It’s ethnic cleansing, UN official says
ROHINGYA PLIGHT: Survivors tell of Myanmar military atrocities, including rapes and killings
MYANMAR is carrying out “ethnic cleansing” of Rohingya Muslims, a United Nations official has reportedly said, as horrifying stories of gang rape, torture and murder emerge from among the thousands who have fled to Bangladesh.
Up to 30,000 of the impoverished ethnic group have abandoned their homes in Myanmar to escape the unfolding violence, the UN said, after troops poured into the narrow strip where they live this month.
John McKissick, head of the United Nations High Commisioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the Bangladeshi border town of Cox’s Bazar, told the BBC that troops were “killing men, shooting them, slaughtering children, raping women, burning and looting houses, forcing these people to cross the river” into Bangladesh.
Dhaka had resisted urgent international appeals to open its border to avert a humanitarian crisis, instead, telling Myanmar it must do more to prevent the stateless Rohingya minority from entering.
“It’s very difficult for the Bangladeshi government to say the border is open because this would further encourage the government of Myanmar to continue the atrocities, and push them out until they have achieved their ultimate goal of ethnic cleansing of the Muslim minority in Myanmar,” McKissick said.
A spokesman for Myanmar President Htin Kyaw slammed the comments.
“I would like to question the professionalism and ethics which should be followed and respected by UN staff. He should speak based on concrete and true facts, he shouldn’t make accusations,” said Zaw Htay.
It’s not the first time such claims have been made against Myanmar.
In April 2013, Human Rights Watch claimed that the government was conducting an ethnic cleansing against Rohingyas — an accusation rejected by then president Thein Sein as a “smear campaign”.
But the scale of human suffering was becoming clear on Thursday, as desperate people like Mohammad Ayaz told how troops attacked his village and killed his pregnant wife.
Cradling his 2-year-old son, he said troops killed at least 300 men in the village market and gang-raped dozens of women before setting fire to around 300 houses, Muslimowned shops and the mosque where he served as imam.
“They shot dead my wife, Jannatun Naim. She was 25 and seven months pregnant. I took refuge at a canal with my 2-year-old son, who was hit by a rifle butt.”
Ayaz sold his watch and shoes to pay for the journey and had taken shelter at a camp for unregistered Rohingya refugees.
outside the Myanmar embassy in Bangkok Rohingya refugee unregistered refugee camp at Ukhiya, southern Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh on Thursday.
As the crisis deepened, Bangladesh said on Wednesday it had summoned Myanmar’s ambassador to express “deep concern”.
Since the latest violence flared up, Bangladesh border guards had intensified patrols and coast guards had deployed extra ships. Officials said they had stopped around a thousand Rohingyas since Monday.
Farmer Deen Mohammad was among the thousands who evaded the patrols, sneaking into the town here four days ago with his wife, two children and three other families.
“They (Myanmar's military) took my two boys, aged 9 and 12, when they entered my village. I don’t know what happened to them,” Mohammad, 50, said.
“They took women in rooms and then locked them from inside. Up to 50 women and girls of our village were tortured and raped.”
Mohammad said houses in his village were burned, echoing similar testimony from other arrivals.
Rohingya community leaders said hundreds of families had taken shelter in camps in border towns here and in Ukhia, many hiding for fear they would be sent back.
Police on Wednesday detained 70 Rohingya, including women and Indonesian police officers protest in Jakarta yesterday.
at an
and his family in a refugee camp in Teknaf on Thursday. The farmer claims that the two elder sons and he does not know what happened to them. children, who they say would be sent back across the border.
“They handcuffed even young girls and children, and then took them away to push them back to Myanmar,” said one community leader, adding that they faced “certain death” if made to return.
Yesterday, angry Muslim protesters took to the streets from Jakarta to
during a
Dhaka to denounce Myanmar.
Around 5,000 Bangladeshi Muslims demonstrated in Dhaka after prayers, with hundreds more in Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta and Bangkok, to accuse Myanmar of ethnic cleansing and genocide in its northern Rakhine state.
The Dhaka protesters gathered outside the Baitul Mokarram mosque, the country’s largest, to demand an end to the violence, denounce Suu Kyi and call for Bangladesh to accept fleeing Rohingyas.
In Jakarta, around 200 demonstrators from local Islamic organisations protested outside the Myanmar embassy. Chanting “God is great”, they called for the government of Indonesia to break off diplomatic ties with Myanmar and for Suu Kyi’s 1991 Nobel Peace Prize to be revoked.
“This genocide is happening to women, children and the elderly," said Maya Hayati, a 34-year-old housewife.
“If they (Myanmar) don’t want them, then it’s probably better to send them to another country. Don’t torture them like that in their own country.” AFP