Refugees, Rohingya and Resistance

All Islamic nations are cumulatively one-fourth of the World’s population, and yet produced 59% of worldwide refugees. The magnitude of crisis, statistics, big picture, a perspective & India's biggest challenge from a Rohingya ethnic group!

As per the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) data, various countries in the world host 24.8mn refugees, and out of which a whopping 59% i.e. 14.7mn are originated from Islamic nations, despite these nations are just 23% of the world’s total population.

The status ‘refugee’, implied it concerns the international borders but not the one who is forced to be ‘displaced’ within a country, neither it accounts for illegal infiltrations. If we look at the overall forced displacement number worldwide, is much larger, 82mn.

For the sake of understanding the magnitude, try this analogy- one of India's major city Bhopal’s population is 2.5mn and Madhya Pradesh (M.P.) state's population is 87mn. So we are here talking about the displacement of the entire M.P. and the number of refugees is equivalent to almost ten cities like Bhopal. Each resident of it, Ten Cities.

While the responsibility of forced displacement due to regional conflicts or ethnics reasons still lies with the state (remember Kashmiri Pundits' exodus), however, when communities decide to flee out of the country, the challenge becomes entirely different.

For that matter, worldwide, 39% of refugees are only from Two countries– Syria & Afghanistan. The world knows their history, power conflicts, flavored with Islamic extremism (ISIS & Taliban / Haqqani Network resp.), further messed up by US foreign and military's oily policies.

Out of this 14.7mn that originated from Islamic nations, approx. 68% (i.e. 10mn or equivalent to 4xBhopal) moved to another Islamic nation, while 32% i.e. 4.7mn, chose a non-Islamic nation as shelter. 50% of these 10mn, (i.e. 5mn or ~2xBhopal), granted asylum only by Turkey and Pakistan, surprisingly, not by the more resourceful and rich group of countries- the Arab World.

In other words, a significant 0.85% of the total Islamic nations’ population moved to another country, while a similar number is just 0.17% for all non-Islamic countries cumulatively.

Take a look at how the United States, under the past four presidents, exploited the post 9/11 era that led to irreparable damage to global refugees' mess.

As per WION new channel report, the United States invasion & military actions caused 38mn displaced from their natives, i.e. equivalent to the Telangana state of India) and cost 335,000 lives. While civilians toll were 2071 per year killed by the Taliban, USA's airstrikes claimed 1134 lives per year between 2017-19.

Now consider non-Islamic nations' refugees i.e. 9.8mn. 22% (i.e. 2.1mn) got shelter in Islamic nations, rest (78%) preferred non-Islamic only. Interestingly these 2.1mn have 1mn outflux only from Myanmar, largely persecuted minorities and Rohingya Muslims, which have been granted shelter by Bangladesh and Malaysia.

Largest non-Islamic nation refuge crisis- South Sudan, with 4.1mn people displaced, 2.1mn hosted by Uganda-Ethiopia-Kenya-Sudan. Worth to note that while Syria and Afghanistan crisis is a large product of religious radicalization & terrorism, catalyzed by the West, Sudanese civil war is for internal power struggle and oil revenues.

Let's look into India's story!

Before moving ahead to the most crucial part- the Rohingya crisis, note that India is not a signatory of The Refugee Convention, 1951 nor 1967 Refugee Protocol that obliges India to recognize refugee status, yet India has done its job well.

As a matter of fact, India hosts 2.28L refugees from 45 countries, out of these 24 are Islamic nations. The big pies are -

Sri Lanka (41%); China (read Tibetans) (33%); Myanmar + Stateless (17%) mostly Rohingya; Afghans (7%)

One might wonder, then where do 'Bangladeshi' numbers stand? The official number of Bangladeshi refugees in India is hilariously 8 (Eight), absolute number, no unit. Therefore, note that this is not an actual foreign citizen presence on Indian soil, but just a registered number as per UNHCR.

Let's look into the trigger events that led to an influx in India by largely four groups-

1. State and terrorist outfit LTTE led civil war situation pushed Sri Lankan Tamilians.

2. Persecution of Tibetans by expansionist China.

3. Myanmar - Bangladesh - Rakhine region conflict resulted in fleeing Rohingya

4. Price of Soviet, USA, and Taliban war crisis for Afghans

Take a look at the chart and footnote.

