INTRODUCTION
Southeast Asian nation known as Myanmar, or Burma, is formally known as the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. By area, it is the largest nation in Mainland Southeast Asia and the tenth-largest nation overall in Asia. According to the UN World Population Prospects study, Myanmar is expected to have 54,964,694 people living there in 2024 (55 million or 5.5 crores). In Myanmar, Buddhism makes up the majority religion. While about 0.5% of people in Myanmar practice Hinduism, it used to be a major religion in the country.[1]
Muslim rebels from the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) attacked and slaughtered 99 Bengali Hindu villagers on August 25, 2017, in the Hindu villages of Kha Maung Seik, a cluster in the northern Maungdaw District of Rakhine State, Myanmar. After a month, 45 Hindus, mostly women and children, were found dead in mass graves found by the Myanmar Army. After conducting a thorough investigation inside Myanmar’s Rakhine State, Amnesty International revealed that a Rohingya armed group armed with guns and swords is accountable for at least one, and possibly a second, massacre of up to 99 Hindu women, men, and children in August 2017 as well as additional unlawful killings and abductions of Hindu villagers and villages. Drawing from numerous interviews conducted both in that region and in Bangladesh, along with forensic pathologists’ analysis of photographic evidence, the organization disclosed how Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) fighters instilled fear among Hindus and other ethnic communities through their vicious attacks.[2] Numerous Hindu ladies, men, and children were seized by armed men wearing black clothing and by Rohingya people clothed simply. They marched the men to the village’s edge, where they divided them into groups according to gender and age, robbing, binding, and blindfolding them. ARSA fighters executed 53 Hindus, beginning with the men, a few hours later. Following their coercion to “convert” to Islam by ARSA members, eight Hindu women and eight of their children were kidnapped and later spared. With the help of the authorities in both Bangladesh and Myanmar, the survivors were compelled to flee to Bangladesh with the fighters a few days later. They were then repatriated to Myanmar in October 2017.[3] Hindu survivors told Amnesty that they either saw relatives being killed or heard their screams. On August 26, Arsa members attacked the Hindu village of Ah Nauk Kha Maung Seik. “In this brutal and senseless act, members of Arsa captured scores of Hindu women, men, and children and terrorized them before slaughtering them outside their villages,” [4]
WHY IS THERE SCEPTICISM REGARDING A MASS GRAVE?
In September of last year, the Nay Pyi Taw administration declared that it had found a mass grave, just as world concern over the scope of the Rohingya migration to Bangladesh and the horrifying reports of crimes committed by the Myanmar security forces was mounting. However, the fatalities were not Muslims; according to the authorities, Arsa terrorists killed the Hindus. The grave and bodies were shown to journalists, but questions remained about the specifics of what transpired in Ah Nauk Kha Maung Seik and Ye Bauk Kyar, a neighboring village, as a result of the government’s continued refusal to let independent human rights researchers into Rakhine. Additionally, the government’s refusal to acknowledge any serious abuses by its forces, despite mass testimony, further damaged its credibility. Arsa’s activities were so heinously awful that it’s difficult to overlook them. Both the crimes against humanity committed by Myanmar’s security forces in the northern Rakhine State and these atrocities require accountability. “In the past, Arsa has refuted these charges, claiming that reports of its fighters murdering people were “lies. “Even though some members of the Rohingya community have lived in Myanmar for years, the stateless, predominantly Muslim group is deeply disliked there and is viewed as illegal migrants from Bangladesh. [5]Another forty-six Hindu people vanished from Ye Bauk Kyar, a nearby village, and were reportedly slain by the Rohingya rebels. Numerous Hindu men, women, and children were kidnapped by ARSA members, who then harassed and killed them outside of their villages. Director of Amnesty International’s crisis response, Tirana Hassan, stated, “The perpetrators of this horrible crime must be held accountable. “The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) is said to have attacked thirty military stations in Myanmar on the same day that the atrocities against the Hindu minority took place, leading to violent retaliation. Approximately 700,000 Rohingya Muslims crossed into Bangladesh as a result of a violent military action that the UN referred to as “ethnic cleansing.” Doctors Without Borders reports that in just the first month, at least 6,700 Rohingya people lost their lives.[6] However, the government of Myanmar has adamantly denied that the military forces engaged in any grave violations, even in the face of numerous reports from refugees of rape, torture, arson, and extrajudicial executions. ARSA was therefore suspected of killing the Hindu victims when the authorities announced the discovery of two mass graves in September. This has further eroded confidence in the legitimacy of the government’s conclusion by preventing journalists and independent observers from entering the conflict area outside of government-escorted tours.[7]
