C. Violence in 2012
5. Spreading hate
Generation Students Group.1492 The Chair of the Commission was Dr. Myo Myint, former Director-General at the Ministry of Religious Affairs; concerns were expressed to the Mission about his lack of independence.1493 The Commission published its report on 8 July 2013.1494 The Mission welcomes the fact that some parts of the report seek to reflect the perspectives of both communities on the violence. However, the report contains fundamental flaws that undermine its credibility.1495
(d) Displacement camps and sites
689. As of July 2013, about 140,000 people (Rohingya, Rakhine, Kaman and Maramagyi) were displaced in Rakhine State as a result of the 2012 violence. They initially lived in 76 displacement camps and sites.1496 Another 36,000 people were considered as “people in humanitarian need” having been adversely affected by the violence but without having been displaced. The displacement camps and sites were located across Rakhine State (see details in the map below).1497 About 95 per cent of those who were displaced in 2012-13 were Muslims, the great majority of them Rohingya, and the remaining five per cent were ethnic Rakhine and Maramagyi.1498
OCHA map of June 2013 showing the populatino affected by the 2012 violence in Rakhine State
690. By mid-2013, about 20 displacement sites in Sittwe and Maungdaw had closed. These were small sites, such as monasteries, where mostly ethnic Rakhine people had stayed for a short period. By the end of 2015, approximately 25,000 displaced people, including most of the Rakhine, had been assisted to return to their homes or to resettle, with individual housing assistance provided by the Rakhine State Government with support from the international community.1499
691. As of 31 July 2018, 128,000 people – mainly Rohingya along with a small number of Kaman – still remained in 23 displacement camps and sites across central Rakhine State.1500
1499 K-069.
1500 OCHA, “Myanmar: IDP Sites in Rakhine State - as of 31 July 2018” (20 August 2018).
They have not been allowed to return to their places of origin, and have been confined with severe restrictions on their freedom of movement. The majority of the displaced live in a large area on the outskirts of Sittwe town (see details in the map below).
OCHA map of July 2018 showing the displaced population in Rakhine State
692. The camps in Rakhine State do not meet international standards for long-term camp populations. Moreover, as highlighted above, the Mission considers that the holding of
Rohingya and Kaman in these camps and sites since 2012 constitutes an arbitrary and discriminatory deprivation of their liberty.1501
693. According to credible reports, when the camps were established, the authorities decided on their location and stated that they would not be permanent.1502 However, six years later, little has changed, with no indication that the situation will be resolved in the foreseeable future. The displaced population is heavily dependent on humanitarian assistance. The humanitarian community faces multiple challenges in seeking to improve conditions in the camps. Most of the displaced live in over-crowded long-houses with inadequate privacy and restrictions on access to livelihoods, health and education. 4,000 people displaced in the Nget Chaung 2 camp in Pauktaw Township live in muddy, wet, unsanitary conditions because the camp is located on low-lying land, which is continuously flooded.1503 During her visit in April 2018, the United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs described the conditions in the camps as “beyond the dignity of any people”.1504
694. In its interim report of March 2017, the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State (the Advisory Commission) recommended that the Government prepares a comprehensive strategy towards the closure of all the IDP camps “through a consultation process with affected communities”.1505 As a “first step and sign of goodwill”, the Commission called for the return and relocation of displaced people from three locations in Ramree, Pauktaw and Kyaukpyu. The Government claimed in May 2017 to have achieved this. However, while it successfully moved ethnic Rakhine from Kyaukpyu to a relocation site within Rakhine State, 55 Kaman households were relocated from Ramree to Yangon. They were told that they would not be allowed to return to their places of origin and were given small financial incentives. Furthermore, rather than returning the Rohingya from Kyein Ni Pyin camp (Pauktaw) to their places of origin, or offering them a durable solution elsewhere, the Government built individual houses on their displacement site.1506 Similarly, the Government’s pilot project to start closing the remaining displacement camps in Rakhine State, announced on 2 January 2018, is highly unsatisfactory.1507 According to credible reports, instead of closing the 10 camps in the pilot project, and returning the displaced to their places of origin or relocating them, the intention is to convert some of the displacement camps into villages. This goes against the wish, expressed by the majority of the displaced, to return to their places of origin, often located in urban centres.1508 It is also contrary to the final recommendations of the Advisory Commission. Implementation of these plans, as with Kyein Ni Pyin, will further entrench marginalization, segregation and confinement.
