Friday, October 6, 2017

The Irrawaddy Magazine

The Irrawaddy Magazine

Abducted Hindu Rica: ARSA Killed My Husband

Posted: 06 Oct 2017 08:19 AM PDT

On Aug. 25, Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) launched coordinated attacks on 30 police posts in Buthidaung, Maungdaw and Rathedaung townships in Rakhine State.

The Myanmar government released a statement on Sept. 24 saying ARSA abducted around 100 men and women from several Hindu villages in Kha Mauk Seik village tract on Aug. 25 and killed the majority of abductees.

Security forces unearthed 45 dead Hindus, including six children, near Ye Baw Kya village in northern Maungdaw Township on Sept. 24 and 25.

Eight Hindu women, aged between 15 and 25, and eight children who said they were abducted by ARSA arrived back in Myanmar on Oct. 3 and gave their accounts of the massacre.

According to their account, about 500 Muslim villagers of Khamaungseik led by self-identifying Rohingya leader Norulauk and what they described as a "foreign terrorist leader in black dress" came and killed 45 villagers of Ye Baw Kya on Aug. 25.

Rica, 25, one of eight Hindu women whose husband was killed by ARSA told The Irrawaddy about the massacre, how they were abducted and how they eventually escaped:

Ma Rica, how is your health and how are things going with you?

I'm good. Everything is fine. We're now staying at military camp [in Buthidaung]. We don't know how long we have to stay here. We are altogether eight women and eight children.

When did you arrive back in Myanmar?

We arrived back on Oct. 3. We came [back] from Bangladesh. We had to stay one month and five days in Bangladesh at Kutupalong Refugee Camp. Bengalis tried to find us to kill us.

How were you abducted by terrorists?

They came into our village [Ye Baw Kya] around 8 a.m. on Aug. 25. They took all our phones, and surrounded the village. They tied us up and blindfolded the men. They beat the men, and asked how much gold and cash we had. I gave them all my possessions. Then they took all the villagers outside the village to Baw Tala village. Then they put men and women in separate groups. We eight women were put in a separate place. They slit the throat of men first, and knifed children and women. Then they asked eight of us if we would convert to Islam, and we won't be killed if we did. They said the God we believe in is nothing and their Islam is mighty. So, we said we would convert to Islam if they didn't slash us. So, they didn't kill us.

What happened then?

We stayed overnight in Baw Tala village that day. We were forced to eat beef [Hindu followers abstain from eating beef], and study to dress like Muslim [women]. We didn't eat, but the children ate a little.

Didn't you beg terrorists not to kill your husbands?

We did. We went down on bended knees and begged them. We had given them all our gold and made them promise not to kill our husbands. They slashed my husband even after they got gold from us. I told them that I had given them a lot of gold and asked them not to kill him. When they were about to kill my children, I said I won't do as they want if they kill my children. I said I didn't want to survive if they killed my children. [So, they didn't.] We have a gold shop. Bengalis took all 30 ticals of gold and over four million kyats.

How did they take you to Bangladesh?

They took us on foot beyond the mountains in the west of Khamaungseik village. We had to sleep two nights on mountains. We had nothing to eat and it was absolutely terrible. We arrived in Bangladesh on Aug. 28.

Who were the people who attacked your village?

They included villagers of Khamaungseik as well as terrorists. I recognized around ten Khamaungseik villagers. Their leader is Norulauk. While we were detained at Baw Ta La village, five people guarded us. Others left, saying they would attack the government. The five men who were guarding us said this area [Rakhine] is not a Hindu State, not a Bamar State. They said they would turn the area [from Maungdaw border] to Sittwe to their [self-identifying Rohingya] State.  We were brought by those five Bengalis to Bangladesh. The rest were left in Myanmar reportedly to attack the government. Now, they are in Bangladesh. I saw them in clothes which they had taken from our brothers and husbands.

Who came and rescued you from Bangladesh?

