Rohingya Muslims plead for help at the UN to stop the killings in Myanmar

NEWS NATION
EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press 
Updated: Oct 1, 2025  

FILE – Rohingya refugees wait for food to be distributed during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan at their camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, March 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Shafiqur Rahman, File)

 

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Rohingya Muslims pleaded with the international community at the first United Nations high-level meeting on the plight of the ethnic minority to prevent the mass killings taking place in Myanmar and to help those in the persecuted group lead normal lives.

“This is a historic occasion for Myanmar, but this is long overdue,” Wai Wai Nu, the Rohingya founder and executive director of the Women’s Peace Network-Myanmar, told ministers and ambassadors from many of the U.N.’s 193-member nations in the General Assembly Hall.

Rohingya plight in Myanmar, a ‘test for humanity’

UNITED NATION
By Vibhu Mishra 
30 September 2025

© UNICEF/Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin Rohingya refugees cross the Naf River on a makeshift raft while fleeing violence in Myanmar, on their way to Bangladesh in 2017

“Houses burned. Neighbours killed. Hope vanishing.” With those stark words, General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock opened a high-level UN conference on Tuesday, as alarm rises over the impact of Myanmar’s deepening crisis which threatens to destabilise the wider region.

Rohingya Noticeably Absent From U.N. Conference

FP 
Foreign Policy
Alexandra Sharp,
September 30, 2025, 

Rohingya refugees gather to listen United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres during his visit to a refugee camp in Ukhia, Bangladesh, on March 14. Munir Uz Zaman/AFP via Getty Images 

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at U.N. efforts to address the Rohingya crisis, an internet blackout in Afghanistan, and the collapse of one of Indonesia’s oldest Islamic schools.

HRW calls on UN to support protection and justice measures for Rohingya

Mizzima
September 30, 2025

Human Rights Watch (HRW) press release on 29 September calls on United Nations member states to commit to urgent action on 30 September meeting on the plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar. HRW says Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, Bangladesh and across Asia in need of protection from persecution and violence. The text of the press release continues below.

Companies Built Bases On Rohingya Land After They Fled Myanmar Security Forces: UN Report

OCCRP
Organized Crime and Corrupttion Reporting Project
Reported by :Mariam Shenawy
September 29, 2025

 United Nations investigators say Myanmar’s military demolished Rohingya villages, hiring private companies to clear the land and build security infrastructure. 

Myanmar companies received state contracts to build police posts and other infrastructure on land seized from Rohingya Muslims, who fled their homes amid violent “clearance operations” by security forces, United Nations investigators said in a report today.

8 Years On: Accountability needed for Myanmar atrocities against Rohingya

A M N E S T Y
INTERNATIONAL 
25 August 2025

August 25, 2025, marks eight years since the Myanmar military and authorities launched widespread atrocities against the Rohingya population in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. 

Starting in August 2017, Myanmar security forces razed several hundred Rohingya villages and killed Rohingya women, men, and children throughout northern Rakhine State, forcing at least 700,000 to flee to Bangladesh. An Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar documented evidence of genocide and crimes against humanity.

Since these atrocities, no one has been held accountable in Myanmar for the crimes committed against the Rohingya.

The U.S. shouldn’t ignore the starving Rohingya of Myanmar

The Washington Post
20th July 2015

Myanmar’s junta has cut off food to Rohingya in squalid camps. Those in Bangladesh try to flee by boat. 

Rohingya refugees gather at roadside kitchen market at the refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, in March. (Mohammad Ponir Hossain/Reuters)

In Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state, a new horror is unfolding largely unobserved. The long-persecuted Rohingya have been caught in the crossfire of the country’s ongoing civil war, and now they are being deliberately starved.

150,000 Rohingya flee to Bangladesh amid renewed Myanmar violence

United Nation 
11 July 2025 

© UNHCR/Susan Hopper Rohingya refugees at a camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.

Migrants and Refugees

Escalating conflict and targeted violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine state have forced some 150,000 Rohingya refugees to flee to Bangladesh over the past 18 months – the largest exodus to the neighbouring country in years.

UN agency, Rohingya refugees allege Indian authorities cast dozens of them into the sea near Myanmar

AP
By SHEIKH SAALIQ and PIYUSH NAGPAL
May 17, 2025 

 The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a statement on Thursday, said at least 40 Rohingya refugees were detained in New Delhi and cast into the sea by the Indian navy near the maritime border with Myanmar. The refugees — including children, women and older people — swam ashore, but their whereabouts in Myanmar remain unknown, the agency said.

A Rohingya refugee who has not been identified due to safety concerns, talks to The Associated Press in New Delhi, India, about how his family was deported to an island in Myanmar, Friday, May 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a statement on Thursday, said at least 40 Rohingya refugees were detained in New Delhi and cast into the sea by the Indian navy near the maritime border with Myanmar. The refugees — including children, women and older people — swam ashore, but their whereabouts in Myanmar remain unknown, the agency said.

Road to Rohingya repatriation is more complex than it seems

THE BUSINESS STANDARD
Ariful Hasan Shuvo
05 April, 2025

Myanmar declaring a portion of Rohingya refugees eligible for repatriation might sound like overwhelmingly good news. But in reality, they cannot return as long as the Arakan Army controls Rakhine 

Bangladesh is now home to over a million Rohingya refugees who have fled violence in Myanmar since 2017. Photo: TBS

 A Facebook post from the verified page of the Chief Adviser to Bangladesh's interim government broke the internet on Friday. After all, it offered a ray of hope in the longstanding Rohingya crisis the country has been grappling with for over eight years now.