695. The Mission is extremely concerned about the protracted confinement of Rohingya and Kaman communities in these camps and sites, which has a devastating impact on the human rights of these individuals. It urges the Myanmar authorities to resolve the situation urgently in line with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. Its principle 28 underscores the primary duty and responsibility of the competent authorities to establish conditions, as well as provide the means, which allow displaced persons to return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, to their homes or places of habitual residence, or to resettle voluntarily to another part of the country. It further stipulates that authorities shall endeavour to facilitate the reintegration of returnees, and that special efforts should be made to ensure the full participation of the affected persons in the planning and management of their return.
1501 See this chapter, section B.2.f: Conclusion.
1502 K-069.1.
1503 K-069.1.
1504 See video: https://twitter.com/uschimuller/status/981625075953782784?lang=fr
1505 Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, Interim Report and Recommendations (March 2017), p. 12- 13
1506 Inquiry Commission on Sectarian Violence in Rakhine State, Final report (July 2013), p. 35; K-063
1507 The Global New Light of Myanmar, “Meeting on IDP camps, freedom of movement matters held in Rakhine State” (3 January 2018); Statement by the Office of the State Counsellor on the Final Report of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State (24 August 2017).
1508 K-063, K-069.1.
5. Spreading hate
(a) Inciting anti-Rohingya sentiment
696. The Mission has examined documents, publications, statements, Facebook posts and audio-visual materials that have contributed to shaping public opinion on the Rohingya and Muslims more generally. The analysis demonstrates that a carefully crafted hate campaign has developed a negative perception of Muslims among the broad population in Myanmar.
This campaign has been the work of a few key players: nationalistic political parties and politicians, leading monks, academics, prominent individuals and members of the Government. This hate campaign, which continues to the present day, portrays the Rohingya and other Muslims as an existential threat to Myanmar and to Buddhism.1509 In the case of the Rohingya, it has gone a step further. It is accompanied by dehumanising language and the branding of the entire community as “illegal Bengali immigrants”. This discourse created a conducive environment for the 2012 and 2013 anti-Muslim violence in Rakhine State and beyond, without strong opposition from the general population. It also enabled the hardening of repressive measures against the Rohingya and Kaman in Rakhine State and subsequent waves of State-led violence in 2016 and 2017.
697. Anti-Muslim campaigns are not a recent phenomenon in Myanmar. A book published in the 1980s by an anonymous author, spells out a series of anti-Muslim concepts and admonitions that would resurface and gain traction 20 and 30 years later. Entitled “Fear of extinction of the race”, the book presents Islam as a serious threat to Buddhism and calls on people to “protect their race and religion”. It states that Buddhist women are particularly vulnerable and that children should be taught not to be friendly with people of other religions.
The book also calls the readers not to do business with Muslims (referred to by the derogatory term “Kalars”1510) and states that, “it is certain that in 100 years, the glorious Buddhism along with Myanmar ethnic people will disappear completely”. It also calls for a boycott of Muslim shops (“… buying from them is like watering poisonous plants …”) and states:
If we are not careful, it is certain that the whole country will be swallowed by the Muslim Kalars (…). When we study world-history, we can see that different races of the world did not get swallowed to extinction by the earth, but only by other humans.1511
698. This book was published close to the adoption of the discriminatory 1982 Citizenship Law. According to credible reports, it was initially banned by the military Government but was later distributed either in full or in shorter anti-Muslim pamphlets.1512 In 2001, violence broke out in Taungoo (Pegu division), reportedly after the distribution of these pamphlets by the Union Solidarity and Development Association, which later became the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), established in 2010 by former senior military officers. The violence reportedly left around 200 Muslims dead, mosques destroyed and houses burned.1513 The main narrative of the book and the calls for boycotts of Muslim businesses were amplified by the 969 movement in 2012 and later by MaBaTha.1514 More generally, the idea that there is risk for one race to extinguish another can be found in the motto of the Ministry of Immigration and Population, now the Ministry of Labour, Immigration and Population:
The earth will not swallow a race to extinction but another race will.
