Thursday, July 19, 2012

Press Release on the plight of the Rohingyas


Subject: Press Release  - Condemnation on Myanmar Expelling Rohingya
Press Release

18th July 2012


MYANMAR POLICY TO EXPEL ROHINGYA CONDEMNED


The Malaysian Consultative Council of Islamic NGOs (MAPIM) and the Secretariat for the Ulama Assembly of Asia ( SHURA ) strongly  condemn the recent announced policy of the Myanmar government that 800,000 Rohingyas will be herded to a camp and will be shifted to a third country .

This is a clear international criminal act which is extending the already existing policy of persecuting the Rohingya communities since 2 decades ago.

The historical facts that Rohingya is rightfully a legitimate people of Arakan , a once sovereign Islamic Sultanate, cannot be denied. Historians have not contested this fact and Rohingya has a legal right to claim their originality as sons and daughters of Arakan.

Not only are the Rohingyas denied of their basic human rights, they are also being oppressed to the extent of denying their right to live as legitimate citizens of the country.

The government of Myanmar does not have any legal right to banish the Rohingyas since their alleged status as immigrants must be proven. The Rohingyas have being living within the Arakan states for generations. In fact it is the Rakhines that were the invaders who occupied Arakan before the British colonial period. The British announced Arakan as part of Burma after giving it independence.

This announcement of expelling the Rohingyas from Myanmar is a clear violation of human rights against a minority ethnic. We are outrage by this barbaric policy announced by a supposedly democratic civil government of Myanmar.

Is the international community allowing another Palestine in the making? A once sovereign nation of people with legitimate citizenship, but with a stroke of the pen, all of a sudden becoming stateless and the authorities continuing their persecution on the Rohingyas with impunity.

The Rohingyas are voicing aloud that they are the legitimate people of Arakan. The oppressive military rule has targeted the Rohingya in their 19 military operations since 1962. The current Nasaka operation which is still ongoing has resulted in an inhuman treatment on the Rohingya population with a full throttle of the government machinery to massacre and torture them.

With 5 decades of oppression the UN has recognised the Rohingya ethnic as one of the most oppressed people in the world.

The Myanmar government under the military rule has massacred hundred of thousands of the Rohingyas. Unfortunately the genocide has been obscured from world attention leaving the Rohingyas vulnerable to inhuman treatment without notice by the outside world.

The Myanmar Government had intentionally framed a law on citizenship by conveniently deleting 9 minorities out of the 144 original list. The Rohingyas had been targeted and since then labeled as immigrants.

We call for the international communities to exert pressure on the Myanmar government to stop the injustice by the authorities inflicted on the Rohingyas. The recent extermination of thousands of Rohingyas and grave atrocities perpetrated onto them cannot be silenced by the change of the military regime to a civil government.

All OIC countries should call the Myanmar embassies to demand for a stop to the carnage and genocide.

We urge that the UN and the ASEAN to pressure the Myanmar government to allow all Rohingyas now a seeking refuge in 14 countries to allow them to return and restore their legitimate rights as citizens of Maynmar.

We urge a national reconciliation and dialogue be immediately negotiated to protect the rights of the minority Rohingya Muslims and other minorities who are suppressed by the former military junta.


Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid                             Abdul Ghani Samsuddin

Secretary General MAPIM                          Chairman  SHURA and

                                                                   World Ulama Muslimin Association ,

                                                                   Malaysia



No comments: