Since 2012, the long-term plight of the Muslim minority living in Rakhine State of Myanmar has gained unprecedented international attention. Muslims in Rakhine State and elsewhere across Myanmar have been the victims of violent attacks and arson campaigns.[1] These attacks come after decades of tension during which many Muslims – often known as Rohingya – in the northern part of Rakhine State remain stateless having failed to attain any form of citizenship. During 2012, most Muslims across Rakhine State were displaced from their communities into camps that they have not since been allowed to leave.
The campaign against Muslims in Rakhine State has been accurately described by Human Rights Watch as ‘ethnic cleansing’. It has involved razing communities to the ground as part of a concerted effort to rearrange the state’s ethnic composition.[2] Violent clashes can be blamed on culprits from both the minority Muslim and the majority Rakhine Buddhist communities, but the main aggressors across the state are unquestionably affiliated with Rakhine Buddhist networks. Casualty figures are unreliable but up to 1,000 people, the majority of them Muslim, are thought to have died in inter-communal violence during 2012.[3] Tensions have since persisted at a high level.[4]
In most instances, a similar pattern of violence evolved. A specific flashpoint, such as an argument between a Muslim shop-owner and a Rakhine Buddhist customer, or allegations of offenses committed by Muslim men against Rakhine women, is grasped as a rallying call for a violent response by groups of mostly young men. Rumours and virulent political speeches, spread by radio and the internet as well as through community networks, polarise many bystanders. Similar chains of events have been recorded in anti-Muslim riots elsewhere in Myanmar and in other countries. Politically-inspired communal violence between Hindu and Muslim groups in Gujarat, India, killed some 2,000 people in 2002.[5]
This working paper does not follow the common academic practice of isolating one specific factor as a primary cause of violence. Instead it points towards five different overlapping background causes that combine to create a volatile, high-risk environment. This approach is more likely to offer an accurate representation of the unrest and offer useful explanation to all those within Myanmar and internationally who are concerned about ongoing tensions and interested in pursuing potential solutions. It also demonstrates the complex challenges facing individuals or organisations aiming to reduce conflict over the long term. The work is based on written material and on interviews conducted in Rakhine State, in Yangon, and outside Myanmar in late 2013.
Views over violence in Rakhine State are often extreme and highly polarized. I have made every effort to offer an impartial account while remaining true to universal principles of human rights, equality, non-violence and also national sovereignty. As is often the case when covering emotive and controversial issues, it is likely that readers from all extremes will find plenty to disagree with.
1. Historical legacies
Efforts to build an inclusive state based on shared universal citizenship rather than ethnic categories have never been pursued with any sustained vigour in Myanmar. British colonial rule defined and codified ethnic differences, distinguishing in particular between the Burmese majority and minority groups. This legacy laid a basis for modern Myanmar, with regions outside the central plains mostly defined according to ethnicity – Mon, Karen, Rakhine, and so on.
Post-independence efforts to promote an inclusive government never took off, even before the decades of military misrule set in. External support for different armed groups added to tensions, from conflict between Japanese and Allied forces during World War Two to Chinese promotion and American suppression of communism during the Cold War. Minority groups typically continue to feel poorly represented at the national level, not only by the military-led government but also by the opposition National League for Democracy headed by Aung San Suu Kyi.
Repeated ceasefires between ethnic minority leaders and military officials have created calm in many border areas but have rarely led to comprehensive settlements. They typically remained as elite-level agreements to share resource wealth, failing to counter the centralized nature of the government or encourage accountable institutions in peripheral, ethnic minority zones.
At the same time, tension and communal violence against Chinese and South Asian minorities have recurred regularly for over a century in many parts of Myanmar including the capital, Yangon. Migration from India was encouraged by the colonial authorities who often employed Indian officials as civil servants, functionaries and labourers. This, along with the role that migrant communities have fulfilled as urban traders and business brokers, has engendered resentment among the majority population. With the nation state defined in ethnic terms, migrant communities are easily scapegoated even if they have been around for many generations.
These historical patterns have perpetuated sharp ethnic distinctions between minorities and the majority population. Groups perceived as outside the classified 135 ethnic categories of national citizen are especially marginalized, including Muslims in Rakhine State. Longstanding yet unjustified alarm over Muslim dominance and propagation of Islam feeds ongoing xenophobia among the majority, making them an easy target. Muslims comprise only a very small percentage of the population of Myanmar but in several townships in Northern Rakhine State as well as some small areas within cities across the country their local numerical dominance appears to vindicate these irrational fears.
2. Ethnic politics and marginalized peripheries
It is important to grasp the importance of longstanding tensions between local leaders representing the Buddhist majority in Rakhine State and national authorities. As in other minority states of Myanmar, violent conflict against the central government has broken out in the past. Although active resistance has petered out, leaders of armed Rakhine activist groups remain in exile. For many people in Rakhine State, their struggle with an oppressive and centralised government dominates the political arena. Culturally, they feel that their heritage is not recognised and their past historical greatness has been undermined.
Ethnic identity is typically defined in Myanmar and across most of Southeast Asia in primordial terms, playing up the rights of a defined group of people (or a supposedly pure ‘race’) to ancestral land. State nationalism is built on a similar basis: historians and archaeologists in Indonesia or Thailand regularly produce new material apparently discovering the migratory routes of their nation’s pre-modern ancestors.[6] The term ‘race’ is still regularly used across Southeast Asia, for example in official Malaysian discourse that defines the natural racial and blood divisions of the population and devises policy accordingly or in commercial market research surveys asking people to tick what race they belong to as well as what brand of toothpaste they prefer.[7]
Ethnic Rakhine Buddhist leaders, along with leaders in most of Myanmar’s other border states, use ethnic identity as a rallying call to oppose the central state. Claims are based on asserting the rights to govern territory identified as the historical homeland of an ethnic group.[8] Demands typically fall short of full independence, based instead around stronger regional self-determination through a federal or decentralized system and through greater control of resources.
Economic inequalities fuel resentment. Development has tended to bypass minority states in Myanmar, benefits accruing instead to businesses linked to the central government and the military. Rakhine State is one of the poorest in the country. It sees limited benefit from natural resource exploitation including billions of dollars generated from offshore gas fields. Farmers complain that they cannot transport their products to market given the poor state of the road network. Fishermen lay the blame for the massive recent decline in fish stocks on large trawlers from outside the state owned by well-connected national business interests.
With ethnic affiliations so central to longstanding local political claims and to the central state’s efforts to prove its legitimacy, Muslim leaders in Rakhine State have adopted a similar logic. They have promoted the use of the old term ‘Rohingya’ to describe themselves as part of their assertion of rights along ethnic lines. The refusal of the Government and many Buddhists to recognize this term across Myanmar appears extreme but can be partly explained through the logic of Myanmar’s ethnic territorial politics. To most people in Rakhine State and elsewhere, the use of an ethnic label implies a claim to land along with an identity. This makes it threatening to politicians who are attempting to assert authority over their own perceived Rakhine homeland and to religious nationalists who associate the territory of Myanmar with Buddhism.
Most ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and the Myanmar Government insist on using the term ‘Bengali’ to describe the majority of Muslims in Rakhine State. The term emphasizes historical origins in neighbouring Bangladesh and India. It is understandably resented by Muslims themselves, many of whom believe that their families have been in Rakhine State for generations. For example, Muslim leaders refused to cooperate with a recent census that would have defined their ethnicity as Bengali, while denial of equal rights to Muslims in Rakhine State has for decades been justified by claiming that they are recent and often illegal migrants. Laws in Myanmar state that families need to have been resident in the country since 1823 in order to claim full citizenship status.
In this polarized environment, there is little time for shared values or common goals. Conceptions of equal rights or notions of plural governments that accommodate diverse groups within the same territory are not only of little concern but are also seen to undermine the Rakhine cause. Meanwhile, some vocal Muslim leaders inside Myanmar and among expatriate Muslim groups have attempted to counter oppression by pressing claims to Rohingya identity and adopting aggressive rhetoric. This has added fuel to the fire. With some Muslim leaders in Rakhine State arrested, and others confined to displacement camps along with the rest of the Muslim population, there are few respected representatives able to engage in dialogue.
Photo of displaced Muslim Children north of Sittwe, late 2013
3. Managing new democratic space
As democratic space has expanded across Myanmar, repressive state practices have been scaled back. Public gatherings, political networks, civil organisations, mobile phones and the internet are all broadly tolerated. Many challenges remain, yetthis is unquestionably a massive shift after decades spent suppressing freedom of expression.
Nevertheless, there is little guarantee that open political space will encourage progressive values. Instead, a relaxation of central authority can exacerbate politically motivated violence at the local level.[9] In Myanmar, partial democratic change has created space for airing racist views and promoting extremist organisations. Persecution of Muslims in Rakhine State, and across the country, has been facilitated by social networks. These include political parties, religious organisations and charities, some linked with the high-profile, media-savvy Buddhist monk known as Wirathu.[10]
The state response to initial signs of violence is a further important factor in determining how communal tensions spread.[11] In Myanmar, government inaction was compounded not only by earlier relaxation of authoritaran control but also by ingrained anti-Muslim sentiment among civil servants, military, and across society. Thein Sein, Myanmar’s President, suggested in 2012 that most Muslims in Rakhine State should be deported.[12] Many local residents and observers claim that local police units have repeatedly taken few if any measures to restrain anti-Muslim violence. Anti-Muslim campaigns conform to decades of state propaganda promoting extreme expressions of ethnic and religious nationalism across Myanmar’s Buddhist population. At a time when rapid changes inevitably create uncertainty at all levels, fear of outsiders and discrimination against minorities has grown.
Violent incidents have become less frequent since the last outbreak of mass unrest in October 2012. This is partly because most Muslims in Rakhine State are confined to displacement camps that were established after threats and arson forced them to flee their homes. The most reliable estimates indicate that around 900 people died in the associated violence. A clear majority of the victims were Muslim.
The reduced level of violence also results from a more assertive state response. In October 2013, violent attacks on Muslims before a planned presidential visit to the town of Thandwe in Rakhine State led to a stronger government reaction. Rakhine Buddhist ringleaders inciting violence were arrested by a police unit sent from the capital.[13] Clamping down on unrest is influenced by a desire to maintain authority, to stem unacceptable levels of violence, and to retain good international relations as Myanmar assumes the rotating chair of ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations), a body that includes Malaysia and Indonesia, both Muslim majority nations.
4. New roles for political entrepreneurs
Increasingly democratic politics have polarised ethnic relations in Rakhine State. The Rakhine National Development Party (RNDP) builds its core support from strong ethnic association with Rakhine Buddhists, confronting the military dominated central government. Anti-Muslim sentiment and forced relocation of Muslim communities suit their political agenda.[14]
Ideologically, a strong assertion of ethnic identity demonstrates their status as the key body representing an exclusive Rakhine Buddhist territory. RNDP leaders position themselves to act as intermediaries between the state and citizens. Government institutions and civil servants are typically associated with the opposition in Rakhine State, the national Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) which is linked to the country’s military and former military leaders. In environments where accountability is limited and connections are needed to gain any benefit from the government, local political leaders often act as go-betweens. When local political entrepreneurs perceive that they can improve their local status by stirring up ethnic tension, the risks of communal violence increase.[15]
Those Muslims in Rakhine State entitled to vote have tended historically to back either the military-linked USDP and its predecessors or local Muslim parties. Since Myanmar’s reforms have been skewed so that the central government and the USDP hold the upper hand, RNDP politicians feel that they need to fight hard to gain electoral dominance. For instance, the President has the right to select the Chief Minister for each state from members of the state Parliament, including a quota of military appointees as well as elected representatives.[16] The Chief Minister of Rakhine State is a retired colonel who was the lead USDP candidate in the local elections of 2010.[17]
Basic electoral arithmetic suggests that forced removal of Muslims would benefit the RNDP. Increased anti-Muslim sentiment among the wider population decreases the scope for the government to offer voting rights to a greater number of Muslims. Interviews with community members, local leaders, and others linked with Muslims in Rakhine State repeatedly pointed to local RNDP activists as promoters of anti-Muslim violence.