We arrived in Bangladesh on Aug. 28 at Kutupalong Camp. Then, they brought Mawlawis and initiated us into the Islam faith. We were asked to repeat Muslim words and shout "Allah." We were also asked to eat beef, and wear Burqas. Then a Muslim boy there reportedly told a Hindu barber at Kutupalong market that eight Hindu women from Myanmar were being Islamized. Hindu elders came and rescued us around 8 p.m. in the evening.

How did the Muslim boy know about you?

As soon as we arrived in Bangladesh, we were given lunch at a house. Then, they interviewed us and video-recorded it. They asked us to say in the interview that Hindus were killed by Arakanese people. They also asked us to say that our husbands, parents and relatives as well as Muslims were killed by the government; and that we would be killed if we didn't.

So, how did you escape?

We contacted [Hindu community leader] U Ni Mal. We sneaked out of Kutupalong Camp. We left for Taung Pyo Letwe in the car of a Hindu man. It took around one and a half hours. On the way, we were inspected by the Bangladesh border guards. The driver said we were going to Deepavali Festival [a Hindu religious festival]. When we got out of the car, we saw government officials waiting for us in Taung Pyo Letwe.

The post Abducted Hindu Rica: ARSA Killed My Husband appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Yangon Launches Water Bus Service

Posted: 06 Oct 2017 04:12 AM PDT

YANGON— After a delay of three months, a water bus service on Yangon's rivers rolled out on Friday, offering a new transport option to the city's 5.2 million residents.

Thirteen boats will connect Bohtataung and Insein townships with seven stops in between under the first phase of the project which launched Friday, Daw Tint Tint Lwin, the chairwoman of Tint Tint Myanmar company which won a tender to provide water bus services in February, said at the launching ceremony.

Three imported boats from Australia which can carry each 180-230 passengers, three boats from Thailand which can carry 60 passengers and seven locally constructed boats which can carry 150 passengers will run between 6:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. every day.

The stops include Bohtataung Terminal (Bohtataung Pagoda compound), Nan Thi Da Terminal (Pansodan Street), Lan Thit Jetty (Lan Thit Street), Kyee Myindaing Terminal (Kyee Myaing Kanar Road, near Zay Gyee Street), Hlaing Terminal (Hlaing Station Road, next to Shwe Padauk Fish market), Punn Hlaing (Punn Hlaing Golf Estate) and Insein Terminal (Aung Zay Ya Bridge).

The chairwoman said it takes about two hours to drive from Insein to Botahtaung, but by the water buses, it will only take around 45 minutes.

The initiative falls under the regional government's plans to upgrade public transport services to relieve worsening traffic jams in the former capital and commercial hub, following the new bus system that launched in January.

Yangon Chief Minister U Phyo Min Thein and officials taking a water bus in Yangon on Friday (Photo: Thet Tun Naing/ The Irrawaddy)

Yangon Chief Minister U Phyo Min Thein said at the launching ceremony that he hopes the new water transport will be helpful for the traffic congestion on Yangon's roads which has caused commuter journeys to lengthen, pledging the government was strict in ensuring the tender-award winning company was up to standard on safety and security.

The service was previously planned to launch in late June. Daw Tint Tint Lwin told The Irrawaddy that there had some delay in importing boats because of bad weather and also in arranging the required documents with the related government departments for the project.

She said based on the customers' demand, the routes and stops will be expanded under the Yangon regional government's instructions.

Two routes along Nga Moe Yeik Creek and Thanlyin Township will follow within three to six months after the jetties have been constructed, she said.

Some 56 to 67 boats are expected to service the full operation, which aims to serve an annual 12 million commuters this year and a projected 24 million by 2020.

"I hope to get full customers on all 13 boats under phase one as even in the trial there was high demand," she added.

She added that Yangon Region Transport Authority is also arranging to expand the bus lines that connect the water bus terminals.

