As I’ve said before, I don’t
post about Burma issues often. This is
going to be one of those times.
You may know about the
violence against Muslims going on in Burma right now. Long story short, this really kicked off about
a year ago, when a Buddhist woman was raped and murdered by three Muslim men in
Arakan (or Rakine) State, one of Burma’s ethnic states. (Lemme pour you a quick shot of context if
you don’t know what I mean by “ethnic states”:
about a third of Burma’s population is made up of indigenous tribes;
many of these groups live primarily in specific areas, like the Arakanese in
Arakan State. The ethnic states are
officially under the rule of the central government; each state has its own
administrative structure, but state officials are appointed by the central
government and are ethnically Burman, the country’s majority. However, armed groups in many of the ethnic
states have been at war with the central government for decades. Currently, ceasefires exist between
government troops and ethnic armed groups in all the states that were at war,
except for Kachin State, though clashes continue even in ceasefire areas.) Anyway – days later, even though the
perpetrators had been arrested, a Buddhist mob attacked a bus and lynched ten
Muslim passengers who’d had nothing to do with the crime. The situation escalated, leading to a state
of emergency being declared in Arakan State, with curfews and areas being
locked down by government troops.
Since then, the violence has
risen and fallen. It spiked in November,
but quieted down in the new year – until the current wave of attacks, which
really got going in March. The violence
has now spread beyond Arakan State and into central Burma, with Muslims being
targeted in Mandalay and even in Burma’s first city and former capital, Rangoon
(Yangon). According to a recent article in the independent Burma paper Mizzima, the 2012 violence left 140 dead in Arakan State alone, and displaced at least 100,000
people (other sources say as many as 140,000).
Another 43 people have been killed in central Burma since March, where
attacks have also destroyed over 1,200 homes, 77 shops, and a staggering 37
mosques.
Where is all this coming
from? Well, tensions between Muslims and
Buddhists in Burma have existed for a long time. The article I linked to above gives a fuller
picture, but there have been Muslim communities in Burma for centuries
now. As was the case in many countries,
the British colonial administration favoured a particular minority – here, it
was Muslims, specifically Indian Muslims – and this generated resentment among
the Buddhist majority. Anti-Muslim riots
in the 1930s were a way of expressing anger at the British regime, as well as
at Muslim communities. Since the
military takeover of Burma in 1962, discrimination against Muslims has only become
more entrenched.
In Arakan State
specifically, there’s a large Rohingya population – Muslims of Bangladeshi
descent, who have been established in Arakan State for generations. The Rohingyas consider themselves to be one
of Burma’s ethnic groups. The Buddhist
Arakanese, on the other hand, still see them as interlopers – to the point
where I’ve seen Arakanese activists go apeshit at the mere mention of the
R-word, because they equate using the term “Rohingya” with “siding with the
enemy” by admitting that “Rohingya” is a real thing. (A lot of Arakanese just refer to them as “Muslims”
or “Bangladeshis”.) Rohingyas have been
excluded from citizenship, employment, housing – you name it. It’s not about religion, every Arakanese
person I’ve met hastens to reassure me.
It’s about nationality, culture. They
simply don’t belong.
It seems, ironically enough,
that the loosening of government control over the past few years was one factor
that helped take the lid off roiling tensions between Arakanese Buddhists and
Rohingyas – and the lifting of some censorship laws may have fed into it. During the riots in November and December of
last year, rumours both true and false about the attacks were flying on now
freely available social networking sites.
Instant communication can be a powerful tool… but the same technology
that allowed protestors in Egypt to organise and to get word of their struggles
out to the world can also allow an unverified story about Muslims burning
Buddhists’ homes to reach thousands of already pissed-off Buddhists in seconds.
But the current wave of
attacks, according to reports, seems to be more organized. It’s heavily linked to the 969 movement, a (terrifyingly)
widespread and grassroots movement led by radical Buddhist monks. (Yes, I’m going to pause for a second to let
the idea of “radical Buddhist monks” sink in.
Trust me, I had the same mental image of a Buddhist monk before I
started working out here – we in the West tend to picture lotus blossoms and
the Dalai Lama and movies about flaky white people discovering inner peace – but
Buddhism is no more immune than any other essentially peace-loving religion
from developing radicalised clergy.)
Now, I’m going to tell you a
little bit about why this movement scares me so much. I realised when I was reading some of the 969
propaganda out there (some of which is collected here by Burma Campaign UK) that it sounded awfully familiar. In fact, it was eerily reminiscent of
researching my Master’s dissertation.
You know, the one on
genocide.
You might think I’m
exaggerating, but regardless of the scale of the violence – and in this case,
it’s increasing – the same techniques used to dehumanise a minority group in
areas where ethnic cleansing later took place are being used here.