5. International perspectives
Through a combination of misinformation and circumstance, most people in Myanmar and especially in Rakhine State see international organisations including NGOs and the UN as overwhelmingly pro-Muslim. Campaigns against international involvement and accusations of bias fuel ethnically exclusive nationalist agendas. National staff of UN agencies and Non-Governmental Organisations have been intimidated and access to Muslim displacement camps has repeatedly been blocked.
Until recently, sanctions and efforts to avoid Myanmar’s military regime, along with government-imposed operating restrictions, led international agencies to limit their work in the country. By contrast, international support has been provided for stateless Muslims in northern Rakhine State over several decades, reflecting their extreme need, lack of citizenship, and a failure of the government to uphold their fundamental rights.
Since mid-2012, UN agencies and non-governmental organisations have been providing greater levels of high-profile assistance to displaced people. Yet popular perception among the Rakhine Buddhist population, fed by extremist rumours, holds that external support only benefits Muslims.
The UN and NGOs are now unlikely to make headway by arguing that support is allocated on the basis of need and in response to abuses of international human rights standards. There is little if any tradition of government resource allocation according to need in Myanmar, with resource allocation depending on political priorities and reflecting patronage connections rather than rational planning or welfare objectives. International isolation and low levels of education mean that understanding of human rights norms is extremely low.
While providing support according to need is understandable from a technical perspective, international bodies also have to recognize that offering assistance to one side in a conflict situation is likely to increase tension and compromise operational neutrality.[18] Although some support has also been provided to the far smaller number of displaced ethnic Rakhine Buddhists, and assistance was also offered in response to a severe tropical storm in 2010, the record of international humanitarian and human rights interventions has unintentionally stoked local fears and expectations of bias.
International agencies are unlikely to be able to counter virulent campaigns against them in the short term. Over time, improved communication and ensuring outreach that supports poor Rakhine Buddhist communities could strengthen their scope to operate effectively. This may be necessary to ensure continued engagement yet it is not straightforward to implement. Combining appropriate approaches based on high levels of contextual awareness while also remaining consistent with international standards and focusing on greatest need is a challenging undertaking.
More widely, continued international attention to problems in Rakhine State is vital but has to be applied cautiously in order to minimize the risks of a backlash.
Conclusions
Conflict is still ongoing in Rakhine State. All groups have suffered but the State’s beleaguered Muslim population has been most heavily affected. Deeply entrenched bigoted attitudes have been awakened by recent political changes and the opening of democratic space. Tensions are likely to continue. Neither of the two large mainstream political parties, the military–linked USDP and the opposition NLD, have shown much concern for Muslim victims of communal violence across Myanmar. In Rakhine State, the locally dominant party that aims to represent the ethnic Rakhine Buddhist constituency, the RNDP, has electoral interests in marginalising Muslims and in exacerbating tensions.
In the long-term, efforts to moderate ethnically defined nationalism and to introduce a pluralist notion of citizenship based on equal rights would be valuable.[19] More specifically, recognition of the citizenship rights of Muslims in Rakhine State who have lived there for many generations is important. However, it remains controversial. Ethnic tensions and racially defined categories are likely to continue for some time yet given their history in Myanmar and the high ethnic content of nationalism across most of Southeast and East Asia.
Other interim approaches could consider inclusive development initiatives that look at building linkages between communities and gradually establish space so that displaced communities can in due course return to their homes. International agencies can increasingly demonstrate how they are supporting all ethnic groups. In a polarized environment, in which Muslim leadership is fractured and moderate Buddhist voices are hard to find, there is little discussion of a viable future plan to manage Rakhine State’s ongoing challenges. Efforts to build space for representative and responsive Muslim leaders may also support gradual improvements.
Over time, improvements in how both local government and informal community structures operate could reduce reliance on potentially ethnically polarising local political entrepreneurs who operate as brokers between the state and local voters. Lessons can be learnt from successes and failures in addressing communal violence across South and Southeast Asia. Yet regional experience shows that democratic politics are unlikely to solve, and may well exacerbate, interethnic tensions. Local political entrepreneurs, some linked with criminal interests and others having a stake in fomenting communal unrest, are likely to become a common feature across many parts of the country.
A more balanced relationship between the central authorities and state governments may reduce some of the frustration felt by local leaders in Rakhine State and elsewhere at a lack of access to power or resources. This includes the political role of state parliaments, administrative responsibilities of local government, and the scope for local businesses to benefit from new opportunities. However, Muslims and other minorities are likely to remain marginalised at all levels unless further measures are taken to recognize their equal rights.
In the interim, continued careful monitoring and engagement places pressure on the government to manage future outbreaks of violence. Elections scheduled for 2015 are likely to lead to continued tension even if violent conflict subsides. A forthcoming national census, the first since the 1980s, is also generating concern across many minority areas of Myanmar.
Max Beauchamp is the pseudonym of a development practitioner working in Rakhine State
[1] This paper uses the uncontroversial term ‘Muslims’. While accepting the validity of the term Rohingya, the term generates strong responses in Myanmar. What is more, some Muslim communities in Rakhine State that have been persecuted since 2012 do not describe themselves as Rohingya, including groups referred to as ‘Kaman’ Muslims. The dispute over names is discussed later in the paper.
[2] Human Rights Watch (2013) “All You Can Do is Pray”. Crimes Against Humanity and Ethnic Cleansing of Rohingya Muslims in Burma’s Arakan State, April 22. Also Michael Mann (2004) The Dark Side of Democracy: Explaining Ethnic Cleansing, Cambridge: University Press.
[3] The BBC World Service estimates that 70% of victims were Muslim. 969: How Burma’s Buddhist Monks Turned on Islam. 3 September 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01fnz3d
[4] International Crisis Group (2013) The Dark Side of Transition: Violence Against Muslims in Myanmar. Asia Report N┬░251, 1 October. Also Republic of the Union of Myanmar (2013) Final Report of Inquiry Commission on Sectarian Violence in Rakhine State, 8 July.
[5] See Ward Berenschot (2011) Riot Politics: Hindu-Muslim Violence and the Indian State. London: Hurst. Introduction.
[6] See Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (1983) The Invention of Tradition. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
[7] See for example Joel Kahn (2006) Other Malays, Nationalism and Cosmopolitanism in the Modern Malay World. Asian Studies Association of Australia in association with Singapore University Press (Singapore) and NIAS Press (Copenhagen).
[8] See Thomas Parks, Nat Colletta, Ben Oppenheim (2013) The Contested Corners of Asia: Subnational Conflict and International Development Assistance, The Asia Foundation, 2013.
[9] Similar processes are well documented elsewhere. See for example Gerry van Klinken (2007) Communal Violence and Democratization in Indonesia: Small Town Wars. Routledge.
[10] The ‘969’ campaign associates itself with Buddhist values and promotes a boycott of Muslim businesses in defence of national identity.
[11] Steven Wilkinson (2004) Votes and violence: Electoral competition and ethnic riots in India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[12] The Economist, 18 October 2012, No help, please, we’re Buddhists. http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21564909-when-offending-muslim-world-seems-small-price-pay.
[13] Those charged were later released on bail, a measure generally perceived in Myanmar as a failure to pursue justice while some Muslim leaders are thought to remain in detention. The Irrawaddy, 5 December 2013, 11 Arakanese Charged for Thandwe Violence Released on Bail.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/latest-news/11-arakanese-charged-thandwe-violence-released-bail.html.
[14] The author interviewed RNDP politicians and activists in late 2013.
[15] See Ward Berenschot’s research on India and Indonesia (op.cit.).
[16] The Asia Foundation and MDRI/CESD (2013) State and Region Governments in Myanmar. Yangon.
[17] All 14 Chief Ministers were the lead USDP candidate for their respective states. Most are retired senior military officers.
[18] Guidance for humanitarian and aid agencies repseatedly stresses the need to ‘Do No Harm’ by avoiding stoking perceptions of bias through aid delivery. See for example various sources at www.conflictsensitivity.org.
[19] See James Fennell (2013) Rakhine State Conflict Analysis An overview of conflict dynamics at national and state levels, IDL and The British Council, 5th March.
Speaking of bigotry, wasn’t Buddha an Indian (“Kalar” as the Burmese call them) and of course Mohammed was not a “Bengali” but an Arab, no?
Racial purity (“Rassenhygiene”) is an oxymoron. 135 racially distinct indigenous tribes in Burma? What a joke! I bet most so-called “Rakhines” or “Bamars” or “Karens” or “Mons” or whatever are all mixed.
I probably have traces of Neanderthal, Denisovan and Homo Erectus genes (I don’t believe in “creationism”)
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I don’t foresee the problem ending any time soon. Until a man sees a fellow man as just another human being,without the attachment of his ethnicity and religion, I am afraid the problem will continue. The only way to solve this type of problem is to modernize his mind through education. And I believe the Central government and the international community are in position to do so.
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Bias, yet a good road map to how we got to this quagmire.
‘Bigotry’ without addressing the inherent characteristics of Buddhism and more importantly Islam, in light of the fact that Myanmar is and will be a Buddhist country.
As Thailand is Myanmar will have been if not for the glaringly passes given to factors:
1) Colonial legacy
With a note to remind the author of this article that, the 2nd longest next to Pagan Dynasty that has changed Myanmar with all the quagmires.
2) The West of letting BSPP period (1962-1988) to proceed unmolested while imposing a policy that were useless and careless (1988-? 2013).
Again to the author to see the significant of nearly 1/2 a century of policy that contributed to present quagmires, to a country with so called 1948 to present to solve any problem.
If any country has to endure what Myanmar and the citizenry has gone through due to the West policy the author will see the significance of Buddhism, Bigotry DO NOT apply here.
The road to reconciliation in Myanmar can not exist w/o the religion.
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Plan B, could you explain what you mean by:
“Bigotry’ without addressing the inherent characteristics of Buddhism and more importantly Islam.”
As far as I am concerned, Buddhism only teach compassion toward all beings. And what I have been observing, concerning the situation in Burma, is contrary to the teachings of the Lord Buddha.
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Buddhism in MYANMAR is Theravada the purest form of teaching from Buddha.
Purest due to least incorporation of others religious figures.
Buddha, teaching like most other religion are indeed epitome of Tolerance Deprivation and sacrifice for others’ sake yet there is NO instruction on What or How to response when Buddha or his teaching is denigrated.
Islam in any form beyond the 5 pillars has no provision for tolerance to any religion even ones those admitted same God as Allah.
The perpetual animosity b/t Islamic supremacy and Buddhist response is inevitable.
Until Buddhist find none violent response the inherent characteristics of the two religious followers will continue to clash, allowing the ignorant west to nefariously label Buddhists as Bigot.
Maulamyain the city:
A true result of colonial legacy,
Less effected by the “useless careless west”,
Relatively plenty economically for everyone the co existence b/t Muslim and Buddhists peacefully
is a testimony to what could have been.
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Buddhism teaches that all people should strive for peace and harmony with nature and among themselves. The cardinal rule for Buddhism, as for all Indian-based religions, is Ahisma, which loosely translated, means “Do no harm” because “If one harms another, one is in fact actually harming themselves.” I daresay few human beings, Buddhist or not, are capable of achieving this lofty goal, but those who choose to follow the path of Buddhism are taught by senior monks and temple/monastery abbots to at least try.