Commuters will use a top-up card payment system with water bus rides costing between 300 and 500 kyats.

The post Yangon Launches Water Bus Service appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Mass Exodus of Muslims from Rakhine ‘Not Honest’: Govt Spokesperson

Posted: 06 Oct 2017 04:01 AM PDT

NAYPYITAW — The Myanmar government's spokesperson has questioned the motives behind the mass migration of Muslims from northern Rakhine State to neighboring Bangladesh in the last month, claiming there are no clashes at all in the area.

"We believe that [self-identifying Rohingya Muslims] are plotting against the government by misleading [the international community] that there is mass migration," said U Zaw Htay, who is also director-general of the State Counselor Office.

More than half a million self-identifying Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine State since Aug. 25, bringing with them tales of rape, murder, and arson during Myanmar Army security operations the UN's human rights body has labeled "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing."

The UN's humanitarian aid chief said on Friday they were bracing for a possible "further exodus" from Rakhine State, according to Reuters. An estimated 2,000 self-identifying Rohingya continue to flee Rakhine State daily according to the International Organization for Migration.

"This flow out of Myanmar has not stopped yet, it's into the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya [who are] still in Myanmar, we want to be ready in case there is a further exodus," Mark Lowcock, UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs told a news briefing in Geneva on Friday, according to Reuters. "Half a million people do not pick up sticks and flee their country on a whim."

The self-identifying Rohingya Muslims are denied citizenship and classified as illegal immigrants, despite claiming roots in Myanmar that go back centuries, with communities marginalized and subjected to bouts of violence over the years.

Myanmar has denied it is pursuing ethnic cleansing in the state and, according to Reuters, Myanmar and Bangladesh agreed on Monday to form a working group to commence plans for the repatriation of refugees.

"It is not honest. [Self-identifying Rohingya Muslims] are fleeing even as we have told them that nobody would cause any harm to them, and [the government] would provide security and social assistance," U Zaw Htay said.

U Zaw Htay said there were also reports of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA)—a self-identifying Rohingya militant group which sparked the latest violence with deadly attacks on 30 police outposts on Aug. 25—making threats by phone from Bangladesh to Muslims in Rakhine State, encouraging them to leave for Bangladesh, he said.

"So, it is also possible that they are fleeing because of fear and concerns that they will be alone when renewed clashes occur," he said.

"But then, we also heard reports that Muslims were paid to leave by boat [from Rakhine] and arrive at the camp [in Bangladesh]. Putting two and two together, this has brought into question who are funding them to leave," he added.

During a visit of Myanmar State Counselor's Office Minister U Kyaw Tint Swe to Bangladesh Dhaka this week, Bangladesh said it regarded ARSA as a common enemy of the two countries.

In her diplomatic briefing in September focusing on the Rakhine issue, State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi urged the international community not just to look at problems but also to look at the areas where there were no problems.

She explained that 50 percent of Muslim villages remained intact. Human Rights Watch said last month that more than half of 400 self-identifying Rohingya villages in Maungdaw and Buthidaung townships had showed fire damage, according to satellite imagery.

"If those people remain [in Rakhine State] Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's statement is valid. At such time, attempts at mass migration is not honest, I think. Because Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has called the international community to help find out the reason behind the exodus," said former political prisoner U Tun Kyi who is a Muslim.

"So, I think they are trying to contradict the statement of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi."

Since last week of September, thousands of self-identifying Rohingya Muslims from villages in Buthidaung have gathered at the border with Bangladesh. According to the government information committee, there were around 13,000 Muslims at the border.

"Together with community elders, we met them and asked if they needed any assistance. They replied mildly that their relatives [from Bangladesh] called them and they would go and settle with them," said U Tin Maung Swe, secretary of Rakhine State government.

"They said they have no problems. Entire villages are leaving and therefore there are thousands of people," he said.

Though authorities dissuaded them from leaving and promised to provide security, health care and food, they refused to stay, he added.

