A deeper relationship between Dhaka and Beijing

Dhaka Tribune 

Opinion

Muhammad Zamir
July 21st, 2019

Photo: DHAKA TRIBUNE

Can China help in addressing the Rohingya crisis?

The ties between Bangladesh and China have evolved into a deeper relationship over the last few years. This dynamic has intensified in its diversity through greater connectivity within the sub-regional and regional paradigms. This has opened doors within this matrix. It has also generated endeavours towards cooperation in diverse areas.

New Sanctions A Positive Step In Responding To The Rohingya Crisis

Forbes
Olivia Enos Contributor
Policy 

                  Young Rohingya man carrying senior Rohingya woman in refugee camp. Getty

In a welcome move, the U.S. Department of State issued sanctions against four senior Burmese military officials. One of those sanctioned is Senior-General Min Aung Hlaing, the man directly responsible for atrocities committed against the Rohingya, a Muslim minority group in Burma.

While State’s action stopped short of financially sanctioning military officials, it subjects them to a travel ban and represents a positive step toward accountability.

Why is the UN’s Response to Myanmar’s Rohingya Persecution so Powerless?

THE 
GLOBE POST
Max Pensky
July 11, 2019
Opinion

 In August 2017, Myanmar’s military launched 'area clearance operations' against the Rohingya in its western Rakhine Province, driving nearly three-quarters of a million citizens into neighboring Bangladesh. Photo: AFP

Recent reports about the United Nations’ response to Myanmar’s persecution of the Rohingya minority highlights just how deep the U.N.’s dysfunction has become. U.N. officials now openly worry that ongoing aid provision to internally displaced Rohingya civilians confined to squalid camps within Myanmar will have the unintended effect of “entrenching segregation,” effectively helping Myanmar in its efforts to isolate the Rohingya.

Let them work

Dhaka Tribune

Opinion
Op-Ed, Anupam Debashis Roy
July 11th, 2019

 Photo: MAHMUD HOSSAIN OPU 

Desperation breeds criminality
The Rohingya living in southern Bangladesh are passing their days in inhuman conditions. They are confined to the restraints of the refugee camps. They are not allowed to work. They are not allowed to learn Bangla. They are not allowed to marry Bangladeshis. And most importantly, they are not allowed to leave the confines of the camp.

Is China’s Rohingya pledge mere rhetoric?

Dhaka Tribune
Opinion - Op-Ed
Towheed Feroze
July 8th, 2019

 They have a right to return MAHMUD HOSSAIN OPU

Or are we finally going to see an end to the Rohingya crisis?

Reportedly, China has told the visiting prime minister of Bangladesh that they were thinking of taking a step to help settle the impasse between Bangladesh and Myanmar over the Rohingya issue.

China has also said that the imbroglio can only be addressed when the two countries sit for dialogue.

This demand for “dialogue” has been standard diplomatic rhetoric for a long time. Of course, in most complex situations of life, people often try to find an acceptable middle path through dialogue.

Though, in such cases, both parties must have the spirit of reconciliation along with a desire to find a possible way forward by making concessions.

Rohingya Crisis: Should Rakhine Be Under Bangladesh’s Sovereignty?

the quint
Shafiur Rahman

Opinion

Five years ago, an op-ed in a Bangladeshi daily, Dhaka Tribune, ruffled the feathers of the powers that be in Myanmar’s capital, Nay Pyi Taw. Such was the offence taken that the Bangladeshi Ambassador was summoned for a dressing down by the Burmese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In the opinion piece, now long removed from the web, journalist Zeeshan Khan had argued that the Rohingya “should have the option of forming an independent country between Bangladesh and Myanmar”.

Now, a broadly similar proposition has resurfaced in an intervention by US Congressman Brad James Sherman, in the House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific. 

 

Also Read : Meet Tasmida,  the First Rohingya Refugee Girl to Enter College

The Rohingya need an answer: The Nation

THE STRAITS TIMES

Jun 13, 2019,Editorial Notes

A group of Rohingya Muslims sitting on the sand at the Tarutao Marine National Park on Rawi island, southern Thailand on June 11, 2019.PHOTO: AFP

In its editorial, the paper urges Asean to take into account the concerns of the stateless minority, instead of ploughing ahead with plans to repatriate refugees.