699. The Ministry has had this motto since its establishment in 1995 but some reports trace it back to the first military dictator, General Ne Win, around 1962. Credible reports indicate
1509 See chapter VI, section B.2: Findings on the issue of hate speech.
1510 The word “Kalar” is used as a racist slur to insult and highlight someone’s dark skin or foreign ancestry.
1511 K-112. Unofficial translation of A Myo Pyaut Mhar Soe Kyaut Sayar
1512 K-111.
1513 K-111.
1514 For a brief description of 969 and MaBaTha, see chapter III, section B.2: Place of Buddhism in society.
that until recently this motto was displayed prominently on billboards and in offices.1515 Although this motto now appears to be less prominent, it is still featured on the Ministry’s website. On 26 August 2011, during a discussion in the lower house of Parliament about the issuance of white cards to the Rohingya, the then Minister of Immigration stated: “Our Ministry is trying its best to uphold the slogan ‘Race is not swallowed by the earth but by another race’”.1516
700. Another influential publication in relation to the hate narrative against the Rohingya is the book Influx viruses – The illegal Muslims in Arakan by U Shwe Zan and Dr. Aye Chan, published in the United States in August 2005.1517 The title and content of the publication refer to the Rohingya in an offensive and degrading manner, with a stark difference between the English and Myanmar language sections. The latter refer to the Rohingya as “hairy with long beards” and to “Bengali Kalars … swallowing other races”. Similar patterns are seen with the Paccima zone magazine, where the English content – some of which was also authored by Dr. Aye Chan – was drafted in a very different tone and style to the Myanmar language content, possibly in an attempt to project a more acceptable image to the international community.
701. Several interlocutors informed the Mission that the publication of the Paccima zone magazine in February 2012 marked a turning point in the targeted campaign of hate and hostility against the Rohingya in Rakhine State.1518 The first volume of the magazine includes a foreword drafted by the Maungdaw District Administrator. It also lists some of the most senior State officials and police chiefs from Maungdaw and Buthidaung Townships as
“patrons” and “committee members” and includes the names and pictures of monks who were “consultants”.1519
702. The magazine includes one section containing a series of anti-Rohingya articles written with provocative titles such as “Black tsunami in a pitiful disguise” or “Slow invasion”. Articles present the entire Rohingya population as terrorists; assert that the term
“Rohingya” was invented to take over the land; make reference to a “Rohingya invasion”;
challenge the claim that the Rohingya suffer human rights violations; portray the Rohingya as perpetrators of serious abuses; and accuse the international community of believing
“Rohingya lies” and in prioritising Maungdaw and Buthidaung over other parts of Rakhine State. In one article, the Rohingya are referred to as the “common enemy” of all the ethnic groups in Myanmar.1520 Another article, “What the Rohingya is”, states:
What the Rohingya is, is the latest weapon of the religious extremist terrorists… they are trying their very best to steal the land. Current actions of the Muslim extremists are extremely frightful.1521
1515 V-240.
1516 Pyithu Hluttaw, “Question from U Thein Nyunt of Thingankyun Constituency, on whether the Union Government was aware of the fact that the Township Immigration Offices incurred arbitrary delays for people of Islamic faith to go through the nationality verification process, to obtain household list and birth certificates, as answered by the Minister of Immigration and Population, U Khin Yi” (26 August 2011), available at: https://pyithu.hluttaw.mm/question-2747
1517 K-112. The first author used to be an immigration officer in Rakhine State, while the second author is a Rakhine historian and professor at Kanda University of International Studies in Japan. He is currently the Chair of the “Ancillary Committee for Reconstruction of Rakhine National Territory in the Western Frontier”, a body set up after the 25 August 2017 attacks.