"But I don't like them breaking through border fences. The border is quite long and they can go [into Bangladesh] through other ways," said U Tin Maung Swe.

U Tun Kyi said he condemned any person or organization which is deliberately forcing a mass exodus. He said he believed that there are persons and organizations that have exerted improper influence over people of poor education-level in the area.

"There are a lot of interests. ARSA also has interests. The government and the Tatmadaw have shown arms seized from ARSA to international diplomats. Those arms are old and broken. Why can't the government defeat ARSA which only have broken guns?" questioned U Tun Kyi.

Upper House parliamentarian U Khin Maung Latt said international laws allow people to flee and it is difficult for the government to stop them.

"Authorities said they would provide security and food, but they don't accept it. They may get more relief supplies and aid there, and they may get into a third country. There are such incentives. So, they were told that they would face troubles if they stay here and were talked into leaving for Bangladesh," said U Khin Maung Latt.

Myanmar's government was facing allegations of human rights violations because of the unfair portrayal of the issue by international media, he said.

The post Mass Exodus of Muslims from Rakhine 'Not Honest': Govt Spokesperson appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

Ready to Fight Again: The Homeless Muslims Still Backing Myanmar Insurgency

Posted: 05 Oct 2017 10:17 PM PDT

COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh — For 28-year-old Self-identifying Rohingya Muslim shopkeeper Mohammed Rashid, the evening phone call from organizers of the fledgling insurgent movement came as a surprise.

“Be ready,” was the message.

A few hours later, after meeting in the darkness in an open field, he was one of 150 men who attacked a Myanmar Border Guard Police post armed with swords, homemade explosives and a few handguns. At the end of a short battle, half a dozen men he had grown up with in his village were dead.

“We had no training, no weapons,” said Rashid, from the Buthidaung area of Myanmar’s Rakhine state, who had joined the group just two months earlier.

Accounts from some of those, like Rashid, who took part in attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) on dozens of police posts early on Aug. 25 paint a picture of a rag-tag band of hopeless, angry villagers, who were promised AK-47 rifles but ended up fighting with sticks and knives.

Hundreds joined as recently as June, according to the accounts, and membership meant little more than a knife and messages from leaders on the popular mobile messaging app Whatsapp.

Reuters interviewed half a dozen fighters and members of the group now sheltering in Bangladesh, as well as dozens of others among the more than half a million Self-identifying Rohingya refugees who have fled across the border to escape a Myanmar army counteroffensive that the United Nations has branded ethnic cleansing.

ARSA, which emerged in 2016, says in press releases and video messages from its leader, Ata Ullah, that it is fighting for the rights of the Self-identifying Rohingya, a stateless Muslim minority that has long complained of persecution in mainly Buddhist Myanmar.

Myanmar says ARSA is a ruthless Islamist extremist movement that wants to create an Islamic republic in northern Rakhine.

Despite the massive suffering inflicted on their communities in the weeks since the August attacks, most of the fighters now stuck in dirt-poor camps said they were determined to continue their fight and some refugees voiced support for the insurgency.

Other refugees Reuters spoke to criticized the insurgents for bringing more misery upon them.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s spokesman, Zaw Htay, said ARSA had killed many Muslims who had cooperated with the authorities and so “people have felt threatened and terrorized” into supporting it. He added that Myanmar’s intelligence showed that religious scholars were prominent in recruiting followers.

ARSA denies killing civilians, and did not respond to a request for comment this week.

Analysts say the violence could galvanize ARSA members and supporters huddled in the refugee camps and among those Self-identifying Rohingya still in Myanmar, as people feel they have even less to lose.

“A militancy like this finds fertile ground because of the desperation of the community,” said Richard Horsey, a Yangon-based analyst and former U.N. official. “They are willing to take suicidal steps because they don’t see any other choice.”