What is different between Buddhism and Islam
is that Buddhism speaks to all human beings, irrespective of their chosen religion (or religion by birth) and what Buddhism teaches
is not restricted to just Buddhists, which is why you find Jewish Buddhists, Christian Buddhists, quite a few Quaker Buddhists (likely because of the the teachings of non-violence), Taoist Buddhists, and Hindu Buddhists. Whether any given individual,
from a Westerner turned Buddhist to a senior
abbot in a Buddhist Monastery in Burma, Thailand, Sri Lanka, China, Korea, or wherever, follows the principles is another matter entirely. Like ANY religion, when Buddhism becomes politicized, then trouble starts, whether it is the issue of the Rohingyas in Burma, or the long devastating
battle between Sinhalese Buddhists and Tamil
Hindus in Sri Lanka. To some Buddhists,the Rohingyas are extremists or terrorists, as
was the Tamil LTTE (Liberation of Tamil Tigers Eelam) in Sri Lanka. To the non-Buddhist that is, depending upon your point of view, as well as theirs, striving for equality or autonomy or a perhaps a separate homeland, the non-Buddhist may feel that they are not doing anything wrong (and there are some Buddhists who will agree with and some who won’t).
Islam and the Quran does not address the concept of Jihad (internal and external) struggle for oneness with God/Allah for non-Muslims. The Suras and the teachings of the Hadith were intended for Muslims and not intended for non-Muslims (unless they become Muslims).
When non-Muslims are spoken of within the various Suras in the Quran, there are often admonitions to be careful of non-Muslims
(and admonitions stronger and more explicit than that, which I won’t mention here).
Islam and the Quran were intended as a guide
for Muslims to follow, and not intended as a guide for non-Muslims who remain non-Muslim,
though there is nothing inherently prohibitive if a non-Muslim wishes, and is able, to read the Quran and the Hadiths.
However, one need not be undergo formal conversion to Buddhism, to be regarded
as a follower of the Buddha; one does
need to become a Muslim (if not one already) to participate in all aspects of Islam, not
the least of which is to enter a Mosque
(which is not mandatory) to pray five times
a day, which while there rarely is any religious profiling at the Mosque entrance, is not intended for non-Muslims. Anybody can enter a Temple or a Buddhist Shrine, as I have done so countless times.
Different religions may have principles that
differ in terms of the intended audience and the nature of the path to the common goal of getting closer to God, by whatever name you wish to call the Creator. But when religion becomes politicized as it does in most of the world (not just Burma or Sri Lanka or the
Middle-East, but practically everywhere), how a follower of a particular religion deals with that process of politicization very frequently impacts the various interpretations and pathways of belief that inform any actions that they may choose to take now, or in the future.
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“Through a combination of misinformation and circumstance, most people in Myanmar and especially in Rakhine State see international organisations including NGOs and the UN as overwhelmingly pro-Muslim.”
The Burmese have some very good reasons to think so:
Prince Khaled Sultan Abdul Aziz, commander of the Saudi Arabian Military, visited Dhaka (Bangladesh) in 1992 and recommended waging a military action against Burma like Operation Desert Storm in Iraq to defend the Rohingya.
Your missing analysis of the role of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Al-Qaeda and their influence on Rohingya militancy from the period of Pakistan’s independence, and subsequently Pakistan’s partition into West Pakistan and East Pakistan, Bangladesh’s formation, and subsequent arming of the Rohingya until today, is nowhere to be seen. It is all too easy to play up the Rohingya as innocent victims, thus relieving them of any responsibility for their own fate. One must also look at the political groups that are motivating them as much as the Burmese leadership (Tatmadaw) that is discriminating against them.
Your bibliography is not exactly multi-sourced and includes, naturally, only those citations that support your commentary. Why
the pseudonym ? I am sure the Tatmadaw have
a very long list primarily consisting of well-known NLD members and other more pertinent ‘threats.’
Despite the vigorous defense of the Muslim Rohinyga, ironically enough, by Israeli (and obviously Jewish) Historian Moshe Yegar (and others):
Yegar’s arguments seem to be anachronistic. First, we have to note that Muslim separatist movements in Arakan had already begun before Burma’s independence together with an idea of separating the Mayu region of Arakan from Burma and creating an independent Muslim state. In May, 1946, Rohingya Muslims of Arakan asked for Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s assistance in the annexing of this region to forthcoming Pakistan. Secondly, the Rohingya Mujahidden rebellion (1947-1961) happened under U Nu’s parliamentary democratic rule. Available records for this democratic period do not show any trace of discrimination against Muslims – even Muslim ministers were holding high positions within U Nu’s democratic government. Thirdly, such discrimination and oppression were only carried out by Burmese authorities under the military dictatorship of General Ne Win (1962-1988), who also discriminated against ethnic Chinese (even as he was himself ethnic Chinese), ethnic Indians and indigenous tribes, and later by the Tatmadaw, who discriminated as well against Karen Christians. It seems that Moshe Yegar anachronistically utilized the Muslims’ conditions under the Ne Win regime as the roots of the Mujahidden separatist movements which began quite a while before Ne Win’s autocracy.
And:
Arguments made about the Rohingya Mudjahideen insurgency in relationship to the declaration of Buddhism as the State Religion of Burma also does not match with historical authenticity. Buddhism was declared as the official religion of Burma on 26 July 1961, more than a decade after the start of Rohingya Mujahideen insurgency in 1947.
And:
On 28 October 1998, the Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) and Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front (ARIF) combined together and the Rohingya National Council (RNC) was founded. The Rohingya National Army (RNA) was also established as its armed wing; and, the Arakan Rohingya National Organization (ARNO) appeared to organize all the different Rohingya insurgents into one group.
According to US Embassy Cables revealed by Wikileaks, the alleged meeting of ARNO members and Al-Qaeda representatives is reported as follows:
“Five members of ARNO attended a high-ranking officers’ course with Al Qaeda representatives on 15 May 2000 and arrived back in Bangladesh on 22 June. During the course, they discussed matters relating to political and military affairs, arms and ammunition, and financing with Osama Bin Laden. Mohamed Arju Taida and Mohamed Rau-Sheik Ar-Mar Darsi from the Taliban were present with them at the meeting. Ninety members of ARNO were selected to attend a guerrilla warfare course, a variety of explosives courses and heavy-weapons courses held in Libya and Afghanistan in August, 2001. Thirteen out of these selected members participated in the explosives and heavy-weapons training.
As Wikileaks noted, there was also connection between the Taliban and ARNO Rohingya militants:
“Arrival of Two Taliban members at ARNO Headquarters: Al Ha-Saud and Al Ja-hid, two members of the Taliban group, arrived at ARNO’s headquarters in Zai-La-Saw-Ri Camp on 2 November 2001 from the Rohingya Solidarity Organization’s (RSO) Kann-Grat-Chaung camp. They met with Nur Islam (Chairman), ZaFaur-Ahmed (Secretary) and Fayos Ahmed (acting Chief-of-Staff Army), ARNO, and discussed the reorganization of RSO and ARNO. It was learned that ARNO/RSO and Taliban groups planned to hold a meeting on 15 November 2001. Nurul Islam, Chairman of ARNO, also declared that the Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front (ARIF) and the Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) had agreed to reorganize as integrated members of ARNO. However, Mullah Dil-Mar from RSO did not agree with this re-organization and resigned with his entourage of insurgents.
As much as the Tatmadaw and some portions of Burmese society may not be enamoured of the Rohingya, one also has to ask, are the Rohingya being well-served by the political leaders and political organizations that have been self-designated to represent them for the last 65 years ?
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Thank you Mr. Cohen for your insightful explanation into the Rohingya’s history. Your writing is a superb addition to an already excellent article.
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Wait a second here Mr. Cohen, you need to put these Rohingyah rebel groups into perspective before you go condemning the entire Muslim/Rohingyah population of Burma to suspected terrorist status. First of all the RSO and ARIF have been around since the early 1990s and have never had more than a few dozen members with a couple of rifles (see Lintner, 2003, “it never had more than a few dozen soldiers, mostly equipped with elderly, UK-made 9mm Sterling L2A3 sub-machine guns, bolt action .303 rifles and a few M-16 assault rifles.33 In 1998, it became the Arakan Rohingya National Organisation (ARNO), maintaining its moderate stance and barely surviving in exile in Chittagong and Cox’s Bazaar.”, http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/publication/faultlines/volume14/Article1.htm). The were formed in the context of the 1991 ethnic cleansing and expulsion of 200,000 or so Rohingyahs from Arakan/Rakhine state. You make it seem like they are a branch/affiliate of Al Qaeda but the reality is that they are not carrying out terrorist attacks and have shown themselves to have next to no organizational capacity to do so. Bangladesh suffers a real threat from Islamic radicalism and terrorism but RSO and ARIF don’t seem to be a part of that either.
Next, the Wikileaks cable (http://wikileaks.org/cable/2002/10/02RANGOON1310.html) that you base your whole Al Qaeda discussion off of is a cable on a report from the Myanmar government’s military intelligence. It is dated September, 2002 and the regime clearly has a motive for trying to play up links between the ARNO (ARIF/RSO) and al Qeada (the report states: “The Burmese view all these [rebel] groups [KNPP, etc.] as terrorists. Their purpose in giving us this report is to make sure we are aware of the alleged contacts between ARNO and the Burmese insurgent groups on the Thai border. Presumably, they hope to bolster relations with the United States by getting credit for cooperation on the CT front.”). There has not been similar reporting since that time about links between Al Qaeda and the these groups, which again are extremely small.
So given the insignificance of the RSO and ARIF do you honestly think it’s fair to bring them up as justification for the Burmese government’s consistent policies of forced labor, forced expulsion and ethnic cleansing? Also given the small size of these organizations and their near total absence from Burma would you really think it fair to call these organizations the “political leaders and political organizations” of the Rohingyah? I think that’s not justified and it does a disservice to the vast majority of the hundreds of thousands if not millions of Rohingyah who have been subjected to horrific abuses for the past 20-plus years.
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A couple of arguments made by an “ordinary Rohingya” (as opposed to ever present Tun Khin or Habib Saddiqui- the people Peter Cohen put question marks on) are relevant here. He said Rohingya more than the “True” or “Pure” Crystalline Burmese wear “Burmese” traditional clothes- Burmese are now ashamed to be seen in their own clothes to the delight of the marketers- and more importantly there has been no report even by the traditional Always Lying, Cheating, Phar-ba-sus Sit-tut and its loyal press of Rohingya conducted terrorist attack anywhere in Burma for the last half century. There has surely been mass killing from both sides in the past on record.
So while trying to rally the poor, devastated people on the ground (pawns- as opposed to goats) to have a rallying name “Rohingya” and widespread airing in international organizations and events where they have thoroughly infiltrated asking for something they are not likely to get- a peace of land to be owned and administered by them), the Rohingya Leadership- as such has been careful not to incite the wrath of the most cruel, reckless and ruthless Sit-tut by way of organised terrorism.
But by failing to curb the ever present physical threat by the Rohingya to their immediate neighbors,they cop disproportionate physical destruction and appalling, inhumane deprivation made worse every day now by their current policy and actions on the face of overwhelming physical, psychological and journalistic support to that very Sit-tut by the “international communities” singing the tunes of global commercial interests.
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Mr. Sommer
In my opinion, upon reading Dr. Cohen’s writing, I found nothing indicating that he condemned the entire Rohingya population as terrorists. It is important to understand the history of the Rohingya in order to make a more unbiased opinion and viewpoint. Different perspectives are always needed to be informed readers.
