No Justice, Freedom Since 2017 Atrocities." The headline of the report says it all.
The genocidal campaign that the Myanmar military launched in August, 2017 against the unarmed civilian Rohingya population of the Rakhine state in Myanmar forced hundreds of thousands of them to flee their bulldozed and burnt down ancestral homes to safety in neighbouring Bangladesh. The enormity of the brutality perpetrated against men, women and children of the Rohingya community by the Myanmar's military under the watch of a Nobel Peace Prize winner, Aung San Suu Kyi, who then headed the government of that country as its State Counsellor, shocked the world. The genocide that the Myanmar military perpetrated got the endorsement of the country's civilian head, because she refused to admit any wrongdoing by, at that time, her army. Ironically though, it is the same army, the inhuman atrocities of which against the Rohingya she tried to whitewash before the world community, even before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), has now proved to be her nemesis.Thus persecuted and hounded out of their homeland, the only place these traumatised people could flee to for safety was Bangladesh. That is because they had their fellow people who were persecuted earlier by the Myanmar military did also take shelter in refugee camps of Cox's Bazar, a southern district of Bangladesh. With more than 700,000 fresh entrants, the number of Rohyngya refugees in the Cox's Bazar camps swelled to over a million.
Six years have passed since. The outpouring of sympathy, especially from the rich and powerful Western democracies, ignited hope in the hearts of the devastated Rohingya who found shelter in the refugee camps in Bangladesh and those still remaining in Myanmar in temporary shelters in total segregation from the mainstream life without any rights. Following the February 2021's coup, the Myanmar military again arrested thousands of Rohingya for, what it said, unauthorised travel, blocked the supply of international aid to them and subjected them to all forms of deprivation and torture. Even after the severe cyclonic storm that struck the Rakhine state in mid-May, the Myanmar junta did 'block live-saving humanitarian aid including urgently needed medical care for communities experiencing dengue and malaria outbreak', reports HRW.
Here on the other side of the border in Bangladesh, the aid flow for the Rohingya in the refugee camps of Cox's Bazar has been gradually petering out. 'The 2023 UN Joint Response Plan for the Rohingya humanitarian crisis has received less than one third of the USD876 million' sought from donors, adds the HR report. As a result, since February this year, the World Food Programme (WFP) has cut back on food rations for the Rohingya. Their monthly ration has come down from USD12 to USD8. Small wonder that malnutrition is endemic among the residents of the refugee camps. With no assured source of sustenance, no medicare, no work, no future for their children, even no possibility of return to their homeland anytime soon, what is then the future of the Rohingya? Many have already lost their lives during their dangerous journey on boats across the sea to Malaysia and Indonesia. No one wants these stateless, homeless people.
Following the mass exodus of Rohingya people from their homeland in November, 2017, the then-Myanmar government led by Aung San Suu Kyi signed a bilateral agreement with Bangladesh for repatriation of, what they (Suu Kyi's government) said, 'displaced Myanmar nationals'. Understandably, China was behind that move. But things did not progress much due to insincerity of both Suu Kyi's government and the military government that usurped power in Naypyidaw in February 2021. Clearly, it was a stratagem by the successive Myanmar governments to hoodwink the international community. In fact, the Myanmar generals who carried out the Rohingya massacre were facing the charge of crime against humanity at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). So, they needed a ploy to show a human face to the world. The UN Security Council (UNSC), too, could not do anything to hold the Myanmar government to account. The UNSC cannot reach any consensus on the issue because its important members including China, Russia and India have friendly relations with the Myanmar junta.
Bangladesh has been playing host to the Rohingya fleeing Myanmar authorities' persecution since the 1960s after the military toppled the elected government in Rangoon and denied Rohingya people their citizenship. August 2017 only saw the largest such flight of the Rhingya from Myanmar to Bangladesh.
So far, the international community has been very appreciative of Bangladesh's generosity. The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday (August 25, 2023) expressed his government's deep gratitude to Bangladesh government and its people for giving shelter and refuge to nearly one million Rohingya.
But itself a densely populated country with its limited resources and environmental issues, how long can Bangladesh be expected to remain generous? US sanctions and visa restrictions on Myanmar's generals and entities alone are not enough. Stronger and more concerted actions from the international community are required to make the Myanmar junta see reason.
The Rohingya, practically forgotten by the rest of the world, are also losing patience every passing day.
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