BANGKOK (THE NATION/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - Repatriation of Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to Myanmar's conflict-torn Rakhine state will be on the table when Asean leaders meet later this month in Bangkok.

No quick Asean fix for Rakhine state

Bangkok Post

WRITER: TAN SRI SYED HAMID ALBAR, LAETITIA VAN DEN ASSUM, KOBSAK CHUTIKUL & DINNA WISNU 

11 Jun 2019 

Opinion > Opinion

When Asean's leaders meet in Bangkok for their summit on June 22-23, they will discuss a preliminary report about Myanmar by the Asean Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management (AHA Centre).

According to news reports and press releases, this report -- which remains confidential -- makes an initial assessment of the preparations for the voluntary repatriation of Rohingya refugees.

The emphasis of Asean's efforts to support Myanmar with the Rohingya repatriation will be on "low-hanging fruit", the assumption being that practical measures will contribute to creating a conducive environment for the safe, dignified return of Rohingya refugees.

The Rohingya need an answer

THE NATION

opinion 

June 11, 2019 01:00

By The Nation 

Myanmar and Asean neighbours plough ahead with plans to repatriate refugees, ignoring concerns of the stateless minority

Repatriation of Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to Myanmar’s conflict-torn Rakhine state will be on the table when Asean leaders meet later this month in Bangkok. Also in their hands wil be a report on the positive prospects for repatriation, written by an assessment team that spent months in Rakhine earlier this year. However, any leader convinced that the process will go smoothly would be succumbing to false hope.

The grim reality behind Rohingya crisis rhetoric

THE NATION
Opinion
May 22, 2019 01:00
By Mohammad Zaman

Repatriation to Myanmar is nowhere in sight as threat of disease and hostility from local hosts rises

There are over a million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh – the latest batch of 800,000 came after August 25, 2017, joining 250,000 that had arrived since the first exodus of mid-1990s. As Myanmar nationals, Rohingya Muslims have historically faced ethnic and religious persecution, culminating in 2017 in a fierce, protracted genocidal campaign by the Myanmar army against its own people. The military launched a violent crackdown leading to arbitrary killings of Rohingya, including children and the elderly, gang rape of women, inhuman torture, and razing of village after village that forced communities to seek shelter in Bangladesh, unleashing a humanitarian crisis unprecedented in recent history.

Rohingyas: Genocide in the backyard

THE LEAFLET  
OPINION
Ujjaini Chatterji | @ | May 17,2019

 

Political agenda has overtaken constitutional and international law protections

AT the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, two new nations were formed – India and Pakistan. That same night, around two million people had already been butchered, and 14 million people displaced within the Indian subcontinent. Over 100,000 women were raped and killed. Properties were burnt and people were forced to migrate on the basis of their religion – Hindus to India and Muslims to Pakistan. 

Letters: 'Using Ashin Wirathu's words to support Islamophobic views is a new low'

The Northern Echo
Opinion
Letters 10th May

 HEAR ALL SIDES: Letters to the Editor

I WAS intrigued by Ralph Musgrave’s claim that he had been temporarily banned from a social media platform

simply for stating that Muslims are responsible for a disproportionately large number of terrorist attacks (HAS, May 3).

So I took a look at his Facebook page, where he says he was also banned for posting: “Buddhists on Islam: You can be full of kindness and love, but you cannot sleep next to a mad dog.”

Myanmar shows mercy – but not to Rohingya

THE NATION

opinion 

May 09, 2019

By The Nation 

Release of two journalists jailed after uncovering massacre does not mark a turning point in campaign of ethnic cleansing

Tuesday’s release of two Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists imprisoned on bogus charges was a ray of hope in a dark episode of ethnic cleansing in Myanmar. 

A relentless campaign by their Reuters colleagues, other media outlets and human rights organisations finally saw Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo reunited with their love ones after more than 500 days behind bars. The pair was jailed on trumped up charges of possessing state secrets after exposing the massacre of 10 Rohingya Muslims by government security forces in Rakhine.

Asean should back EU’s sanctions on Myanmar.