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Mr. Sommer never said Dr. Cohen was condemning the entire population as terrorists he said “Wait a second here Mr. Cohen,you need to put these Rohingyah rebel groups into perspective before you go condemning the entire Muslim/Rohingyah population of Burma to suspected terrorist status.” More than half of Cohen’s comment focused on the RSO and ARIF’s connection with Al Qaeda, a terrorist group.
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[…] New Mandala […]
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Isn’t that why, “Our Venerable Lady of Myanmar” (Shin Suu Kyi) told the Australians (on her recent visit there to pick up some cheap honorary doctorates and such trinkets) to “show mercy on the “Rohingyas” (I don’t think she used this politically incorrect word, she is a Myanmarese politician and not a human rights icon nor a saint as she rightfully pointed out), give them political asylum and let them settle down in the promised land of Australia? I’m pretty sure that most Rohingyas will gladly move to Australia (Singapore would be their second choice?). Meanwhile the Rakhaings, the Bamars, the Kachins and all those 135 racially pure indigenous warring tribes in Burma can work as slave labourers for the Chinese paymasters (there are more illegal Chinese immigrants than illegal Bingala-Kalars in Burma). The Rohingyas will gladly rig up their rickety boats and aim straight for Christmas Island.
‘Tis the Season, so let’s be Jolly (Muslims, Buddhists, Christians, Jews, Zaroastrians, etc.,etc., all together!)
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Tocharian
At this point in time DASSK can neither condemn the Han XX genes infusion into Myanmar nor alleviate the status of Rohingyas.
You need to move on beyond these 2 causes that are just symptoms of over all illness of being deprivation.
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You got the chromosomes wrong.
XX male syndrome is extremely rare, even among the Hans!
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The key factor to solving this tragedy:
Yet not attributing the West’s responsibility to this factor instead only blaming the the SPDC ?
“Economic inequalities fuel resentment. Development has tended to bypass minority states in Myanmar, benefits accruing instead to businesses linked to the central government and the military. Rakhine State is one of the poorest in the country. It sees limited benefit from natural resource exploitation including billions of dollars generated from offshore gas fields. Farmers complain that they cannot transport their products to market given the poor state of the road network. Fishermen lay the blame for the massive recent decline in fish stocks on large trawlers from outside the state owned by well-connected national business interests.”
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[…] State and elsewhere across Myanmar have been the victims of violent attacks and arson campaigns.[1] These attacks come after decades of tension during which many Muslims – often known as Rohingya […]
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Can you back up this piece of statistics?
“there are more illegal Chinese immigrants than illegal Bingala-Kalars in Burma”.
Unless you are happy to designate a good chunk of territory to the Rohingya, like say New Mexico to the Hispanics, talk about the Chinese does not hold water. “Kokang substate” is Han Chinese but it’s a fait accompli, a British legacy. In fact so is the Bengali presence in Western Burma. With compliments.
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There are no reliable statistics for illegal immigration in Burma, as Burma has porous borders and no territorial integrity, but Chinese “recent immigrants” are ubiquitous in Burma, as everyone knows (Zhong Guo, Zhong Guo ├╝ber Alles und ├╝berall).
Chinese can easily buy fake Burmese ID’s, for example of dead Burmese (may their ghosts haunt them!) from corrupt Burmese officials, including military guys (Tatmadaw or KIA or Shan or Wa or whatever).
Once, many years a go, I was offered a fake Burmese ID like from some “well-connected” Chinese guy who was just trying to be nice to me (he didn’t quite offer me a young Burmese bride for an extra 1000 Yuan LOL) Chinese are so “nice and caring”!
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Weary as some might be of tocharian’s “obsession” with harping on and on about “Chinese bashing”, there is surely a strong point for him to be so. It is common knowledge since Khin Nyunt’s (the most treacherous snake, a Chinese) time, Chinese have been buying National Registration Cards by bundles and all the prime lands in Mandalay are all taken by them driving the natives away, etc. etc.
Just like in Pangsang, the signs in Mandalay WERE in Chinese letters as well before they took them down hastily one day incidentally just before Rohingya pogrom and most inhumane unspeakable cruelty on them (for which ALL Burmese seem decidedly nonchalant about) arose. Then again it was treated by equally decadent world in unison with “LIP SERVICE” and LIP SERVICE alone, then and NOW,including Muslim countries.
The most inhumane other killings and deprivations are indeed happening in support of the CHINESE GAS PIPE LINE and the DAM, THE DAM. Not ROHINGYA GAS PIPELINE as it happens and definitely NOT Rohingya DAM. And these killing, raping and torturing happening EVERY day INCLUDING this day you are reading these letters, are done by these highly DEMOCRATIC, reformed, amazingly transformation-al Sit-tut (of course by the bogeyman hardliners but not these nice Thamada Gyi or his Peace Team- how stupid can one get?) in support of CHINESE interest and definite NOT for any Muslim however one hates them. Oh, Latpadaung where global pin-up girl, Amay Suuuuuu is exasperated the villagers simply do not curl up and die quietly.
And why does no one ever mention the fact that these undersea graveyards of hundreds of thousands of freshly fin-less sharks, extinction of tigers and rhinos all over the world, (in Burma, dogs, snakes and even Koke-ko Pins )(do you need a longer list?), etc. etc are related to one race only on earth? And THIS IS a decidedly RACIST remark.
Unfortunately, unless one faces the truth and realty NOW, it will always catch up with one later with interest .
Current global formula of Exuberant sucking up of the Chinese will exact a heavy price one day. Neither good is inciting them as the most virulent Fascist rulers in LDP are doing now. At least ten of so-called Class A War Criminals in Yasukune were directly involved in Nanking.
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Yes, I have always expected another race riot against the Chinese especially in Mandalay this time. Perhaps until the time is ripe for the generals to instigate one we’ll have to wait patiently.
At present we owe so much to the Chinese what with the unqualified success of the SEA Games they’ll probably resume the Myitsone dam construction. Shwe Gas pipelines were successfully completed behind the smoke screen of the Rakhine unrest.
While the 969 movement gains momentum with the regime’s blessing, another anti-Chinese riot won’t be necessary unless the govt desperately needs to gain brownie points with the West.
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Race Riots against the Chinese! In Burma!
It appears there has been concerted and successful (Bravo!)effort by ALL to stop that. Kalars (any religion, thank you) are readily available scape-GOATS any time of the day in this chauvinistic, buoyant Sit-tut dominated (more so now than ever in Burma’s history) and perversely Sit-tut worship-ping (we ALL loooove you- Sit-tut guys more and more the more you kill and torture us and steal and sell us out to all sorts of foreigners) Burma of today.
China’s new found military arrogance is also real.
And even with economical and political “cold war” going on, ALL the global players are united to destroy the social fabric and any pretense of resistance by the people of Burma to global slave labor indenturing and resource rape (“integration to global economy”) and consumer surplus goods dumping for which best partners for the global companies are none other than the Burmese expats themselves.
Please note the current scene of Burma.
There is laying of the foundation for imminent profound and widespread exploitation around the country. For example changing the current paper money which is harder to manipulate to COMPUTER KEYBOARD MONEY made simply from thin air at will (Whose will?) controlled by Basle (grandly, shamelessly and DISHONESTLY called INDEPENDENT CENTRAL BANK- something people like Khin Maung Nyo and Tin Maung Maung Than could not wait to get per kind favour of IMF and other Bretton Woods Monsters).
Promulgating laws using idiotic dubiously elected (definitely self-important)people under most dubious constitution to protect global and local COMPANIES and INVESTORS against the true owners of the land, the people, (that is where the famous “Rule of Law” comes in to evict the people off their land LAWFULLY and charge them for using their own water, etc. to be enforced by newly trained and armed POLICE- People’s Police. Please see exactly the same tone and appeal was made recently here for Malaysia which is already in the grips of the global clutch http://www.newmandala.org/2013/12/04/the-rule-of-law-and-malaysias-middle-income-trap/ )
Massive production and free trade and massively enhanced distribution of all forms of narcotics now inland as a newer feature as well as enormous global export.
Massive corruption and worsening daily violent crimes which makes new profession of “Security Firms” in Burma people seem to be perversely proud to have. (NB People are also so, so proud to have these impossible traffic jams as well! Uber-modern)
These are on top of the unstable and unsavory government directed and conducted racial/ religious strife.
Yet the people are deliriously happy having this wonderful “Democracy” as being mentioned in global forums, getting this and that “Prizes”, being told such and such “Good Country” their dear Burma is, getting involved in such HIP lines as racial harmony, HIV medication, Laprosy eradication, gender equality, non-discrimination of sexual orientation, etc,etc, etc,veering well off the original aim of the uprising they started two decades ago resulting in deaths and sufferings of hundreds of thousands of youths and adults.
It does appear “Democracy” for people of Burma seems to be drinking liberal amount of alcohol – for BOTH genders or ALL genders-, wearing shorts and skirts, using cellphone and dreaming of Singapore. Oh- literary award ceremonies as Burma is so, so cultured and ADVANCED! Meanwhile they can blithely ignore the most cruel acts done to other humans in the daylight with not a flinch and ignore the people looted off their land all over the country as it means the country is “Progressing towards Democracy”. And there is much, much more to come. May be some place near you next time.
So with current sick and perverse climate, your assessment is spot on. Chinese in Burma are totally safe. All of them- old and new. Safer than ever in today’s “Astonishingly Reformed, Progressive” Burma where they are sucking out the life blood of the people more gushingly than ever with full support from their loyal slave Pyithu Arzarni Tatmadaw as well as loyal “Opposition”, a newer feature.
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You don’t have to worry about the Chinese. They certainly can take care of themselves.
Anyway why would half-Chiness or Chinese axe-handles (tayoke-pu-hsein-yoe) riot against their sugardaddy-paymasters? (we owe so much to them lol)
“Yellow is beautiful” nowadays in Burma. Just look at all the entertainment industry and the ads in magazines. You have to look Chinese or be half- Chinese or suck up to the Chinese to be successful in Burma. Rohinygyas have no chance, not just because they are Muslims but because they are “ugly dark-skinned Kalars” (actually those Rohingya kids in the photo look like me when I was their age lol)
The SEA games were obviously paid by the Chinese as a bribe or better a down-payment for continuing their brutal relentless exploitation of Burma’s natural resources: Myitsone dam, Letpadaung copper mines, Phakant jade mines, gas/oil pipeline etc. Not only that, there will soon be a railway line from Kunming to Kyaukphru and Thandwe where they have “ethnically cleansed” the neighbourhood of “undesirables”. so that the loyal Rakhines and Bamars can work as cheap labourers at the new Chinese naval base and oil-tanker seaport at Kyaukphru (to get oil from the Muslim ME, bypassing Malacca Straits, how ironic!). Arakan State belongs to China’s “pearl of strings” and no piece of it belongs to the Rohingya!
Moa Tsetung shengdanjie!
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U Moe Aung,
BTW if you haven’t seen it yet.
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.co.nz/2011/07/advanced-course-on-color-revolutions.html
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.co.nz/2011/11/burmese-pro-democracy-movement-creation.html
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/03/23/294864/suu-kyi-western-proxy-in-myanmar/
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ASSK is no more a creation of the West than the Burmese regime is a proxy of the Chinese. That’s not to say the support they get is insubstantial.
No need for a conspiracy when you have a convergence of interests. And right now Western and regime interests are coming together. Unsurprisingly ASSK is being used as well as sidelined by both.
Seen most of it, thanks Ohn.
