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The Arakan Army is making gains against the Myanmar military. What does it mean for the Rohingya?
The Arakan Army is forcing Myanmar’s military junta out of towns and cities. But recent attacks against Rohingya Muslims have left them wondering about their fate. Host Marco Werman speaks with The World’s Patrick Winn about the situation.
Conflict & Justice
Updated:
4:22
Smoke is seen bellowing from a Myanmar Border Police post following fighting between Myanmar security forces and Arakan Army — an ethnic minority army — in Ghumdhum, Bandarban, Bangladesh, Feb. 5, 2024.
Shafiqur Rahman/AP/File photo
A full-blown war is raging across Myanmar. Fighters are forcing the military junta out of towns and cities at astonishing speed.
They say they’re fighting to liberate Myanmar. But one ethnic minority, the Rohingya Muslims, has reason to doubt that promise. Around 150 Rohingya civilians were killed in Myanmar over the weekend.
An aerial view taken from a helicopter shows Hla Phoe Khaung transit camp, at the Maungdaw, northern Rakhine State, Myanmar, Sept. 20, 2018.Ye Aung Thu/Pool Photo via AP/File photo
“This became known when Rohingya started running into Bangladesh, the country next door, with burns and wounds, telling a Doctors Without Borders clinic that they saw hundreds of dead bodies killed by artillery or a crude drone bomb attack, including women and kids,” The World’s Patrick Winn said.
“There are some really unsettling videos going around on social media that look like they were taken in that area recently, a very marshy green area near the coast. They do show many dead bodies, but these things are hard to verify.”
“All are civilian. So, this, I would say, is a barbaric act,” Rohingya activist Dr. Habibullah told The World.
Marco Werman: So, who do we believe the perpetrators of this attack are?
Patrick Winn: Yeah, typically it’s the military regime tormenting the Rohingya. They’ve done this for many years. They perpetrated what many, including the US, call a genocide.
But the people who escaped this particular attack say it was done by a group that also, like
the Rohingya, despised the military. That group is called the Arakan Army. It’s a mostly
Buddhist force. The ethnicity of the fighters is called Arakan. They have their own
language and culture, and the Arakan people and the Rohingya are both native to that
area. The Arakan Army has been on a tear, just kicking the military out of that whole
coastal area, taking over cities and setting up their own police and courts.
Recently, the military, out of desperation to get back at them, has reportedly conscripted young Rohingya by force to make trouble to fight the Arakan Army to burn down Buddhist
villages. That has inflaming the animosity. And that’s the context in which these reports of
Rohingya civilians killed en masse are appearing. I do have to say the Arakan Army denies
killing any civilians.
But the people who escaped this particular attack say it was done by a group that also, like
the Rohingya, despised the military. That group is called the Arakan Army. It’s a mostly
Buddhist force. The ethnicity of the fighters is called Arakan. They have their own
language and culture, and the Arakan people and the Rohingya are both native to that
area. The Arakan Army has been on a tear, just kicking the military out of that whole
coastal area, taking over cities and setting up their own police and courts.
Recently, the military, out of desperation to get back at them, has reportedly conscripted young Rohingya by force to make trouble to fight the Arakan Army to burn down Buddhist
villages. That has inflaming the animosity. And that’s the context in which these reports of
Rohingya civilians killed en masse are appearing. I do have to say the Arakan Army denies
killing any civilians.
If the Arakan Army takes control of this part of Myanmar, what does that mean for the Rohingya population living there?
Well, the Rohingya know where they stand with the military. It wants them to not exist. Regime officials have been very clear about that, calling them animals. Soldiers have killed and tortured and raped Rohingya, driven them from their homes. This is all well-documented.
The Arakan Army, on the other hand, and their leaders say Muslims do have a home here, that they can be officials, they can be judges and doctors and police in their new government as long as Muslims pledge allegiance to their new government. I did ask the Rohingya activist Habibullah what he thinks about the Arakan Army, and he pointed out that their leaders don’t even like to say the word Rohingya. They typically just call them local Muslims.
“Since they don’t want to say Rohingya, how can anyone believe that Rohingya
can be safe in their hands? That shows how far behind civilization they are,” Habibullah said.
The Arakan Army, on the other hand, and their leaders say Muslims do have a home here, that they can be officials, they can be judges and doctors and police in their new government as long as Muslims pledge allegiance to their new government. I did ask the Rohingya activist Habibullah what he thinks about the Arakan Army, and he pointed out that their leaders don’t even like to say the word Rohingya. They typically just call them local Muslims.
“Since they don’t want to say Rohingya, how can anyone believe that Rohingya
can be safe in their hands? That shows how far behind civilization they are,” Habibullah said.
A placard reading “Rohingyas, humans without rights” is displayed during a rally to protest the situation of Rohingya refugees fleeing Myanmar’s Arakan State, in Paris, Sept. 16, 2017.Thibault Camus/AP/File photo
So, the groups that have been fighting against military rule in Myanmar, they’ve been talking about reviving the country’s democracy and ending the kind of ethnic and religious persecution that the military has imposed. But what does this recent episode say about the promise of that revolution?
I don’t want to equate the two sides. Myanmar’s military has been oppressing all ethnic minorities since the country was created in the late ’40s. The vision of the revolution waged by dozens of armed groups from all backgrounds across the country
is to say, “Look, we can get along. We don’t need a brutal regime lording over us. We can allow different groups to control this coastal area over here and this mountain region over here, under a decentralized federal system that treats everyone equally.”
So, now that you have revolutionary groups such as the Arakan Army getting into more governing and holding territory and ruling it, it has to live up to those promises.
What I always hear, Marco, from people inside Myanmar is, “The revolution, as bloody as it is, does offer the only hope, the only way out, and that there’s no going back to accepting dominance by the military ever again.”
is to say, “Look, we can get along. We don’t need a brutal regime lording over us. We can allow different groups to control this coastal area over here and this mountain region over here, under a decentralized federal system that treats everyone equally.”
So, now that you have revolutionary groups such as the Arakan Army getting into more governing and holding territory and ruling it, it has to live up to those promises.
What I always hear, Marco, from people inside Myanmar is, “The revolution, as bloody as it is, does offer the only hope, the only way out, and that there’s no going back to accepting dominance by the military ever again.”
Parts of this interview have been edited for length and clarity.