- We’ve got
fostering suspicion that the minority community is actually the group plotting
(I’ve edited out an offensive term for Muslims here):
“According to the above situation, Muslims in Marhtila are wearing their mosque clothes and going around in the town more than before. In that group, there are some stranger [Muslims] who we haven’t seen before. Although it is not [Muslims’] Eid period, they have been attending meetings at mosque. Using money Saudi allocated to mosques, they have been buying land, farm and houses both in and out of the town with incredible amount of money under the Burmese names. Two Burmese women from North Pyi Tharyar were married off to two [Muslims] under the responsibility of a mosque. Moreover, [Muslims] are urging each other that only Halal branded kids’ products such as snacks, fizzy drinks and tea are edible for [Muslims]…”
(The scary thing here being that this was released by the “Township Monks’ Chairman in Meiktila, where the current wave of anti-Muslim violence began.) - We’ve got severe
policing of the majority group to weed out “sympathisers”, and especially to smack
down women from the majority group who might contemplate sleeping with men from
the minority group:
4 rules from Alliance to Protect Buddhism Group (Thar Tha Nar in Burmese):
1.Traditionally Buddhist owned houses, compounds and farms are not to be sold, rented or pawned to Muslims.
2.Buddhist women are not to marry Muslim men.
3.Buddhists are to buy goods only from Buddhists’ shops.
4.Buddhists are not to use their Burmese names to buy property, build or rent property for Muslims.
If one of the above rules has been broken, serious effective penalty would be given. - We’ve got
appeals to history or to events in other places where the minority group were
the aggressors, in an attempt to make it seem like they’re the aggressors in
this instance:
To wipe out our religion and nationality, bad Muslims are using several strategies such as using business and humanitarian sectors as leverage. Using such strategies, they have won over Indonesia, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh where Buddhism was once well practiced. In India in AD 11 (Buddhist year 1700), they brutally burned and destroyed recordings of Buddha teaching, killed over a hundred thousand of monks and put out rewards to kill monks who escaped. - We’ve even got Protocols
of the Elders of Zion-style fake documents (in this case, with bonus THEY’RE
STEALIN’ OUR WIMMIN! hysteria) – this is the supposed text of a “secret” Muslim
document, as printed in a 969 pamphlet:
Oh dear Islamists, for all of us Myanmar have become a poison. That is why we need to be united and take any possible ground we can. Even if we have to get out of this country, we will have to leave our blood behind in this country. Buddhist Burmese and ethnic Myanmar women are like prostitutes and we are able to get them anytime with money. For us, it is the best time to be active so we have to manipulate and get those Buddhist Burmese and ethnic Myanmar women by winning their hearts, using our money or businesses. The most important thing is to leave our blood and genes with them. For your hard work, we will be awarding 500 kyats if you can implant your blood inside Buddhist Burmese women. If you can implant into 4 Buddhist Burmese women, mosque will support 1,000 kyats every month. 2,000 kyats will be awarded, if they are graduated Buddhist Burmese women, and 50,000 will be awarded, if they are daughters of brigadiers… You can only distribute this letter to Muslims who promise not to share or talk about this with other religions.
Help doesn’t seem to be
coming, from any direction. Many reports
claim that Burma’s security forces are either standing by and letting the
violence happen, or actively collaborating, so that things will get bad enough
to justify a military crackdown – helping to re-establish the army’s control
and providing an excuse for the government to backslide on democratic reforms. The opposition isn’t exactly leaping to Burma
Muslims’ aid, either: Aung San Suu Kyi
can barely bring herself to discuss the “Rohingya problem” in public. Ethnic Arakanese activism groups certainly
aren’t helping. Bangladesh has long
refused to acknowledge any obligation or connection to Rohingya communities,
and is now refusing to take in displaced Rohingyas (who are largely stuck in refugee
and IDP camps in Burma and other neighbouring countries). And while there’s been some hand-wringing
among the governments of the world, none seem to be ready to hold Burma to
account for finding a better solution.
Meanwhile, the violence has
touched off understandable anger among Muslims elsewhere; right now, there are
protests going on outside the Burmese embassy in Jakarta. More worryingly, there have also been calls
from radical Muslim leaders to violently oppose the Burmese regime on behalf of
the Rohingya. Recently, there was anattempt to bomb the embassy in Jakarta, which is likely to further fuel radical Buddhists’
belief that the Muslims in Burma are somehow “in league” with Muslims around
the world.
You want to know what the icing
on the cake of civil meltdown is? A
cyclone is projected to hit Arakan State this week – and over a hundred
thousand displaced people, holed up in flimsy tents, are sitting in its
path. Unless the government is able to
get its act together and prioritise the safety of its Muslim citizens, the toll
could be devastating.
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