‘The Rohingya crisis’ is a tragedy that was in the making for over several decades and concerns the plight of hundreds of thousands of people belonging to the Rohingya- community in Myanmar’s Rakhine State.
Rohingya belong to Muslim sect, they are descendants of Arab traders who have been in the region for generations.
Myanmar is predominantly Buddhist country & does not recognise this community as its citizens and considers them “illegal immigrants” from Bangladesh.
Militants suspected to be from the Arakan-Rohingya Salvation Army attacked military and police outposts.
Recent violence in Rakhine State has displaced several hundred thousand Rohingya within Myanmar and driven out some 700,000 of them to neighboring Bangladesh after the military launched a bloody crackdown triggered by militant attacks on security posts in late August 2017.
The United Nations (UN) has described the violence against the Rohingya community as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”
The crisis has also acquired a security dimension with concerns being raised over the infiltration of Islamic extremism amongst the Rohingyas, who have grown increasingly desperate over their plight.
The massive refugee outflow has created a serious humanitarian crisis that carries implications on regional stability and security.
The Rohingya-Muslim community are doubly disadvantaged.
Unlike the rest of the other ethnic minorities, the Rohingyas are regarded as “illegal immigrants”.
The Rohingya suffer from the general negative sentiment against Muslims and are easy targets of vitriolic attacks and pronouncements from ultra-nationalist Buddhist forces.
