Burma Task Force USA Briefed Congressman Stark of California on Burma Genocide

New York, August 18:

Raafay Mohammad, coordinator of Burma Task Force-Northern California, met with Congressman Pete Stark to update him and his chief of staff about the dire situation of Rohingya Muslims in Burma (Myanmar). The congressman promised to work to alleviate the horrific conditions to which the Rohingya are subjected. Raafay Mohammad was part of a delegation of Muslims that was led by the American Muslim Alliance. More congresspersons will be approached in the coming two weeks.

Raafay Mohammad who is originally from Hyderabad, India, also briefed the congressman on the ethnic cleansing in Assam India where 400,000 Muslims were displaced using the same pretext the government of neighboring Burma uses- that the victims are foreign settlers.

The congressman was informed that hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have been ethnically cleansed, and hundreds of thousands more live in precarious conditions, threatened by continuous waves of ethnic cleansing. The Rohingya have been, amongst other injustices, stripped of their citizenship status, denied license to work, and they have even been forbidden from marrying without paying a hefty tax that few (if any) of them can afford. Burma Task Force has launched a plan to educate US congressmen and legislators of the human rights violations and oppressions to which the Rohingya are subjected.

Announcing the political outreach effort, Shahana Masoom Ali, a founding member said, “Burma Task Force demands that the citizenship rights of Rohingyas be restored. The Rohingya have lived in Burma for millennia, even reigning over Arakan for four centuries till 1784. It is outrageous that the Burma government is calling them a non-indigenous people and is expelling them from their homeland. Burma Task Force demands that the UN relief agencies make resettling the refugees a topmost priority and to bring the perpetrators of genocide to justice.

Mrs. Masoom Ali announced that a kit on how to approach congressmen and senators was prepared by Raafay Mohammad and will be sent to the Task Force volunteers in various states.