The fighting in Rakhine now is part of a wider rebellion against Myanmar's junta, three years after it ousted an elected civilian government in a coup, triggering nationwide protests that have morphed into an armed uprising.
The Myanmar military’s continuous air and ground assaults against the Arakan Army (AA) along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border in the past few weeks have triggered fears of fresh entry of Rohingyas into the country.
Rohingya human rights activist Razia Sultana talks to Shuprova Tasneem from The Daily Star on Rohingya Genocide Remembrance Day.
Growing up in a bicultural household, I was exposed to two languages, two cultures, as a child. I picked up both the languages as my mother tongue—Bangla and Rakhine. Eventually, a third language,
The present conditions in Rakhine are not conducive for safe and sustainable return of the Rohingya refugees, said the UN refugee agency yesterday.
The situation has been further aggravated by the fact that host Bangladesh is itself a poor country, with a high population density, and that the country's southeast region is not the most geographically accessible area, with hilly terrains and lack of proper infrastructure.
To say that the report on the Rakhine situation, submitted to the UN in May this year and which was bottled up by the UN, is shocking, would be an understatement. And even more so given the fact that the Horsey study was commissioned by the UN itself.
Rohingyas of northern Arakan are facing yet another round of armed atrocities. Not only are they at the receiving end of indiscriminate use of bullets, bayonets and firing from helicopter gunships; their homes, hearths, livestock, crops and businesses are being consumed by bellowing fire deliberately lit by the Burmese security forces and their Rakhine cohorts.
Suspected insurgents kill at least six members of a Buddhist ethnic minority in western Myanmar, the government and regional sources say, amid spiralling violence in troubled Rakhine state.
Myanmar has rescued two migrant boats holding more than 200 people in its waters near the border with Bangladesh.