Historically, Mughals era to the British raj, India has learned a lot from its own experience, hence developed 'preferred' policies for granting asylum. While the Tibetans and Lankan Tamils usually stay away from nuisances, present and so the history is not the same for Rohingya.

So, why India is treating the Rohingya crisis differently than the Tibetans or Lankans?

A simple answer maybe, because it is, indeed, different.

Let's take a deep dive into the Rohingya crisis.

Rohingya, hails from the Rakhine region, bordering almost 95% to Myanmar, 5% to Bangladesh, are considered as most persecuted minorities in the world by the United Nations.

The history of the Rakhine Muslim ethnic group connect to, yet again, the desire for a separate Islamic nation, only to be exploited by colonizer British which promised them to fulfill their desire in return to fight for the British in WW2 at Burma against Rakhine Buddhists, who were then allied with the Japanese.

However, post-Myanmar independence in 1948, the Buddhist dominant nation denied citizenship to the Rohingya Muslims, and hence British left another region of conflict forever. Once an enemy ally, Myanmar never accepted Rohingya and have always considered them as ‘Bengali’ (from Bangladesh), illegal migrants or intruders, anything but their citizen.

And here it began the history of protest, politics, power, and perish in the entire region, from 1950s to till date.

Take a walkthrough of Resistance to Violence timelines, the critical events as they happened.

With Myanmar and Bangladesh both rejecting the Rohingya, since 1970s to date, they have spread across the world seeking asylums. Though mostly moved to Islamic nations like Bangladesh and Pakistan, but being a neighboring country, India couldn’t be spared with Rohingya refugees and significant illegal infiltrations.

(Picture courtesy - AJLabs)

In recent years, the Rohingya militant group Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has taken the front stage. Besides carrying out the Hindu massacre in 2017, where they killed more than 100 women, children, and men, ARSA has targeted high profiles Myanmar - Bangladesh bordering post-deputed police and army personnel.

ARSA, as per many intelligence reports, is now being supported by other 'Jihadist' groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Pakistan intel agency ISI. ARSA is led by a Saudi-raised-Pakistan-born Rohingya Muslim Atta Ullah, son of a Rohingya migrant, who studied at Madrasa in Mecca. In July 2020, Myanmar's Commander-in-Chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing claimed that "strong forces" (indicating towards China) are supporting terrorist groups. Another Rohingya militant group Aqa Mul Mujahideen is allegedly linked with LeT and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) cell in Jammu and Kashmir. Some reports suggested that Jihadi groups like Jamaat-ud Dawa targeting vulnerable Rohingya youths and providing them training crossborder. Al-Qaeda's offshoot Ansar Gazawat-ul-Hind in Kashmir expressed support to Rohingya living in Jammu and 'warned' Modi government against deporting them from India.

Indian authorities have enough reason to deny access to Rohingya. The stand became more clear in 2017 when the Supreme Court of India sought the Modi government's view on Rohingya migrants during a plea filed by usual suspects like Kapil Sibal and Prashant Bhushan to prevent deporting of Rohingya. Home ministry in response drew clear lines citing several national security concerns, affirming further that government is under constitutional obligation to deport any illegal immigrants and therefore it is performing duty. The court was satisfied with the response and denied interfering with home ministry functions. The decision was welcomed by the home minister Rajnath Singh who said that the Rohingya migrants issue should not be seen through the prism of human rights but it is a serious security concern.

"I want to ask when such a criminal or terrorist not only violates the human rights of others but also takes away their right to live, in such a situation how we can raise the issue of human rights of such criminals," he added while addressing the silver jubilee foundation day event of the National Human Rights Commission in New Delhi, in Oct 2018.

There has been unarguably a violent history of persecutions of Rohingya and so with the Kashmiri Pundits and Tibetans, who are equally anguished and are still fighting for justice by means which are accepted in any civil society. From the USA to Germany or Russia to Australia, every nation keeps national interest at prime before handling migrants. Note that the rich Arab World or the USA would prefer to grant financial aids through UNHCR but do have their policies for accepting or denying migrants. India is no exception. By all means, it is mindful about its resources, opportunities, ethnic and cultural harmony and therefore it must take appropriate action, whatever is deemed fit in the national interest.

~ The Hawk Eye

Twitter Thread- https://twitter.com/thehawkeyex/status/1442125669954048005?s=20