Sharp criticism about the lack of help for Burma's Rohingya from neighboring countries

After the arrest of 16 Rohingya refugees in Indonesia, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) expressed serious accusations against Burma's neighboring countries on Tuesday. "Once again, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations ASEAN and Bangladesh will fail in securing basic human rights in Burma, if they deny help for the Rohingya refugees," said Ulrich Delius, the STP's Asia consultant, in Göttingen on Tuesday. He urged the governments of south-eastern Asia to use their influence on Burma constructively to try and stop the persecution of ethnic and religious minorities. Radical Islamic movements and the Iranian government should not be allowed to deprive the Rohingya from their rights in order to pursue their own interests. Last Friday, the United Nations had already demanded that Iran should guarantee to protect the Muslim ethnic group. Islamist movements in Pakistan and Indonesia had also protested against the alleged "genocide" against the Rohingya.

The Rohingya refugees who were arrested in Bogor (Indonesia) recently, had fled from Burma via Malaysia to Indonesia in fishing boats. Although the speaker of Indonesia's House of Representatives and president of the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, Dr. Marzuki Alie, had urged the Indonesian parliament to work on a solution for the Rohingya affair in Burma, there has "so far been no initiative coming from Jakarta," said Delius.

The human rights activist reported that the reaction from Bangladesh is even more shocking and inhumane: According to the border authorities, 828 Rohingya refugees were refused and sent back to Burma since June 11, 2012. Despite reports of mass arrests and ongoing attacks against Rohingya in Burma, the government of Bangladesh is trying to repatriate the 29,000 Rohingya refugees officially living in the country – while the authorities and the media in Bangladesh are trying to incite antipathy against the Rohingya ethnic group and criminalize them simply because of their ethnic origin. "This is pure racism," criticized Delius. A climate of fear is created, making the already dramatic situation of the forgotten Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh even more difficult.

Apart from the Rohingya refugees who are officially living in camps provided by the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR, there are 450,000 more members of this ethnic group living in Bangladesh illegally. Their situation is especially disastrous because they have no protection at all and are treated as fair game. There are around 800,000 Rohingya still living in Burma.