Transnational Islamist groups could also try to exploit the desperation in the camps to radicalise people, Horsey added. Al Qaeda last month called for support for the Self-identifying Rohingya.

Homemade Weapons and Whatsapp

Reuters could not independently verify the individual insurgents’ stories, but there were broad similarities in all of their accounts.

One fighter, 35-year-old Kamal Hussain from a village in Rathedaung in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, said he joined ARSA when a religious teacher stood in his village square in June, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, and implored a crowd of hundreds to fight.

“He said we have no choice but to attack Myanmar because our brothers and sisters are being killed day by day. I think everyone joined that day,” Hussain said, as he sat under a tarpaulin in a Bangladesh refugee camp. “We should attack again and again. I would go back to fight if I had the chance.”

Unlike longer-serving fighters, most new joiners had little or no training or contact with the group’s leaders, who communicated using Whatsapp and delivered rudimentary homemade explosives ahead of the assaults.

A third fighter, his account supported by comments from two elders from his village interviewed separately, said he and about 60 men from Myin Hlut signed up three months ago.

The 26-year-old, who asked not to be named because he feared arrest by Bangladeshi authorities, said he was among 200 men who attacked another police checkpost in the early hours of Aug. 25.

“We had only knives and sticks, no guns,” he said. “They promised us AK-47s but we got nothing. The explosives didn’t work. We had two of them for the whole group, but when we threw them nothing happened.”

About 40 fighters were killed, he said, but added that he would do it again if called on.

“I still support ARSA,” he said. “If my leaders call me to go again and fight, I will go back.”

According to two village-level commanders, there were Whatsapp groups restricted to leaders and others to members.

Bigger groups, administered from overseas, were used to build broader community support for ARSA and the Self-identifying Rohingya cause.

On his phone, Shoket Ullah, an uncle of the 26-year-old fighter, scrolled through messages posted in the Whatsapp group “ARSA.G1”, administered through a Saudi phone number, where ARSA press releases, videos of alleged Myanmar military violence and messages of support for Self-identifying Rohingyas were shared.

Another Whatsapp group on Ullah’s phone, “Rohingya Desh Arakan”, is administered by someone using a number from Malaysia. Tens of thousands of Self-identifying Rohingya live in both Saudi Arabia and Malaysia.

Local Backing

Self-identifying Rohingya anger at Myanmar has long existed, but this is the first serious armed resistance in decades.

In the crowded Bangladeshi camps, several refugees voice support for ARSA.

“I am disappointed and regret what happened but this was pre-planned by the Myanmar government,” said Shafi Rahman, a 45-year-old Burmese teacher whose village was burned to the ground the day after the attacks. “If ARSA didn’t attack, they would have done this to us anyway.”

Several refugees said some people had begun to sell cattle, vegetables and rice to raise funds for ARSA.

Not everyone was supportive, however. When Kamal Hussain, the fighter, argued that ARSA needed to keep fighting, his neighbors in the camp shouted him down.

“We have lost everything. Violence is not the answer,” shouted one elderly man, as muddy water spilled into the tent he now calls home.

It is not obvious how fighters would regroup and rebuild after so many have fled across the border or disappeared.

Three of the fighters who spoke to Reuters said they had been surprised by the ferocity of the Myanmar military’s response, and within weeks commanders had told their men to put down their weapons and abandon their villages.

Several said Whatsapp groups where regional and field commanders from ARSA, which before a rebranding this year called itself al-Yakin, or “Faith Movement”, would post updates had gone quiet.

“People who blame this on al-Yakin need to realize my people had to flee in 1978 and in the 1990s when there was no ARSA,” said one of the two village-level commanders, who grew up in Bangladesh after his family fled an earlier outbreak of violence, but returned to Myanmar in the 1990s.

“We should continue to attack. Even women can join.”

The post Ready to Fight Again: The Homeless Muslims Still Backing Myanmar Insurgency appeared first on The Irrawaddy.
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