Beware of Myanmar’s subterfuge
THE mixed messages coming out of Naypyidaw after the visit of Myanmar’s Union Minister U Kyaw Tint Swe to Bangladesh has said it all. Myanmar’s offer to take back the Rohingya is unmistakably a posturing on the part of Myanmar’s military and does not convey an honest intention.
It is a deceitful tactic to procrastinate the issue, and a handy expedient to assuage international opinion for the time being. And, while the move to formalise instruments of border management between the two countries is a good thing, to talk about it at a time when the sanctity of the border has been defiled by the forced efflux from Myanmar of more than half a million refugees is a very cruel joke.
Our priority should be to persuade Myanmar to work towards removing the underlying causes of the Rohingya conflict that has triggered mass exodus of the Rohingya into Bangladesh.
Bangladesh has been certainly caught by surprise by the develop- ment in the eastern border on Aug 25.
An influx of such magnitude was not anticipated, and the initial reaction of our administration was one of unsureness, hoping that push back would discourage the Rohingya influx. That was not to be, and the mid-course correction was a judicious move.
And while we are on the issue of exodus, I shall ask only one question. Which country in recent times has had to absorb more than half a million persecuted refugees fleeing their country? And that too in a span of less than a month.
We don’t want a pat on the back for taking in the refugees, thank you. We want concrete action.
Had a fraction of the Rohingya ended up in Australia, or on the shores of Europe, all hell would have broken loose. And were it not for the fact that they are Bengalis, and to boot Muslims most of them – there would perhaps have been moves afoot in some Western capitals to prevent the persecution and exodus of the Rohingya beyond the verbal admonitions administered to a country that is impervious to international public opinion.
There is every reason for us to be sceptical about Myanmar’s intentions. After all, we have been down this road before. We must not forget that Myanmar has worked out its strategy vis a vis the Rohingya. And nothing will make them deviate from the path to that objective – making the state of Rakhine Rohingya free – that they had formulated more than 50 years ago, short of duress brought upon them from the international com- munity. All other moves on the part of Myanmar are subterfuges employed as temporary expedient to stymie the current international pressure, which we all know are only transient. And our past experience with Myanmar on various agreements related to the Rohingya is not encouraging.
Apparently, Myanmar has resorted to dilatory tactics to prolong the matter. It should be clear that it has little intention to deliver on its undertakings on any past agreements with Bangladesh on the Rohingya. Had that been so, all those more than 300,000 refugees who came into Bangladesh so far should have been repatriated by now. Verification is a ruse.
Can anyone with common sense expect that a person being hounded out by the state forces would be in a position to retrieve his identity card and carry it along while fleeing?
Thus any future agreement with Myanmar on Rohingya must include the UN as was with the 1993 deal. The matter has gone beyond the bilateral. — The Daily Star/Asia News Network