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Comment on Beauchamp’s views on Rakhine, Myanmar conflicts. You should know that Rakhine Muslims (NOT Rohingya) take a very dim view of the Rohingya’s legitimate claim to Myanmar nationality. You should further know that Myanmar Buddhists have told me that they simply will not tolerate attacks on Buddhist women simply because the Muslim attackers see them as infidels. U Wirathu strikes a powerful chord in Myanmar Buddhist public opinion. The resentment of Muslims dates to British imperialism’s favoritism toward the Muslim migrants brought in by the thousands in the 19th century from India, taking Burman lands, monopolizing trade…
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Mr. Thomas,
It’s not that simple, as I tried to explain earlier. First of all the Rohingya weren’t brought in as Indian Muslims by the British
in the 19th Century. One has to distinguish between Indian workers brought in to work
rubber and oil palm plantations in Burma and Malaya, by the British. The Indians, in Malaya and Malaysia, by the way, comprise(d) southern Indian Tamils and Indians from elsewhere (some northern Indian Muslim, some Sikhs and some northern Indian Hindus) in the Indian Subcontinent. The Indian Tamil plantation workers in Malaysia, today, are not affluent at all and did not fare particularly well under British or Malay (UMNO) rule after Independence. I would point out that the British favoured the Malays over the Indians and the Chinese in Malaya, and the Chinese, to a large extent, worked hard and became relatively affluent with little complaint against the British despite having not been favoured by the British and in fact, those Chinese that worked the tin mines in Perak in Malaya, were poorly treated by the British. Your statement about the British favouring the Indian Muslims in Burma is not correct, as the entire political structure in Burma (just as in Malaya) before and after Independence, was comprised of the dominant ethnic group, the Bamar (Burmans). The post-Independence democratic government of U Nu in Burma, just like the post-Independence government of Tunku Abdul Rahman of Malaysia, favoured the dominant ethnic groups, Bamars and Malays, respectively. It is these groups that the British favoured, though the British left a hell of a lot better infrastructure in Malaya than they did in Burma, which they mostly ignored in favour of India. The Rohingya are ethnically indistinguishable from Bangladeshis, and there has been natural migrations across what was the border between Burma and East Pakistan since the partition of Pakistan, and even earlier when all of the area now known as Pakistan was still part of India, and Burma was just a British backwater region of India (as the British saw it).
The civil war brought against the Bengali Muslims in Eastern Pakistan by the Punjabis and Sindhis of West Pakistan led to the formation of Bangladesh, which borders Burma. Indian Muslim or Hindu merchant classes in Rangoon (Yangon) and Indian plantation workers in colonial Burma, who either were brought in by the British (plantation workers) or emigrated on their own (merchants), are not the same as the Rohingya Muslims or Rakhine Muslims who weren’t brought in, but had lived in the border states prior to Independence of Burma and Bangladesh, and have been crossing over that ‘border’ back and forth for at least a hundred years, before there was a delineated
border.
I don’t disagree (as I very clearly stated in my earlier posts, which were not read properly at all by some) that there is some discrimination against the Rohingya on the part of some individual Bamar Burmese and by the Tatmadaw, for sure. I question whether 100 % of ethnic Bamars hate Rohingya, which one could infer from an earlier commentator’s rather emotional plaint. Some ethnic Bamar people don’t like Muslims and some do, or are neutral. The resentment doesn’t date only to British importation of Indian Muslims, who as I said were not Rakhine Muslims, but the resentment is largely due to extremist elements within the Rohingya political organizations that are, despite some clearly ideological, inaccurate and skewed viewpoints expressed earlier on New Mandala, armed and funded by Bangladesh, Malaysia, Pakistan and possible Al-Qaeda (and maybe even Jema’ah Islamiyah in Indonesia). Burmese of Bamar extraction are very self-conscious about their physical and social geography, and the political and social implications of the potential fragmentation of Burma into semi-autonomous zones for every single ethnic group in Burma: Bamars, Rakhines, Rohingyas, Karens, Kachins, Mons, and others. I think, having spoken with many ethnic Bamar people in Burma, and out of Burma in exile, that the devotion to Burma’s physical geographical integrity is very strong among Bamar people, and any semblance of a threat to that physical geographical integrity is not looked at with great favour. To many (not all) ethnic Bamar people, the Rohingya represent a potential threat to that geographical integrity, as does China, as has been voluminously pointed out by several New Mandala regular commentators in rather colourful language. I repeat, I am not, and I did not say earlier, that all Rohingya Muslims are intolerant, extremist, or are necessarily a threat to Burma’s geographical integrity, but there are elements within the Rohingya political organizations, which are not at all insubstantial or non-influential as claimed by an earlier commentator, that concern Burmese, and I believe, ethnic Bamar people in particular. There is absolutely evidence to support some basis for that fear. How that fear is dealt with, with respect to treatment of, and political autonomy for the Rohingya, is of course best decided by a democratic government, which unfortunately, Burma has not had since U Nu. The Tatmadaw want to stay in power and they want a physically-intact Burma; but even those Burmese who hate the Tatmadaw largely also want a physically-intact Burma. I doubt that DASK, whatever her ‘Liberal’ inclinations, would agree to a fragmented Burma comprising 20 or more semi-autonomous regions. If U Nu failed in his sincere attempt to reach multi-ethnic accommodation, on what basis would one think that DASK would fare better ?
Disparagement is not due to the colour of the skin of Rohingya people or Indian Muslims in Yangon (the few that are left after Ne Win) or of ethnic Chinese in Burma (which have increased as of late), as there are quite a few Bamar that are no ‘lighter’ than many Rohingya or others. But, you are correct that some Imams and some other devoutly religious Muslims among the Rohingya may regard Bamar people as Infidels as they regard all non-Muslims as Infidels. Even in Malaysia, there are Muslim Malays (especially in the Islamic Party of Malaysia-PAS) who regard the UMNO-led Malay government in Malaysia as an ‘Infidel Government’ and have said so frequently, as Malay Shiites are also considered ‘Infidels’ by fellow Muslim (Sunni) Malays who primarily follow the Shaf’i School of Sunni Islam. The term ‘Infidel’ is not restricted to the act of name-calling by Muslims alone against non-Muslims; Muslims call each other “Infidels” on a daily basis throughout the Islamic World, and did so long before the British, Portuguese and Dutch arrived in Southeast Asia.
Trade was not monopolized by Indian plantation workers anywhere in the British Commonwealth, as they were poor, uneducated, and did not come from upper-caste merchant
classes in the Indian Subcontinent. You confuse different groups of Indians (some Muslim and some Hindu and some Sikh) of very different levels of affluence, some of whom (plantation workers) were brought in the British and did not attain upward mobility and Indian merchant classes, many of whom pre-date the British, who did attain some upward mobility. The Rohingya fit neither category of person of Indo-Aryan origin, even if they may share the same religion as a middle-class Indian Muslim sari and clothing merchant in Rangoon (Yangon). Rohingya Muslims and Bengali Muslims do share a common ethnic and religious heritage and origin.
No Indian took land from the ethnic Bamar, the British did, and subsequently returned most of the land to the ethnic Bamar after Independence. I would point out that after U Nu, who tried to engender a multiculturally-tolerant Burma as mentioned directly above, it all went down hill after U Nu. Starting with the ethnic-Chinese Ne Win (who hated his ‘own people’ and his own ethnic origins) and the pseudo-Nationalistic Tatmadaw, discrimination against Chinese, Indians, ethnic Bamars without the ‘right’ connections, AND Rohingya all took place, in favour of a pseudo-Socialist and Pseudo-Bamar-Nationalistic Government ideology.
It is not as if ethnic Bamar people are brainwashed by the Tatmadaw and they are not, they largely despise the Tatmadaw, despised Ne Win, despise Than Shwe, and their reasons for ethnic Bamar pride or nationalism, if you prefer, is analogous to the historical and currently rising Malay nationalism in Malaysia (only, Malays happen to be Muslims and most ethnic Bamar are Buddhists). It is the same as the Sinhalese (Buddhist) nationalistic pride among many Sinhalese in Sri Lanka. Nationalism knows no one culture or ethnic groups or any particular political party. One might just be as equally dismissive of wealth Chinese or Indian or Malay urban and affluent white-collar professionals, as one might disparage rural, poor and non-affluent Indians, Malays or aboriginal peoples, whether indigenous
(Malays and aboriginal peoples) or brought in by the British (Tamil rubber and oil palm plantation workers) in Malaya, which later became Malaysia.
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Peter Cohen,
With all due respect, please provide some evidence for your claims that 1) the ARNO (ARIF/RSO) exists and is a significant organization representing some sizable number of the Rohingyah population, 2) that they are “funded by Bangladesh, Malaysia, Pakistan and possible Al-Qaeda (and maybe even Jema’ah Islamiyah in Indonesia)” and 3) that they have carried out acts of terrorism.
As experts and scholars it is simply not enough to make damning statements of this kind without providing evidence of facts. The false allegations of Iraqi WMDs in 2003 made this clear. You may have felt that my comments to your statements earlier were “ideological, inaccurate and skewed” but I was simply taking the evidence you had provided and reexamining it in its entirety.
You may feel strongly that Western militaries should work closely with the Myanmar regime (and other governments) in fighting terrorist organizations and, as an aside, I would agree with that policy but if you really believe that the ARNO is a terrorist organization then you need better evidence than you provided with the Wikileaks memo which in fact, when presented in its entirety, strongly cautions against drawing that conclusion.
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Mr. Sommer,
Your views are biased and I need not provide
any classified information to you and will not. Your assumptions that all information is
in newspapers, and in the open, demonstrates
your naivete, as does your skewed views themselves.
Your information is all based on your ideological perceptions of the Rohingya. If you think the Wikileaks memo is my primary source of information, you are indeed naive. I have my information and it is factual and accurate. You may choose to believe what you will, which is not based on reality.
You contradict yourself by both questioning the validity of the Wikileaks memo, yet using it to defend your “caution,” which is disingenuous, to say the least.
I wish to have no further discussion with you
on this topic, given your lack of knowledge
of both historical (of which you mention
nothing at all) and contemporary aspects
of Rohingya social and political activities
in Burma and Bangladesh.
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Mr. Cohen,
Everyone has some bias in their views and that’s why policy debates require evidence of real facts in order to make assessments. If your information is in fact classified I would advise you not to go posting it on New Mandala or anywhere else. In academia and foreign policy debates it is important to back up assertions with facts. You did not do this and in fact I took the only evidence you provided and showed how you had misrepresented it.
In terms of my views lacking historical analysis I would respond by saying that I’m going back almost 25 years in historical analysis to the creation of ARIF and RSO so I really don’t think I need much more historical analysis in order to judge your claims that these are 1) terrorist organizations, 2) have any real capacity to carry out attacks, or 3) that they represent any sizable share of the Rohingyah population.
If you have more evidence, even just a few scraps that are in the public domain, I would encourage you to present them. Otherwise please don’t go throwing around unverifiable accusations and calling me biased for simply stating the facts to the best of my knowledge.
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As far as the discussion regarding the secession of ethnic minority areas from Burma goes this is really a non-issue. Although right-wing militarists in Burma would like to portray the civil wars as existential threats to the borders of Myanmar almost all rebel groups have explicitly stated that they simply want a federal system that gives them equal rights, freedoms (religion, speech, and association) and citizenship.
