March 17, 2025

News @ RB

Announcement of New Website: Rohingya Today (RohingyaToday.Com) Dear Readers, From 1st January 2019 onward, the Rohingya News Portal 'Rohingya Blogger' will be renamed and upgraded as 'Rohingya Today'. Due to this transition to a new name, our website will be available at www.rohing...

Rohingya News @ Int'l Media

Maung Zarni, leader of the Free Rohingya Coalition, speaks at a news conference at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo on Thursday. | CHISATO TANAKA By Chisato Tanaka, Published by The Japan Times on October 25, 2018 A leader of a global network of activists for Rohingya Mu...

Myanmar News

By Sena Güler | Published by Anadolu Agency on December 1, 2018 Maung Zarni says he will boycott Beijing-sponsored events until the country reverses its 'troubling path' ANKARA -- A human rights activist and intellectual said he withdrew from a Beijing-sponsored forum in London to pro...

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Article @ RB

Oskar Butcher RB Article October 6, 2018 Every night in an unassuming shop space located in Mandalay’s 39thStreet, Lu Maw and Lu Zaw – the remaining members of the Burma’s most famous comedy trio, the Moustache Brothers – present their show: a curious combination of comedy, political sa...

Article @ Int'l Media

A demonstration over identity cards at a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh in April, 2018. Image: NurPhoto/SIPA USA/PA Images. By Natalie Brinham | Published by Open Democracy on October 21, 2018 Wary of the past, Rohingya have frustrated the UN’s attempts to provide them with documenta...

Analysis @ RB

By M.S. Anwar | Opinion & Analysis The Burmese (Myanmar) quasi-civilian government unleashed a large-scale violence against the minority Rohingya in the western Myanmar state of Arakan in 2012. The violence, which some wrongly frame as ‘Communal’, was carried out by the Burmese armed forces...

Analysis @ Int'l Media

By Maung Zarni, Natalie Brinham | Published by Middle East Institute on November 20, 2018 “It is an ongoing genocide (in Myanmar),” said Mr. Marzuki Darusman, the head of the UN Human Rights Council-mandated Independent International Fact-Finding Mission at the official briefing at ...

Opinion @ RB

Rohingya refugees who fled from Myanmar wait to be let through by Bangladeshi border guards after crossing the border in Palang Khali, Bangladesh October 9, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj MS Anwar RB Opinion November 12, 2018 Some may differ. But I believe the government of Bangladesh is ...

Opinion @ Int'l Media

By Maung Zarni | Published by Anadolu Agency on December 15, 2018 US will not intercede, and Myanmar's neighbors see it through economic lens, so international coalition for Rohingya needed LONDON -- The U.S. House of Representatives Thursday overwhelmingly passed a resolution ca...

History @ RB

Aman Ullah  RB History August 25, 2016 The ethnic Rohingya is one of the many nationalities of the union of Burma. And they are one of the two major communities of Arakan; the other is Rakhine and Buddhist. The Muslims (Rohingyas) and Buddhists (Rakhines) peacefully co-existed in the A...

Rohingya History by Scholars

Dr. Maung Zarni's Remark: The best research on Rohingya history: British Orientalism which created the pseudo-scientific biological notion of "Taiyinthar" or "real natives" of #Myanmar caused that country's post-colonial cancer of official & popular genocidal Racism.  This co...

Report @ RB

(Photo: Soe Zeya Tun, Reuters) RB News  October 5, 2013  Thandwe, Arakan – Rakhinese mob in Thandwe started attacking Kaman Muslims on September 28, 2013. As a result, 5 Kaman Muslims were mercilessly killed and 1 was died in heart attack while escaping the attack. 781 Kaman Mus...

Report by Media/Org

Rohingya families arrive at a UNHCR transit centre near the village of Anjuman Para, Cox’s Bazar, south-east Bangladesh after spending four days stranded at the Myanmar border with some 6,800 refugees. (Photo: UNHCR/Roger Arnold) By UN News May 11, 2018 Late last year, as violent repressi...

Press Release

(Photo: Reuters) Joint Statement: Rohingya Groups Call on U.S. Government to Ensure International Accountability for Myanmar Military-Planned Genocide December 17, 2018  We, the undersigned Rohingya organizations worldwide, call for accountability for genocide and crimes against...

Rohingya Orgs Activities

RB News December 6, 2017 Tokyo, Japan -- Legislators from all parties, along with Human Rights Now, Human Rights Watch, and Save the Children, came together to host the emergency parliament in-house event “The Rohingya Human Rights Crisis and Japanese Diplomacy” on December 4th. The eve...

