards the formation of civil society have began
at a different level to the political activities in this
country. It is like a candlelight, which is faintly
shining far ahead in the darkness. Nonetheless,
although only little by little, dialogues between
ethnic groups as well as religions, and positive
moves towards mutual reconciliation of the conflict are showing signs of spreading these efforts
among the citizens. It is also a movement to liberate the people from the closed (exclusionary)
nationalism blanketing this country.
For example, there is a movement developed by
Min Ko Naing, who was a former student movement leader and a survivor of the long-term prison life as a political prisoner. At the national prodemocracy movement, which occurred in 1988,
he was active as a charismatic leader of student

movement and had gained national level popularity next to Aung San Suu Kyi. Because of this, the
military regime thoroughly contained Min Ko
Naing by imprisoning him as political prisoner
for a total of 20 years. During the imprisonment,
he continued his indomitable resistance consistently, until he was released fi nally in 2012. However, since the release he has not been involved at
all in party politics. Instead, he has been in gentle
cooperation with many people and organizations
towards forming civil society in Burma as a civic
activist to this day, and putting his efforts in the
development of a national movement seeking the
revision of the constitution, in attempts to hold
dialogues between religions and ethnic groups,
and in a wide range of cultural activities.
Activities led by Lahpai Seng Raw, a woman
from the minority ethnic group Kachin, are
also worthy of attention. She is the founder of
Burmas largest NGO called the Metta Development Foundation and, since the military regime
she has been committed to providing vocational
training for income generation and establishing
as well as operating kindergartens for minority
ethnic groups in the national border areas. In addition, she has also been involved in supporting
activities for the Internally Displaced Persons
(IDP) and refugees. In 2013, she was awarded the
Ramon Magsaysay Award, which is considered an
Asian equivalent to the Nobel Peace Prize. She
is one of the activists making steady efforts in
forming civil society in Burma whilst maintaining a certain distance from party politics, as in
Min Ko Naing.
In contrast to Aung San Suu Kyi who intentionally took path to enter the world of party politics,
the image of persons such as Min Ko Naing and
Lahpai Seng Raw aiming to form civil society outside of party politics and continue to make steady
efforts based on citizens perspectives is noteworthy in the political landscape in modern Burma.
No matter how time-consuming the work is, we
hope that someday we will be able to fi nd a clue
to the solution of the Rohingya issue to emerge
from such efforts. Unless the citizens of Burma
are released from its closed nationalism, this issue
will not move towards a resolution.
NEMOTO, Kei
Professor, Faculty of Global Studies,
Sophia University, Tokyo

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