As I argued in my opinion piece on New Mandala last month, the central problem in Burma’s ethnic conflicts is about power sharing and the military elites simply are attempting to maintain and expand their power domestically as much as possible before having to make concessions and co-opt elites of the ethnic minorities. The problems of the Rohingyah are unique in terms of the level of oppression and legalized discrimination that they suffer from the Myanmar regime. That said the solution to the their plight is identical to that of all other ethnic groups in Burma and it requires the imposition of federalism, something that would by its very nature, favors ethnic minorities and not the Bamar military elite. Of course Thein Sein and the all the other former and current Bamar militarists are happy to smile and promise to deliver democracy (and perhaps federalism in a new constitution?) to the world in just a couple more years as long as “development” money keeps rolling in, lining their pockets and fortifying their chances of continuing to be a class of oligarchs from a majority ethnic group in a country destined to be ruled under a federalist system.
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Federalism, legalized discrimination, right wing military SO on so forth—
Similar to the term “democracy” are westerners imposed ambiguity that contributed to the useless careless policy toward Myanmar.
Until ON THE GROUND reality is FULLY realized these are mere terms that all sides will take advantage to describe progress while the real freedom that a beleagued citizenry need remain unreachable.
The Muslim,Buddhist on going violence in Yakhine illustrated well:
As long as the Muslim refuse to accept self as minority in every way as example in Maulamyain, and improvement in economical opportunities, even with adequate immigration laws, just police activities to enforce this quagmire will NEVER be solved using the westerners concept of discrimination and all other terms described above.
SO please define those terms specifically with respect to Myanmar case.
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It does appear Burma is an easy pick for global players. The military with its integral segment changed into some clown uniforms ordinary Burmese wear only for weddings and ceremonies (not funerals) are now of the same mind with the venerable “oppositions” of all sorts to allow in any global players to the country for whatever they want to take away ready to collude to evict the millennia old settlements and populace to dig up (such noble intention!!!) minerals, gems, etc. and destroy the land and environment large scale with irreversibly.
Most people writing in these columns – commentators, “media” people, academics-sure have no land ownership in the country and definitely not earning or supporting a family from the produce of the land. All they want is the ASEAN ROAD/ multiplying this thing called GDP, this and that “Special Whatever ZONES” or anything else IMF, WB and ADB on behalf of their pay masters require.
To that end military and the global corporations have an easy task. They could not ask for more energetic and persuasive leg-work people than the current “activists” and “opposition” leaders/ movers and of course the all important ex-pats screaming for integration of the poor, backward, electricity lacking Burma to international trade to be like shiny Singapore.
With that in mind, greed (Lawba)and misplaced pride (Mawha) are the prime movers of the day in todays’ Burma. To such an extent that when people in Latpadaung refused to simply curl up and die every one led by their Amay Suu denounced them. Same goes for Thilawa site, Tavoy sites and indeed rice fields of the delta.
The issue of ethnicity is simply blurred once the military, who have thus far shown overwhelming ability to use the erstwhile opponents albeit with intimate and solid help of the other erstwhile antagonists “the West” ( their international organizations as well as their media and government personnel), can cheat/ bribe and divide the leadership of various ethnic groups in the name of “development” which is a new word for “Loot Dividend”.
So the Rohingya, the people on the ground being played as pawns from both their own leaders and the oppositions which are aplenty currently and in their current line of strategy have little chance of getting anywhere. Inhumane sufferings will simply be ignored by all amid garrulous lip service.
Ironically, those simple statements like “It is very important for Burma watchers to have a clear understanding of the goals and interests of the Myanmar Government. Not having a clear understanding imperils the peace and democratization processes and also threatens to embolden radical elements within the regiment.” gives solid endorsement that the current guys are good guys under duress from the non-existent “hardliners” or “extremist elements” or as mentioned “radicals” or according to Thant Myint-U “communists”.
That is the real irony. The visible and audible racist, ruthless and covetous portion, floating above the peaceful majority, is buoyant and in command and in control of the society simply because of overwhelming endorsement of their own leaders, the inimitable “Pyithu Tatmadaw” and their integral clown-dressed brethren and venerable similar minded oppositions of sorts invented by the international communities, by the international communities.
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Mr. Cohen, Thank you for your posts. We disagree on only a few points and it is mostly a matter of perspective, not the major issues. My perspective was informed by listening to Bamar street folk, the educated, visits to history museums in Kachin State and in Yangon, and from reading Burmese history in Burmese. Yes, those texts were SPDC-era, but I found little to suggest that there were material distortions or errors in those volumes.
My concern, which admittedly is partly informed by Tatmadaw views, is that should the KNU, ARNO, KNPP, SSA and hosts of other factions (armed to the teeth with black market and very modern weapons) take power, we’ll have Yugoslavia on the Irrawaddy. The Tatmadaw didn’t defeat the KMT, the BCP, and the KNU insurgents in years past just to see the Union bust up.Like it or not, Thura Shwe Mann and Thein Sein and yes, Than Shwe were Myanmar’s Tito(s), holding things together in not-too-gentle manner. The Western noise-makers egging on the insurgents of all stripes–terrorists, drug dealers, human traffickers (yes, the KNU; their own partisans told me so)–will not care if ethnically-mixed Myanmar families have no place to live in the post-Union horror show of ethnic cleansing and race-based local politics. This is what the border KNU and KIO say they want. In other words, they want no-go zones excluding those of other than their race. Like today’s Iraq, Syria and parts of the ex-USSR.
Oh, another problem: in Kachin State, there are 66 Kachin sub-groups. Which one gets primacy? Same for Shan and Chin states. Speaking as an Anglo living in New Mexico USA, I’m understanding of the need for all to live together.
I don’t have to agree with you, nor you with me, for me to be informed by what you say. George Thomas
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[…] to the ground as part of a concerted effort to rearrange the state’s ethnic composition.[2] Violent clashes can be blamed on culprits from both the minority Muslim and the majority Rakhine […]
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#8.2.1.3.1
“No need for a conspiracy when you have a convergence of interests.”
That convergence of interest is the funniest part. Somehow, the global corporations’ wish is funnily the exact wish of not just Than Shwe/ Aung Thaung led Disney Dress-Up “Government” and now ever loyal (to the point of always pimping for them) Aung San Suu Kyi, but also of all the audible and visible journalists and academics. Integrate the Great Nation Burma to the global “Land Loot, Total Destruction and Social Disintegration Economy” now popularly known as “Democracy”. It sure will be fun for a small percentage of the population with the help of trained police and armed forces to isolate and suppress the majority of the citizens according to the “Rule of Law” and supported by the “Media” owned and managed by select few.
This pattern is historically so boringly the same that it is sort of a miracle it still works very well!
But Aung San Suu Kyi being a well made up concoction of “the west” (simply meaning global corporations) does not require any conspiracy theory. Again it seems to be an ever reliable formula. There always is a person they can select on all occasions and then concertedly work via journalists, popular people in show business, academics and this or that prize giving organizations to shine them up. Then use them to control the now accumulated immense cult of them. Worked with Mandela, Dalai Lama, Havel and now this one.
Kudos to the handlers!
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Peter Cohen
No reservation on all the detail historical takes and especially laud you for putting them together the ways you did.
Just one point that will make present quagmire more on the ‘colonial legacy’.
Burma being made a province of India, a colonist brilliant ploy, allow UNMITIGATED migration not immigration mind you, of Kalar as “Royal Subjects” enable every Kalar to freely settle in Burma especially in Yakine and Tanintayi which are the very first colonized territories as well as close proximity.
The Rohingyas population is the major result of migration from adjacent eastern India, which was then regarded as under Konbaung dynasty realm.
The Kalar (Hindus and Muslims) assimilate well with the Yakhine knowing any otherwise will bring on sure “quelling” by the Burmese army. It was one of those quelling under Maha Bandoolas that the British used as an excuse to invade Burma.
Buddhists are the most tolerant that will end when violation of Buddha or Buddhist women are involved. Unlike large scale indiscriminate willful destruction and cruelty of anything Buddhist underway in adjacent Bangladesh and else where in Malaysia and Indonesia to a lesser extend.
Bigotry should never ever be associated with Buddhism.
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Few observations here may be relevant.
Regardless of fruitless digging up the history to the neanderthal age and finding the origin of the word “Rohingya” etc, the very people stuck in neglected sub-human concentration camps in Arakan would have large resemblance to the people who were of Farai-di movement where people on the ground, then as well as now, were used by their leaders for their own agenda. http://books.google.co.nz/books?id=wzm36rEol3sC&pg=PA24&lpg=PA24&dq=faraidi+movement&source=bl&ots=EYpjE-Ow1m&sig=k6dzvR1himdVnT6Bh6V-UJ5qtzw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=w9vOUtiHBIf1kQXXjYHQAg&ved=0CEYQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=faraidi%20movement&f=false
That would have two important implications. First they are likely to be different from Hanbali school of Islamic practice as in that only country in the world of a family’s name Saudi. Being Hanafi sect with some Sufi practices, modern day Salafsits may not see them so eye to eye. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sufi%E2%80%93Salafi_relations
But importantly they would have leaning for Pakistan as All Muslim State as opposed to Bangladeshi who died in millions to be apart from Urudu speaking Pakistani. Hence Jaamat-e-Islami as their main supporter and sympathizer.
For U Nu though, even though it is so sobbingly romantic to shine him up for being “DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED” (such overused/ reverse-meaning nauseating words), he was the most right wing religious fanatic of faux-socialist. Building pagoda at the top of Nat-dwelling Popa and building a town “Kyauk-pa-daung” which until today is the only sizable town in Burma with no mosque, as such was his strong discriminatory credentials.
Lastly, sections of the Burmese equivalents aping the dominant militant, overbearing, yet at once subservient to the rulers, practitioners of the Brand Buddhism in Sri Lanka is biggest and most devastating social problem in Burma today where extreme cruelty and crass boastful, nauseating opulence is now called popular religion. Fanned by the current inane leadership, all inclusive, of the country it can only get worse.
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Your comments about U Nu are at once revolting, patent nonsense, and ignorant. U Nu was hardly a right-wing fanatic or a faux-Socialist. He was elected and he was a democrat and respected by the vast majority or Burmese, and not just by ethnic Bamars. Your emotional, irrational and nonsensical comments, in particular about U Nu, demonstrates your lack of knowledge of contemporary Burma, as well as Burma in any historical context.
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Thanks for reminding. Almost forgot.
The very reason the name Rohingya as an entity came about rather mainstream and were truly recognized, was partially because some of them were/are very well educated. But mainly because U Nu did give them position and leverage. Why he did so was because most of the history of Burma (except for the fashionable All Burma Arakan-Love Fest of the last two years) real Burmese haters were not the Rohingya. But the Arakanese. Perhaps since the time of looting their Phayar (or Phayars as 4 were looted and only one made to Mandalay). Or because of their own ration of usual Burmese military cruelty as seen in the bordering countries be it Thailand (Yopdaya) or Chitagong Hill Tracts where those are still being remembered well after 2-3 hundreds years.
For those cruel acts of the past (like looting and grazing to the ground of Thaton, eg) there is no single repentant Burmese ever alive or dead (kudos to chauvinistic school instructions!). Rather like Sinhalese of today (devout Buddhists) regarding Mullaittivu or any other massacre or like today’s Burmese regarding the say- 38 times stabbing to a 90 year old woman, etc.
So, alas, today’s faux-unity of the racist Burmese and racist Arakanese is simply only on the topic of Rohingya and Rohingya only.
Also thanks for another great example. Ed Barneys’ point was exactly that. Neural connections in the heads of naturally insecure mortals would always recognize the comforting words like “democrat” always and unthinkingly as noble, upright, trustworthy, benevolent and being a savior or even wise even though uncalled for. Eg. Wilson (that is Woodrow) brought “democracy” to Europe even though he had to be told about it by Ed. By the power of a single word, millions of deaths taste sweet!
Cheers!
