Burma’s Denial of Citizenship Rights to Rohingya

Western Arakan State’s isolation and underdevelopment historically meant that few Rohingya were registered at birth, or had documentation proving any citizenship, and this problem persists. Their lack of citizenship continues today. The Rohingya are officially an alien and illegal community, not listed as one of the 135 recognized “ethnic nationalities” in Burma, and thus the majority of them are not entitled to national identity cards. Despite this, those who flee and are deported back to Burma are often imprisoned for leaving the country illegally. In their absence, their names are removed from Burma’s draconian household registration system that keeps track of people’s movements, and they are often handed stiff fines and jailed. This lack of legal status has provided cover to security forces to perpetrate routine abuses against them with impunity, particularly in western Burma, where the security forces are involved in pacification campaigns against the local population.

The SPDC did not publicly comment during the recent arrival of Rohingya on the coastlines of Thailand, India and Indonesia. Eventually, the military government announced that the Rohingya were not Burmese citizens and so the event had nothing to do with Burma, creating the false impression that the tragedy involved only Bangladeshis. At the time of the ASEAN summit in February, the SPDC announced that any “Bengali” who could prove that they were born in Burma could return.[22] The announcement was disingenuous because it is Burmese authorities themselves who have routinely denied Rohingya the necessary documentation to demonstrate their citizenship.[23] 

Discrimination against the Rohingya, though far from universally endorsed, runs deep in Burma.[24] The SPDC’s denial of legal status to Rohingya has considerable public support among ethnic Arakanese and other Burmese, and among some opposition and exile groups. Many Rohingya groups are routinely excluded from multilateral exile movements and meetings.[25] Some Arakanese Buddhists, who have been neighbors of Rohingya for centuries, routinely deny that the Rohingya even exist, claiming instead that they are Bengalis residing in Burma.

The legal limbo in which the Rohingya have long lived in Burma—and the view that they should not be treated as full members of society–are at times married to outright racism.  South Asians are derogatorily referred to as kala (foreigner) in Burma, but the Rohingya often are viewed as beneath even this level of disdain. This was starkly in evidence recently in a February 2009 letter from the Burmese Consul-General in Hong Kong, Ye Myint Aung, to his fellow heads of mission:

In reality, Rohingya are neither ‘Myanmar People’ nor Myanmar’s ethnic group. You will see in the photos that their complexion is ‘dark brown’. The complexion of Myanmar people is fair and soft, good looking as well… They are as ugly as ogres.[26]

Proclamations of the outsider status of the Rohingya also take the form of unsubstantiated assertions that the Rohingya are not loyal to Burma and pose a serious threat to Burma’s national security. While officials periodically raise such specters, history tells a different story. Since Burma’s independence, the majority of Rohingya have attempted to live quiet lives and enjoy the same rights as other Burmese citizens. While some Rohingya have taken up arms, they have never posed a serious threat to Burma’s territorial integrity. A short-lived Mujahid rebellion in the early 1950s in Arakan failed to attract widespread Rohingya support. Contemporary Rohingya armed resistance is small and militarily insignificant, as political and armed resistance groups are splintered and constantly bickering. Small numbers of Rohingya men who have reportedly traveled to the Middle East for terrorism training have evidently not returned with any jihadist designs. There has never been a Muslim-connected terrorism incident in Burma.[27]

Since the early 1990s, the militarization of western Burma has been dramatic, with a rise in the number of army battalions from 3 to 43, the biggest increase in the country.[28]The Burmese army uses the local population to maintain its presence, stealing food, appropriating land, and forcing civilians to build camps, excavate roads, and carry supplies.

The military-buildup has occurred in parallel with the need to safeguard massive infrastructure projects. In December 2008, the Chinese energy company PetroChina signed a 30-year lease with the Burmese to buy natural gas off the coast of western Arakan State, in the Shwe Gas field; the consortium involves Indian, Thai, South Korean, Chinese and Burmese interests. The gas will be transported across Burma to Yunnan province in China by pipeline, with a second pipeline running beside it that will transport crude oil from the Middle East. Although the majority of Rohingya communities are northwest of these planned pipeline routes, the increased troop presence has adversely impacted their already dismal existence.[29]