1518 Paccima zone magazine, volume 1. On file with the Mission (K-112). “Paccima zone” refers to the Maungdaw-Buthidaung region.
1519 Maungdaw District Administrator; Chief of Maungdaw District Police Force; Maungdaw District Planner; Buthidaung Township Administrator; Chief of Buthidaung Township Police Force; Chief of Buthidaung Township Planning Administration, and the Administrator of GAD for Buthidaung Township.
1520 Paccima zone magazine, volume 1, “Local people’s view on the so-called Rohingya” (February 2012), pp. 60-61.
1521 San Shwe Maung, “What the Rohingya is” (Paccima zone magazine, volume 1, February 2012) pp.
30-32.
703. The presence of key northern Rakhine State officials in the editorial board indicates that these articles had their backing or at least their tacit approval. It gives an indication of the attitude of State officials towards the Rohingya shortly ahead of the 2012 violence. The themes covered in the magazine were amplified and used more systematically to cultivate the hate environment against the Rohingya prior to and after the commencement of the violence.
704. On 29 May 2012, seven days before the report in the New Light of Myanmar, the Narinjara newspaper published an article about the murder of Ma Thida Htwe the previous day, and referred to it as the “worst homicide case in Myanmar”. Quoting a police officer, the article stated that the woman was raped by “Kalars”. This article was republished in the Arakan Independent Bulletin with a graphic picture of her dead body. The author called on all the ethnic Rakhine to be united when dealing with the Rohingya issue.1522
705. On 1 June 2012 – three days after the murder of Ma Thida Htwe and two days before the killing of the 10 Muslims in Toungup – Zaw Htay, the spokesperson of the President of Myanmar, posted a statement on his personal Facebook account. He warned about the arrival from abroad of “Rohingya terrorists” from the Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) and stated that the Myanmar troops would “completely destroy them”:
Rohingya terrorists as members of the RSO are crossing the border into Myanmar with weapons. … Our troops have received the news in advance so they will completely destroy them [the Rohingya]. It can be assumed that the troops are already destroying them [the Rohingya]. We don’t want to hear any humanitarian or human rights excuses. We don’t want to hear your moral superiority, or so-called peace and loving kindness. (Go and look at Buthidaung, Maungdaw areas in Rakhine State. Our ethnic people are in constant fear in their own land. I feel very bitter about this. This is our country. This is our land.) (I’m talking to you, national parties, MPs, civil societies, who are always opposing the President and the Government.)1523
706. Although this post was later deleted, the impact of a high official equating the Rohingya population with terrorism may have been significant ahead of the 2012 violence, which erupted a week later.
707. On 8 June 2012, the newspaper Eleven Media – one of the most widely read publications in Myanmar – reported on the violence that took place that day in Maungdaw.
Under the title “Curfew imposed in Rakhine Township amidst Rohingya terrorist attacks”, it attributed the violence exclusively to “Rohingya terrorist attacks” and made no mention of the violence carried out by ethnic Rakhine and security forces against the Rohingya. 1524 708. Both the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) and the 88 Generation Students group made anti-Rohingya statements in two articles published by Eleven Media.
These quotes went far beyond the specific events that took place in Maungdaw on 8 June 2012. The RNDP statement was reported as being made as early as 4.15 pm on 8 June, only about three hours after the beginning of the violence. It labelled the violence as “terrorist attacks” and stressed the fact that the Rohingya were not among the 135 recognised ethnic groups in Myanmar:
Rohingyas are not the national ethnics. As successive government officials favoured and issued them national registration cards by taking briberies, they are acting as the over-indulgent persons. Due to the control of Rakhine ethnics, they could not widely spread until now. The prevailing attacks mean insulting the hosts by the guests. This is a terrorist attack.1525