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I live in the US Southwest where the Anglos are now in the minority and getting more so. Our Anglos (with few exceptions) utterly disdain and dismiss Latino migrants with the flippant “what part of ‘illegal’ do you not understand?” Both the Buddhist Burman and Rakhaing Muslims feel the same way about the Rohingya. The other day, a Republican Party commentator noted that a big part of the White demographic is profoundly nervous and upset about the changing US population demographic. Which is how they justify the Supreme Court decision to gut the Voting Rights Act of 1965. I suggest examining the log in our own eye before harping on the mote in Myanmar’s. George Thomas
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The irony here of course is that Texas, the largest US state after Alaska, came about practically the same way the Rohingya tried unsuccessfully in Western Burma – the rebellion of American settlers wresting the state successfully from Mexico. Now the chickens are coming home to roost. The Latinos however probably won’t be resorting to armed rebellion, will they?
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While this is not the proper forum for an in-depth discussion of race and politics in America, for the benefit of those New Mandalans who are not knowledgeable in American politics, I must comment on George Thomas’ misinformation concerning the recent Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder. To claim that Shelby County v. Holder was a knee-jerk xenophobic reaction to changing American demographics and that it “guts” the VRA is disingenuous, and I say this as an American of mixed-race who has experienced the institutional racism of our society first-hand.
In reality, Shelby County v. Holder was a, mostly failed, attempt to reign in the cynical use of the racial and/or ethno-religious gerrymandering that has been used to fuel American political machines since the days of Tammany Hall. It should be noted that the majority of these political machines are operated for the benefit of one major political party, the identity of which I shall leave the reader to surmise.
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The point, my dear plan B, is to come up with a civilised solution to the issue instead of harping on endlessly about the past. Quelling requires a real rebellion first, like the Mujahid rebellion in Western Burma in 1947. The Sri Lankan solution might then be employed.
If they are deemed stateless then they need residential permits/ID of one form or another since they have been in Burma for so long unless you can deport them but where to?
Re-Burmanisation or Re-Rakhinisation of the three townships could be one answer being sought. Certainly the concentration of one group of people, not in a simple ghetto in some city, but in a large enclave, is asking for trouble, but we are where we are. How it all came about is history.
Outsiders egging them on and helping them notwithstanding (starting another jihad may be just what the govt wanted), voluntary resettlement and dispersion may be the way forward in exchange for recognition and residency. Done properly in a humane and legitimate manner, future assimilation and integration may be expected over time like the Burmese/Rakhine Muslims.
It doesn’t help when the Rohingya spokesmen insist on a prior ‘historical’ settlement in the region. Harking back to history, neither does their past attempt at carving out an independent caliphate by force of arms, genocidal measures on the local Rakhine, land grabbing and dominating over a large territory next to their original homeland.
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Even for an Uber-sensationalist, the phrase “Sri Lanka Solution” does bring in chills. Ironically it is not quite “Solution” either. Rather like the Furer’s Final Solution which brought out multiple times more of the same problem on both sides. Meaning, Tamils are simply biding time again. Through the Sri Lanka history true Buddhist-Hindu total annihilation has happened so many times with current day Sri Lanka Buddhism being boomerang from Burma and Thailand. Hence monks featuring regularly with military expeditions, a sort of scenario Burmese counterparts of today would be desperate to copy.
Your last two remarkable paragraphs definitely are THE best way forward for the current situation which today’s Burma has neither willingness or ability to follow through.
Burma again will pridefully grab abysmal failure right from the jaws of victory.
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Moe Aung,
It is not the Tatmadaw that is encouraging a Rohingya ‘Jihad’ as you suggest. Outsiders
are doing more than just egging on the Rohingya, who are actively supported by Bangladesh and Malaysia. The Tatmadaw don’t need any excuse to clamp down on all their opponents, Bamar or Rohingya. You cannot ignore history, and the British role in Burma (a backwater of India for the British civil service), the British role in India, and later the formation of East Pakistan and its transformation into Bangladesh, with whom the Rohingya share ethnicity, culture and religion, and have crossed into, from what is now Burma, for centuries (and crossed back).
A civilised solution under the Tatamdaw is not possible with the Bamar people, let alone the multitude of ethnic minorities, of which the Rohingya are but one. Yes, re-integration into Burmese society is one approach, assuming the Rokingya want to re-integrate and assuming the Tatmadaw want them to, which are both doubtful.
“It doesn’t help when the Rohingya spokesmen insist on a prior ‘historical’ settlement in the region.” That is exactly what they insist on as I have said before, and will continue to lay claim to Burmese territory, by force of arms if necessary, because they do not want to re-integrate into Burmese society, and the Tatmadaw doesn’t seem to want them to either.
A solution to the Rohingya issue will happen only when there is a democratic government in Burma, which respects the rights of all Burmese, including the rights of the Bamar, which you seem to frequently infer need less or no protection from human rights abuses by their government.
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The military’s big stick has always been indiscriminate, Peter. Folks in rebel areas in ‘Burma Proper’ got it in the neck just like those in ethnic homelands long before the city folk who did not start to experience state violence first hand until shortly after the coup of 1962, opening a new chapter with Rangoon University students.
Burmese nationalism itself needs little encouragement but a demagogue like the monk Wirathu does no favours to anyone except the military elite, the most chauvinistic of them all. The reality on the ground I agree is far from encouraging since neither the military elite nor the Rohingya are amenable to reason.
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Rohingya people on the ground and the voices coming out as Rohingya are two different things. There is no way Tun Khin or Saddiqui or indeed every single ones writing here or making presentations in New York, Geneva, Paris and Bangkok would have to put faith their life in rickety boats or human traffickers. Yet it does appear people now in concentration camps are saying the very same things they feel they have to say. Ie.they are being sacrificed for the piece of land their handlers felt they can get by way of global outrage when enough ugliness is done visibly and audibly. Some thing that is not going to happen when their arch enemy the most racist military is being unseemly sucked up by their handlers of global affairs- business communities. And business (read money) is totally agnostic! More agnostic than all the hedonists past and present put together.
This Wirathu doing Aung Thaung’s dirty work happily and enthusiastically is just a small fry. He can be easily switched on and off like a tap. See those people in monk’s robe with walkie talkies during the “Meiktila massacre” in broad daylight? Carrying a walkie talkie in even today’s highly celebrated “Free” Burma carries pains of death. Yet people killing the kalars and people herding them in concentration camps in the name of “protection” have plenty of them.
And how bizarre that Jew American Ambassador giving a sermon to the obediently congregated monks after kalar killings gone overboard in a hastily called unconventional “Monks’ Congress”!
Incidentally this oft repeated thing called “democracy” seems to be the most cruel joke word ever invented. Untold millions killed, tortured and enslaved for that particular Shangri -La.
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“And how bizarre that Jew American Ambassador giving a sermon to the obediently congregated monks after kalar killings gone overboard in a hastily called unconventional “Monks’ Congress”!”
Ohn, beyond being ridiculous, you are a bigot, anti-Semite and need therapy badly, What ‘Jew American’ Ambassador are you referring to ? Your comments are meaningless, as they are revolting.
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Ko Moe Aung
With all due respects (absolutely no pun intended) the continual west useless careless policy exists as followed:
1) Defining Myanmar with a jaundice eyes such as federalism, Right wing military, elitist and the worst-Democracy.
without ever defining “with context to Myanmar”. Has one ever seen federalism invoked in Thailand or else where?
2) CONVENIENTLY using HRW critreia to define a Buddhist citizenry on the Muslim as well as well as against the Kachin and Karin who happened to be Christians sure constitute the useless careless policy in light of knowing well NEVER admitting the harm to the citizenry and the paranoia induced on the ruling junta.
3) Just because Obama perfunctory visit, do not signify an end to the west continual useless careless policy.
Until “A SEMBLANCE OF DIGNITY’ to an ‘ALL MYANMAR CITIZENRY”, which by the way DASSK is highlighting, as opposed to pick and choose at will, there will not be any civilized solution forthcoming, as history as repeatedly illustrated in Germany, Japan post war and to a certain extend Vietnam recently.
By the way the “quelling” this protagonist described is directly quoted from the historical source of M. Charney ‘History of Modern Myanmar’ even though he called the defined the invasion of British as 1st Anglo Burmese War.
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That’s because the Latinos will soon outnumber the Anglos. They won’t have to resort to violence. Spanish already is paired with English in many venues. Stores cater to Spanish speakers; in some places, English is simply not used. These places are far from the border with Mexico. The Anglos don’t like this, but they stopped having babies, they moved out of the region, and Spanish is now part of the increasingly dominant culture. Even our Anglo politicians love to strut out their awful Spanish. Sort of like listening to 90 percent of the American Embassy staff speaking Burmese.
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Times are different, America is different. Demographic change alone is turning the tide against the Anglos. They can’t win.
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“Sort of like listening to 90 percent of the American Embassy staff speaking Burmese.”
And naturally your Burmese is better than
Professor David Steinberg’s right ?
I am guessing, and I may be wrong, but given
your earlier comments about Indians in Burma, somehow (and given your name) I rather think you an Indian Christian (probably from Kerala) and not an Anglo, but I could be wrong. But not an unreasonable assumption, given that there are probably at least 20,000 people named George Thomas in Kerala State in India (and I happen to know three).
You are indeed wrong, however, by your analogy between Latinos and Burmese or Bamars, and your are way off base in your comments about the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which was opposed by far more southern Democrats than moderate Republicans, who in fact all voted for the Act, and was later reaffirmed as law under both Nixon and Reagan both of whom supported the VRA of 1965, whatever their other frailties.
You had better read up on Shelby County vs. Holder (2013), as well as the history of the bipartisan supported (Mike Mansfield-D and Everett Dirksen-R) VRA on 1965, before you start making anachronistic correlations with contemporary Republicans who have(legitimate) concerns about Caucasian demography, and such concerns are not limited to White Republicans (as my Democratic-voting Chinese immigrant neighbor occasionally complains about Salvadoran leaf blowers and grass cutters).
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Our New York City is already controlled by the new Mayor an Italian-German Socialist activist who once fought for Sandinista communists in Nicaragua, and the new City Council Speaker a Puerto-Rican Latino woman and a union organizer.
Latino percentage of NYC population is only about 30% but with the support of other so-called colored people (poor Blacks and equally poor Asians)these Socialist Latinos defeated the WASPs and now control the NYC the epicenter of Capitalism.
Historic Rise of the New Majority-Minority, claimed they proudly right inside the 450 years old City Hall just last week.
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Aung Moe,
Just as I suspect you would not want to be called “Coloured” or “Kala” or “Black,” as often happened during colonial times in Burma, your gauche use of the word “Wasp,” is equally offensive. Do not make reference to others in a manner you yourself would not want to be referred to as, got it ?
And your glee at the ‘decline’ of Caucasian political influence also helps to explain your barely-disguised prejudice against ethnic Bamar people, which comes out quite clearly in your commentaries. As your name does not definitively prove you of ethnic Bamar origin, I can only suspect, that if you are, you seem to have a perverse self-dislike of your ancestry, reminiscent of a well-known former dictator of Burma, namely one known as Ne Win, who suffered the same perverse pathology of ‘self-deadulation,’ except in his instance, it was Chinese and not Bamar ancestry.
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Wow… you might be confusing me with Moe Aung as I hardly commented here. I am one of those New Mandalar’s devotees lurking in the shadow.
Anyway, for your information, I’m a 65 yer old true blue Bamar and I do not believe WASP (White-Anglo-Saxon-Protestant) is an offensive term as Nigger or Kalar. Where I live I am the only so-called coloured in the whole WASP neighbourhood. Even my wife is a WASP.
