BANGKOK – In recent years, attacks on the Muslim Rohingya by the Buddhist Rakhine have forced almost 150,000 Rohingya into camps after their villages were destroyed. Since then, an estimated 120,000 have run a gauntlet of stormy seas as well as abuse and extortion by traffickers in order to escape to Malaysia. “People do not have any freedom here,” said Myo Win, a Rohingya speaking to the NAR by telephone from Sittwe, the Rakhine regional state capital. “That is why they try to go to Malaysia,” he added.
Tag: Chris Lewa.
The depths of desperation – The Edge Review
YANGON – Bodies buried in the jungle, camps hurriedly abandoned, officials arrested, police suspended from duty, thousands of desperate refugees adrift at sea and pushed back into international waters by foreign navies. Muslim Rohingya have been fleeing discrimination in Myanmar by running a gauntlet of extortion, rape, starvation and sometimes execution in the remote jungles of Thailand’s south, a usual way station en route to Malaysia. But after a recent crackdown on traffickers by Thailand, thousands of distressed refugees are being pushed back to sea by Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand as they attempt to dock, their boats abandoned by crew.
Random shooting or political violence? – The Edge Review
www.theedgereview.com – digital/app download available here (subscription) Shots fired at leading Myanmar lawmakers in KL By SIMON ROUGHNEEN / Yangon...
Timorese pushback of Burmese refugees prompts unease, confusion – The Irrawaddy
http://www.irrawaddy.org/archives/41606 RANGOON — Confusion remains over the recent refusal by the East Timor government to allow a group of...
UN envoy visits Myanmar as ethnic clashes test reforms – Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2012/0731/UN-envoy-visits-Myanmar-as-ethnic-clashes-test-reforms BANGKOK – As a UN human rights envoy visits the troubled western Myanmar state of Rakhine, recent ethnic...
Bangladesh Pressures Rohingya after EU Visit – The Irrawaddy
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=17867 The Bangladesh authorities have renewed arrests and pushback of Rohingya refugees in the days following the departure of...
Rohingya Can Only Starve in Bangladesh – The Irrawaddy
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=17842 Pressure is mounting on the Bangladesh Government to cease what European Parliamentarians and NGOs are calling “an unprecedented...
The People Nobody Wants – ISN
The plight of the Burmese Rohingya made headlines in early 2009 when Thai security forces were accused of pushing...