Petition

By Wyston Lawrence RB Petition October 15, 2017 There is one petition has been going on Change.org to remove Ven. Wira Thu from Facebook. He has been known as Buddhist Bin Laden. Time magazine published his image on their cover with the title of The Face of Buddhist Terror. The petitio...

Campaign

A human rights activist and genocide scholar from Burma Dr. Maung Zarni visits Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi Extermination Camp and calls on European governments - Britain, France, Sweden, Norway, Italy, Denmark, Hungary and Germany not to collaborate with the Evil - like they did with Hitler 75 ye...

Event

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Editorial by Int'l Media

By Dhaka Tribune Editorial November 5, 2017 How can we answer to our conscience knowing full-well what the Myanmar military is doing to the innocent Rohingya minority -- not even sparing children or pregnant women? Despite the on-going humanitarian crisis involving Rohingya refugees ...

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Can we trust the Maungdaw probe?

By Gabrielle Paluch
The Myanmar Times
March 17, 2014

When the Du Chee Yar Tan Investigation Commission presented its final report last week into the alleged killings in Maungdaw township, the group’s leader appeared genuinely offended at having to answer probing questions from the media on the investigation. “I’m not biased, I’m not incompetent,” U Tha Hla Shwe said. “Why don’t you trust us?”

A devastating blaze and alleged clashes between security forces and Muslims which rights groups say left dozens killed and a policeman missing have once again pitted Maungdaw township’s Rakhine and Rohingya communities against each other. (Si Thu Lwin/The Myanmar Times)


U Tha Hla Shwe was asking the wrong question. It’s not a matter of trust. The media are there to ask questions about the report and the commission is expected to give reasonable, rational answers.

The commission occupies the most unenviable of positions, caught between the government and all the groups that don’t trust it. Maintaining independence is key to walking such a tightrope.

Yet the commission is not independent. One example is the manner in which the commission stood by the government’s refusal to even acknowledge that the Muslims of northern Rakhine State self-identify as “Rohingya”. Their insistence on the use of “Bengali” – and hostility to those who disagree – is perceived as disrespectful by the very people with whom the commission says it wants to build trust. While previous investigation commissions at least tried to justify this by saying it was done to “avoid problems”, no such effort was made last week.

A number of the report’s findings suggest that the commission was dismissive of testimonies given by Muslims. The commission said it saw “no evidence of the deaths” of Muslims in Du Chee Yar Tan because witnesses failed to produce evidence in the form of corpses. Although 88 percent of Muslims interviewed confirmed there had been killings, and 26pc could state the precise number of deaths, this was deemed insufficient evidence. The the testimony of Daw Mahanayatu, who said her three-month-old child was taken from her while they were sleeping side by side and killed, was disregarded. The question of the where-abouts of other missing Muslims was never addressed.

However, the death of Police Sergeant Aung Kyaw Thein is not questioned, despite the fact that his body has yet to be recovered. Full credence was given to one witness in police custody who claimed he heard Pol Sgt Aung Kyaw Thein cry out in pain. The commission appears to have shown a bias toward testimonies that support the government’s version of events.

The collection of testimonies that the United Nations presented to the government was published in the Myanmar-language version of the report, despite being labelled confidential. The commission nevertheless blames the UN and international NGOs for inflaming tensions by reporting unconfirmed information.

Gaps in the report, beyond the aforementioned, are glaring. Whether these are the result of bias or incompetence is irrelevant: They should be pointed out openly.

Among the commission’s recommendations for building trust is to prioritise Rakhine State in the citizenship verification process. Should the 1982 citizenship law be applied, the citizenship status of Muslims who identify as Rohingya would rest on the evaluation of a government body relying on village elders.

Ideally, a transparent verification process will lead to genuinely eligible Muslims, regardless of how they describe their ethnicity, being awarded citizenship – a key step toward reconciliation. In the best-case scenario, this recommendation from the investigation team demonstrates true courage and the right balance of political verve. In the worst-case scenario, the recommendation condemns the Rohingya to a future without access to the rights associated with citizenship.

It appears that the commission is trying its best to work from within the system to change it, and in this sense they should be commended. They have the power to create the political will needed to resolve the conflict. But its job was to uncover the truth about what happened in Du Chee Yar Tan. While the commission might win favour for publishing a report that downplays a crisis, it won’t build the trust needed to start moving down the path of reconciliation.

Gabrielle Paluch is a journalist based in Southeast Asia. She worked for The Myanmar Times in 2009.

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