"Myanmar authorities have confirmed to Bangladesh that out of a list of 800,000 Rohingyas sheltered in Bangladesh, they have identified 180,000 Rohingyas eligible for return," the post reads. 

Hope at a time of uncertainty

The Daily Star

Mokammel Shuvo

Sun Apr 6, 2025

 

Mixed reactions in Cox’s Bazar camps as Myanmar identifies 180,000 Rohingyas for return.

Following reports of Myanmar verifying 1,80,000 Rohingyas for potential repatriation, a wave of mixed feelings has washed over the camps in Cox's Bazar and Bhasan Char.

Although many Rohingyas express a strong desire to return to their homeland safely, they remain apprehensive of Myanmar's ability to guarantee security.

Experts: Follow up steps should start on Rohingya repatriation after Myanmar’s assurance

Dhaka Tribune
Publish : 05 Apr 2025

Myanmar has informed Bangladesh that out of 800,000 Rohingyas in the country, 180,000 have been identified as eligible to return.

File image of Rohingya camp. Photo: Dhaka Tribune- BSS

Foreign relations experts on Saturday said follow up talks should start quickly on Rohingya repatriation as Myanmar has confirmed out of over 1.30 million of the ethnic minority Muslim people, who took makeshift refuge in Bangladesh were 180,000 are eligible to return.

ARSA leader arrest: Tensions spark in Rohingya camps, explosions heard along border

daily observer
Observer Online Report
Published : Wednesday, 19 March, 2025 Count : 562

The arrest of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) leader has reportedly sparked tensions in Rohingya camps and along the Myanmar-Bangladesh border.

Following the news of Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi's arrest, loud explosions were heard across the border in Maungdaw, Myanmar, causing panic among residents.

 

Secretary-General's press encounter on the Rohingya Refugees

United Nations
14 March 2025

This is my yearly Ramadan visit, this time in solidarity with the Rohingya refugees and with the Bangladeshi people [who] so generously host them.

And in this visit, I’ve already heard two clear messages. First, Rohingyas want to go back to Myanmar. It is essential that the international community does everything to make sure that peace is reestablished in Myanmar and that the rights of the Rohingyas are respected, that discrimination and persecution like the one we have witnessed in the past, will end.

How Myanmar’s Rohingya refugees feel about Aung San Suu Kyi: ‘She was a rag doll who never had absolute power’

INDEPENDENT
Monday 10 March 2025 

Rohingya Muslims tell of their changing view of Aung San Suu Kyi, seeing her as one of their own – a victim of the military – as she languishes in solitary confinement. Shweta Sharma reports from Cox’s Bazar camps in Bangladesh.

 

 

 
Sitting in a dimly-lit bamboo shelter in the world’s largest refugee camp, Rohingya Muslims like Azizur Rehman could be forgiven for hating Aung San Suu Kyi.

Five years ago, the then-leader of Myanmar appeared at the International Court of Justice to deny the Rohingya were victims of genocide by her country’s military, much to the shock of the rest of the world.

Are the Rohingya stateless?

Daily Mirror Online
By Safrah Fazal
Thu, 13 Feb 2025

The testimonies of the Rohingya paint a picture of innocent people trying to flee grave danger in Myanmar

The recent discourse surrounding the arrival of over 100 Rohingya refugees in Sri Lanka in December 2024 has been fraught with statements that they are victims of human trafficking, or they are illegal immigrants and hence are at risk of deportation. However, the testimonies of the Rohingya themselves paint a different picture—one of innocent people whose lives were in grave danger in Myanmar’s Arakan Province. With no other choice, they entrusted their fate to rickety boats and treacherous waters, clinging to a fragile hope for survival.

‘Become American, Work Hard, Love Democracy’: Dreams Dashed by Trump Orders

The New York Times
By Hannah Beech
Reporting from Bangkok
Feb. 12, 2025

President Trump’s moves to pause refugee resettlement, freeze foreign aid and suspend funds to promote democracy have added more chaos to one of the world’s most urgent humanitarian crises.

The world’s largest refugee camp is in Bangladesh, where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims have sought shelter after fleeing Myanmar. It was built with the help of U.S.A.I.D., an agency paralyzed by the Trump administration.Credit...Reuters

The family of four refugees filled seven suitcases for their new life in America. They packed blankets, tin plates, one blade for clearing the land in their future home and one for chopping meat. They left behind what they were not supposed to bring: slingshots, fish paste, traditional medicines from their native Myanmar.

Myanmar crisis: Civilians killed in airstrikes as Rohingya risk dangerous journeys

UNITED NATION
By Vibhu Mishra
22 January 2025 

UNICEF/Patrick BrownA child at an internally displaced persons (IDP) centre in Myanmar. (file)

The security situation in Myanmar continues to remain highly volatile, with intensified airstrikes across multiple regions leading to dozens of civilian casualties, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on Wednesday.

Joint Press Statement on the Human Rights and Humanitarian Situation in Myanmar

U.S Department of State

Media Note
Office of the Spokesperson
January 6, 2025

The text of the following joint statement was released by the High Representative on behalf of the European Union and the Governments of the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, the Republic of Korea, Switzerland, Timor-Leste, and the United Kingdom to address the human rights and humanitarian crisis in Myanmar.

Begin text:

Rohingyas’ return to Myanmar uncertain, despite rebel control of Bangladesh border

mizzima
January 6, 2025 

RFA

The dream of returning home to Myanmar remains uncertain for hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who fled to Bangladesh despite rebel control of the border, members of the ethnic group said Friday.