The horrific attacks carried out by ARSA were followed by an ethnic cleansing campaign by the Myanmar military against the Rohingya people as a whole. Human rights abuses or violations by one party should never excuse abuses or violations by the other, Tirana Hassan stated. Both must be denounced.”The families of the victims and survivors have a right to justice, the truth, and compensation for the great harm they have endured. “The permanent representative of Myanmar chastised certain UN opens in a new tab for only hearing “one side” of the narrative and neglecting to acknowledge violations carried out by ARSA during a UN Security Council.[8]
CONCLUSION
The Rohingya community in Rakhine State has been subjected to institutionalized prejudice by the Myanmar government for many years. According to Amnesty International, apartheid was a crime against humanity because of the extreme discrimination the government had toward the Rohingya even before the horrors that began in August 2017. Following the attacks on August 25, these crimes and violations peaked, resulting in widespread rapes, unlawful killings, and village burnings that drove most of the populace to leave the nation. Such violations are not justifiable in any way. However, nothing can excuse the massacre, kidnappings, and other mistreatment of the Hindu community carried out by ARSA, as this briefing has demonstrated. It has been exceedingly difficult to reach the communities affected by ARSA and to verify witness accounts because the Myanmar authorities have refused to allow Amnesty International and other independent investigators access to northern Rakhine State since the outbreak of violence in August. Amnesty International has now concluded that ARSA fighters are accountable for the unlawful killing and kidnapping of members of the Hindu community in northern Rakhine State, despite the restrictions. These are grave offenses against human rights. A competent body should look into them, and if enough evidence is found to be admissible, those guilty should face justice in independent civilian courts during fair trials that do not involve the death sentence and adhere to international standards of justice. To fully uncover the scope of human rights violations and criminal activities in northern Rakhine State, including those carried out by ARSA, the Myanmar government needs to promptly grant independent investigators, such as the UN Fact-Finding Mission, complete and unrestricted access across the entire region. Justice, the truth, and restitution for the harm endured are rights that belong to victims, survivors, and their families. In order to achieve this, the authorities must also guarantee that communities in need get complete and unrestricted humanitarian aid, and they must guarantee that all survivors of violence in northern Rakhine State have access to appropriate psycho-social support.
Author(s) Name: Nidhi Shyam Singh (Symbiosis Law School, Pune)
Reference(s):
[1] World Population Prospects 2022,United Nation, Department of social affairs population
division< https://population.un.org/wpp/DataSources/104 > Accessed on 7th January 2024
[2] The Morung Express < https://morungexpress.com/massacre-of-hindus-by-rohingya-in-myanmar-could-be-international-crime-un-investigator > Accessed on 7th January 2024
[3] Myanmar: New evidence reveals Rohingya armed group massacred scores in Rakhine State (2021) Amnesty International. <https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/05/myanmar-new-evidence-reveals-rohingya-armed-group-massacred-scores-in-rakhine-state/ > (Accessed: 11 January 2024).
[4] Myanmar Rohingya militants massacred Hindus, says amnesty (2018) BBC News. Available at: <https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-44206372 > (Accessed: 12 January 2024).
[5] ibid
[6] Barron, L. (2018) Amnesty: Rohingya insurgents massacred Hindus in Myanmar, Time. Available at:
< https://time.com/5288063/amnesty-report-rohingya-militants-massacred-hindus-in-myanmar >(Accessed: 13 January 2024).
[7] Barron, L. (2018) Amnesty: Rohingya insurgents massacred Hindus in Myanmar, Time. Available at: <https://time.com/5288063/amnesty-report-rohingya-militants-massacred-hindus-in-myanmar/> (Accessed: 14 January 2024)
[8] Barron, L. (2018) Amnesty: Rohingya insurgents massacred Hindus in Myanmar, Time. Available at: <https://time.com/5288063/amnesty-report-rohingya-militants-massacred-hindus-in-myanmar> (Accessed: 14 January 2024).