THE NATION
Opinion
May 02, 2019 01:00
By The Nation

Regional bloc has the power to help end military atrocities that have killed thousands 

This past Monday, the European Union extended its ban on selling arms to Myanmar while also prolonging sanctions against high-ranking officials suspected of perpetrating atrocities against the country’s Rohingya Muslims.

The sanctions are aimed at preventing the export of arms and equipment “that might be used for internal repression”, the EU announced.

Democracy is on the ropes in Myanmar and the rest of the world

The Washington Post 

By Editorial Board

April 23 at 1:47 PM

Opinion 

 

Reuters journalists Kyaw Soe Oo, left, and Wa Lone are handcuffed as they are escorted by police out of a court in Yangon, Myanmar, in September 2018. (Thein Zaw/AP)

  

TWO JOURNALISTS in Myanmar, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, were among those from Reuters awarded the Pultizer Prize for international reporting this month for documenting the plight of the Rohingya Muslim minority. But these two will not be enjoying the hugs of family and applause of colleagues. They are in jail — unjustly, in a case that can only cause outrage at what has gone wrong in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

Myanmar -- investors should be cautious but take the risk.

         NIKKEI

ASIAN REVIEW

MARCH 27, 2019

If government pursues humanitarian agenda, foreign partners can back projects, even in Rakhine State.

Simon Tay

Aung San Suu Kyi told investors that "much of Rakhine's economic potential still remains untapped." © Reuters

A humanitarian crisis that has been brewing at the border between Myanmar and Bangladesh since 2016 is reaching a critical point. At Cox's Bazar, just inside Bangladesh, an estimated 740,000 displaced Muslim Rohingya from Myanmar's Rakhine State are encamped in temporary shelters, hoping that the international community will take them in as refugees or facilitate their safe return to the homes they claim in Myanmar.

‘Safe zones’ for the Rohingya are a prelude to apartheid — and worse

The Washington Post  

By Azeem Ibrahim  

March 20 at 3:48 PM

Opinions

 

 Rohingya refugees gather at a market in a refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, on March 7. (Mohammad Ponir Hossain/Reuters)

Azeem Ibrahim is a director at the Center for Global Policy and author of “Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Genocide.”

Bangladesh is once again calling for the establishment of safe zones for the Rohingya in Myanmar, so that it can begin resettling some of the 1 million or so refugees in its care around the district of Cox's Bazar . This is not the first time that the government in Dhaka has pushed for this. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina pressed Myanmar on the issue before the U.N. General Assembly in September 2017.

There’s hope for Myanmar, but the road is a long and painful one

THE HIGHLANDER

By Robert Gold- March 4, 2019
Opinions.

Since 1962, Myanmar has been, in one form or another, under autocratic military control, punctuated by disregard for civil rights and democratic institutions. Only recently did the military regime slowly shift towards democracy, holding democratic elections in 2010, the first in nearly half a century. However, in 2016, the military began a state-led persecution against the nation’s Muslim minority. This varying progress on liberalization has led to much frustration on the part of outside observers.

‘Way of Rakhita’: dream or nightmare?

ASIA TIMES

By Kyaw Linn, February 28, 2019

Opinion

“The Way of the Rakhita” – the Arakan Dream – doesn’t have a single definition, but its force as a unifying message among the Arakan people is powerful. Evoking memories of the once-great Arakanese Kingdom, Arakan Army General Twan Myat Naing’s appeal to Rakhita inspires the Arakanese in ways that Burmese calls for peace cannot. However, its power among the Arakanese might be the very reason the people of Myanmar’s Rakhine state will continue to suffer worse and worse violence in the years to come.

Hasina’s Rohingya dilemma growing, Delhi must help Dhaka resolve crisis

The Asian Age 

Shubha Singh

The writer is a senior journalist based in New Delhi.

 Muslim refugees many of whom have now spent more than 18 months in the camps.

Bilateral ties between India and Bangladesh have blossomed into a full-fledged, broad-based relationship that has broken new ground over the past decade. Weeks after Sheikh Hasina’s government was re-elected for a third term, Bangladesh foreign minister A.K. Abdul Momen was in New Delhi for his first foreign visit.