Rohingya crisis: Southeast Asia’s emerging security concern

• K. YHOME

'The Rohingya crisis,' has raised several concerns from regional security, humanitarian crisis to the nature of the conflict involving Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state in Myanmar

Source: AKRockfeller

• MYANMAR
• RAKHINE

For a long time, south and southeast Asia have seen the consequences of radicalisation. The ongoing conflicts in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state, known as ‘the Rohingya crisis,’ have raised several concerns from regional security, humanitarian crisis to the nature of the conflict involving Rohingya Muslims.

Recently, the conflicts resurfaced in northern Rakhine state when the Burmese military launched counterinsurgency operations in October, in the wake of militant attacks on three border outposts that killed nine policemen along Myanmar-Bangladesh border. The past weeks have witnessed thousands of Rohingyas fleeing the country to escape increasing violence while several hundred thousand were displaced at home.

According to the UN, over 10,000 people have fled across to Bangladesh. Those who managed to escape have reported horrifying stories, including arson, killing, rape and building down of villages. The government of Myanmar refused aid agencies and journalists entry to the conflict areas and has denied the allegations.

The estimated 1.3 million Rohingya Muslims minority in the Buddhist majority country are mostly concentrated in the northern part of the country’s coastal state of Rakhine that borders Bangladesh. The Myanmar government considers them ‘illegal immigrants’ from Bangladesh and are deprived of citizenship rights.

In 2012, when violence erupted between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and the ethnic Rohingya Muslims, it was widely viewed as a communal conflict between two ethno-religious groups. The renewed violence against the Rohingyas is challenging the discourse. Some activists argue that the issue is nothing but a ‘state-sponsored ethnic persecution.’ This claim was bolstered when a UN official based in Bangladesh called the recent conflicts in northern Rakhine state nothing less than ‘ethnic cleansing.’

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has said the Rohingya may be victims of ‘crimes against humanity.’ Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who heads a commission to find solutions to the violence in Rakhine, expressed ‘deep concerns’ over reports of military abuses but refused to use ‘genocide’ to describe the Rohingya crisis. The debate over this issue will intensify if Myanmar soldiers continue its repression on Rohingyas.