1522 Arakan Independent Bulletin, Issue 4, No. 11 (May 2012), pages 3-6.
1523 V-247.
1524 Eleven Media, “Curfew imposed in Rakhine township amidst Rohingya terrorist attacks” (8 June 2012), available at: http://aboutarakaneng.blogspot.com/2012/06/curfew-imposed-in-rakhine- township.html
1525 Eleven Media, “Curfew imposed in Rakhine township amidst Rohingya terrorist attacks” (8 June 2012), available at: http://aboutarakaneng.blogspot.com/2012/06/curfew-imposed-in-rakhine- township.html
709. On the same day, Eleven Media also published a statement of Dr. Aye Maung, the Chair of the RNDP, in which he drew parallels between the violence in Maungdaw on 8 June 2012 and the 1942 violence when more than 60,000 Rohingya and ethnic Rakhine are believed to have been killed in inter-communal violence during the Second World War.1526 He referred to “attacks that seriously threaten the Arakanese people” and called for the establishment of paramilitary forces in Rakhine and Shan States. He went on to state that “the persons behind the curtain”, presumably alleging that Rohingya groups have instigated the violence, will be “responsible for the consequences”.1527
710. The 88 Generation Students group made similar statements, with Ko Mya Aye, a prominent leader of the group and former political prisoner, quoted as describing the incident as a “terrorist attack”, referring to “infiltrations” by “illegal migrants”, and calling for a “firm and solid immigration law” in response. The article also quoted Ko Ko Gyi, another prominent member of the 88 Generation Students group and former political prisoner, as stating that the Rohingya were not a Myanmar ethnic race and that this incident might
“threaten the sovereignty of the State”.1528
711. On 25 June 2012, Eleven Media published an op-ed by its editor-in-chief warning about the “risk and danger of ethnic cleansing or genocide”, as a result of the threat posed by the Rohingya. It claimed that swift action had save(d) “the lives of the Rakhine nationals from being attack of genocide”.1529
712. On 11 July 2012, President Thein Sein held a meeting in Naypyidaw with Mr. Antonio Guterres, then United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. During this meeting, the President referred to “illegal migrants” who “sneaked into” Myanmar and “later took the name Rohingya”. He stated that he could not take responsibility for them and that they should either be sent to IDP camps and be supported by UNHCR, or be sent to a third country.1530 A depiction of this nature by Myanmar’s highest official further stigmatised the Rohingya in an already tense climate.
713. From mid-June 2012, various groups, including the RNDP, the All Rakhine Refugee Committee, the Wunthanu Rakhita Association and Buddhist monks’ associations, such as the Arakanese Youth Monk’s Association, stepped up activities that served to incite the population in Rakhine State against the Rohingya. They included increasingly extreme calls to the Rakhine population to act, and other provocative statements, with a common theme of the perceived threat represented by the Rohingya and the need to sever ties between communities.1531 For example, on 26 June 2012, the RNDP warned against the threat of the
“present population of Bengali” and called for a “final solution”. One of the recommendations of the RNDP was to “relocate the non-Myanmar national Bengali to a third country”.1532 The RNDP also praised Hitler and argued that inhuman acts were sometimes necessary to maintain a race. In a November 2012 publication, it identified a collective need to take “a decisive stand on the issue of Bengali Muslims”. It went on, “if we do not courageously solve these problems, which we have inherited from several previous generations, and instead hand them over to the next generation, we will go down in history as irresponsible”:
1526 See for a study on the 1942 events: J. Leider, “Conflict and Mass violence in Arakan (Rakhine State) – The 1942 Events and Political Identity Formation”, in Citizenship in Myanmar, A. South, M. Lall (eds.), (Chiang Mai University Press, 2018), pp. 193-221, noting that “the waves of communal clashes of 1942 have been poorly documented, sparsely investigated and rarely studied” (p. 194) and that “the absence of a factual master narrative, which both Buddhists and Muslims could have agreed upon, barred the emergence of consensual interpretations of the events” (p. 211).
1527 Eleven Media, “Curfew imposed in Rakhine township amidst Rohingya terrorist attacks” (8 June 2012), available at: http://aboutarakaneng.blogspot.com/2012/06/curfew-imposed-in-rakhine- township.html
1528 Ibid.
1529 Than Htut Aung, “I will tell the real truth” (Eleven, 25 June 2012).
1530 V-243.
1531 K-112.
1532 V-242.