I just hate all Socialists and Commies as any Bamar who had to live through that bastard Ne Win’s and crazy zealot U Nu’s Socialist reigns.
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The classic confusion is actually yours, Aung Moe, between the faux socialists of Burma and the genuine albeit failed socialist experiment of the Eastern Bloc in history.
You reckon the current lot are real democrats too? Sadly some people in this world grow old without ever trying more than scratch the surface.
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Peter Cohen
Kalar, Tayoke etc are NOT derogatory terms in any way or sensitivity in Myanmar.
These are generic terms used everyday to describe the origin, cultures. There are many very fair skin Indian still called Kalar in Myanmar.
Adding ‘Lu Myo’ describe the origin.
There are many ‘Kalar lay’ or ‘Kalar gyi’ among villages through out Myanmar. The former an endearing name/ reserved for relatives, friends and sons, the latter leaders and persons of influence.
Yes if Ko Aung Moe had a darker complexion from toiling in the field he can be endearingly called a “Kalar Gyi”, a title I am quite sure he will gladly accept. Knowing well that the darker skin color will end once one no longer have to toil in the field and yet the title shall remain.
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Plan B,
The “N” word is a derogatory term everywhere
and you are wrong. “Kala” is a derogatory term in both Burma and India, was often used by the British as a term of disdain for both Indians and Burmese. They are not generic terms whatsoever. You are completely incorrect. ‘Kala lay’ and ‘Kala gyi’ are not used in the same context as ‘Kala’ as used as a term of disdain. Some people find the term ‘Caucasian’ and ‘Coloured’ as completely acceptable, and the latter term was used
generically-used by mixed-race South Africans to refer to themselves, but it was also used during Apartheid as a racial classification term. The context of the use of the term is what matters, and ‘Kala’ like ‘N’ word has been used derogatorily, and I have seen it used by the colonial British (as I am much older than you) in reference to Burmese and Indians with very clear disdain. So your defence of the term is not accurate, out of historical context, and thus not justified.
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#12.2.1.1.1
Ambassador Mitchell spoke to hastily herded monks in June 2013 at the height of burning and killing orgies by government thugs on defenceless Indian communities where being Muslim is just coincidence.
One real perk of going to Burmese schools is that being anti-semite means absolutely nothing neither positive nor negative.Scary sounding word though.
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Yet the bizarre-ness is only to degree.
As some or most of these well drilled monks (young men now fully eschewing avoidance of Lawba, Mawha and Dawtha or contemplating finding the Noble Truths but hell-bent on usurping centuries-old high regard and reverence of laity to them for social manipulation and concentration of power to themselves) have long been used to being instructed by their American preachers in clandestine camps along the border or in town secretly. By the likes of Robert Helvey and Peter Ackerman’s crowd in the same vein of their wildly successful production of “Color Revolutions” -(http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0710/S00277.htm, (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article32110.htm) fully hatched at humble abode of Gene Sharp in Boston with such grand name as Albert Einstein Institute.
Of course Sharpy’s endeavours have thus far failed in Venezuela and Iran with or without ex-marine Helvey and it will be interesting to see how long and indeed how far the majority Burmese public can be taken for a ride by these highly influential army of indoctrinated self-important well organised (and supported) monks before people realise what they really are.
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Ohn,
Ambassador Mitchell is not a “Jew American”
and your commentary is revolting at best.
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Well when a Cohen says a son of Malcolm Mitchell and Charlotte Mendelsoln from Georgia is not jewish, apologies! Any news about a Soros who tried via one O’ Brien to control Burma’s communication lines and still trying and funded and funding the so-called 88 group, and worked along with NED, a CIA front, to incite and conduct the wonderful “Color Revolutions” around the world? One particular wonderful Color Revolution of 2007 in Burma did result in deaths and sufferings of hundreds of innocent people including monks.
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Plan B,
You don’t even know your own culture.
‘Kalagyi’ was used to describe Muslim Burmese
Independence Hero U Abdul Razak, an ethnic Muslim Burmese-Indian Independence hero from Mandalay. Kalagyi translates as “Big Kala”
or “Honourable Big Black Person.” In the same way, in Burma, towns and temples may have the
name, Kala as well, which is derived (via Pali Hindu religious script) from the Sanskrit and means “Time” but can also mean
“Grand” or “Reverential” which is why holy places often have the word Kala as well.
Kalagyi (Big Kala), Kala (as meaning time or grand in importance as applied to temples, towns, respected elders, and heros) is no way related to Kala, as used as a derogatory terms for South Asians and some Westerners by some Buddhist Burmese, and as used by the British to refer to both Indians and Burmese
during the colonial period. While some Burmese may regard the term as a generic reference to South Asians, it is also used derisively by some Burmese, and was most certainly used in such a manner by the British in colonial India and Burma.
“Muslims in Burma regularly suffer social and religious discrimination. Burmese Buddhists commonly call them, Kala, a derogatory term for South Asians and also used insultingly to describe westerners.”
“While some consider the term abusive and degrading, there’s general acceptance that it takes on a sense of honor, respect and loving kindness when it’s used in the form Kalagyi (Big Kala), to describe independence hero Abdul Razak.”
http://www2.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=8463&Submit=Submit
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Please do not be ‘just another westerner’ instead of Peter Cohen.
“Plan B,
You don’t even know your own culture.”
It is always refreshing to have someone from the west challenging this protagonist as less knowledgeable of one own heritage. Guilty as charged but not for the reasons.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kallar_%28caste%29
If the west desire a genuine integration of different races, accusing the majority of using a term familiar in Myanmar as racist is going to be indeed a problem another west useless careless policy that will prolong the quagmire.
As embedded in Myanmar cultures where English words such as ‘Democracy, English and many others’ are directly Burman-ized/Myanmar-ized without regards to the colonists racist attitude.
In this case Kala Muslim fate can not end well with almost everyone in Myanmar except those outside, such Irrawaddy and most other western publications calling the term Kala as racist or derogatory.(Zarni and Tocherian I hope you will read this)
Does being called a Tayoke or Pauk Phau prevent the Chinese every where in Myanmar
from being so far ahead in every way or the Kala mostly Muslim in Maulalyain from being better off than most Bamar?
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Plan B,
Please don’t waste my time with your archaic comic-book anti-Western rhetoric. It is embarrassing (for you).
KALA AND KALLAR are not the same thing,
if you had bothered to even read the URL link. Kallar refers to a class of Tamil or south Indian caste. Kala refers to ANY Indian (often a Muslim and often not south Indian in Burma) or South Asian or even Westerner, as used by some Burmese, as a derisive term for South Asians and Westerners. This is fact; what you provide is both irrelevant and pure deflection.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kallar_%28caste%29
This link has nothing to do with Kala or the use of the term in Burma, whether negative
(derogatory) or positive as in Kalagyi or Kala in Pali liturgy in Hindu-Buddhist temples or as a partial name for a village in Burma. You are confusing different meanings and pronunciations of Kala which can mean Black, Time, Grand, Reverence and other meanings. When a South Asian is called a “Kala” by a Bamar person, they aren’t asking for the time, are they ? They aren’t calling the South Asian, “Grand” are they ?
Stop your pretentious and silly deflecting of the evidence I provided and, yes, you are guilty, as charged.
Guilty of constantly deflecting the point at hand, guilty of constantly blaming Westerners
for all of Burma’s problems and not taking any personal responsibility, guilty of tiresome and whining archaic rhetoric that means nothing, refusing to take any responsibility when you are wrong and instead
pointing the finger at Westerners or so-called “Western Publications” because they show you up as being wrong and incapable of defending your point, so you change the subject in classic scapegoating fashion.
Thus you bring up Chinese name-calling and saying the Kala Muslims are better off than than Bamar as a way to deflect from the definition of Kala. Nice try Plan B. It won’t fly. Not all Indian Muslims in Burma are better off than Bamar, and the conservation had nothing to do with Chinese in Burma.
Your deflections are tiresome and the facts remain the same, Kala is sometimes used as a derogatory term by some Bamar in Burma against South Asian and Westerners, and I have known this since before you were even born, when I was lived in Rangoon with the British prior to leaving for Malaya. I was very young, but not so young that I did not know what “Kala” meant, when used by a Englishman or by a Burman (Bamar). So, yes, you are ignorant of your own culture by your own feeble admission. And my Bamar friends
have confirmed my definition of “Kala” and
one admitted using the term a few months ago
against someone he didn’t like (an Indian)
who he claims took money from him.
Goodbye.
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Plan B,
Not all Indian Muslims in Burma are better off than Bamar, and the conversation had nothing to do with Chinese in Burma.
Your deflections are tiresome and the facts remain the same, Kala is sometimes used as a derogatory term by some Bamar in Burma against South Asian and Westerners, and I have known this since before you were even born, when I was lived in Rangoon with the British prior to leaving for Malaya. I was very young, but not so young that I did not know what “Kala” meant, when used by a Englishman or by a Burman (Bamar). So, yes, you are ignorant of your own culture by your own feeble admission. And my Bamar friends
have confirmed my definition of “Kala” and
one admitted using the term a few months ago
against someone he didn’t like (an Indian)
who he claims took money from him.
Goodbye.
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Sorry, Peter. What is really tiresome is the sole and persistent interpretation of the term kalar as derogatory which has made it ‘gospel truth’ in Western media. How that came about I won’t waste my time arguing. And I don’t care how long you’ve lived in Burma or if you were born there in Yadanabon Naypyidaw a hundred years before me.
Derogatory entirely depends on the context and inflection used when you say it like when your vexed mother might say, “Peter Cohen!”.
Ka-la (soft first syllable, short creaky stress on the second) is time/period, whereas ka-lar (stress on second) is Indians and later Europeans of whatever colour, religion or ethnicity. Burmese of course never get the two mixed up.
Only outsiders and those who have only a superficial knowledge of the language cannot say it right. Romanisation is all over the shop mine included so when you get it through English second hand there’s scope for confusion and mistakes.
India (kalabyi) and Indians, our close neighbour and where Buddhism and a lot of our cultural traditions came from, retain the original term.
Gyi is just a qualifier for big, great or old. The old Indian teashop owner is still kalagyi as was Abdul Razak. The noodleshop Chinese is still Tayoke gyi.
Historically only India became formally Eindiya naingan to distinguish it from the other kalapyu (white kalar) European nations but China remains Tayoke naingan. There just is no other word in the Burmese language for either of them. Ayagyi and Paukpaw are nicknames for Indian and Chinese like you might call an Irishman Paddy.
If we want to be really derogatory or abusive, believe me, we don’t pull any punches since there will be plenty of qualifiers, prefixed or suffixed to go with the unmistakable tone of voice.
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That was very kind and truly instructive lesson.
One other way, unfortunately more plausible way, to look at the whole affair of all “Burma Experts” (none of whom speak Burmese with confidently full knowledge from reading the equally white people’s writing and talking to the wanna-be Whites), crowing in unison of “Kalar” meaning derogatory for the Muslim is truly for the wilful criminal purpose of inciting discord and inflaming among the hitherto peacefully coexisting communities to such violent ends the likes of which has not been seen in Burma before.
Even if Kalar is derogatory, it still does not mean to be to a Muslim. All dark color ones, as Plan B has pointed out, are termed Kalars. But that sort of fact in the “Burma Experts” eye would not look good as the very intention is to seed hatred among the people of the land they want to loot.
High time Gene Sharp/ Helvey/ Ackerman indoctrinated young, aggressive and hyperactive men in monk’s robes, Soros funded so-called 88’s and once-were-dissident journalists and variously foreign-funded we-want-our-land-just-for-ourselves groups come to their senses and see the true enemy facing all as one as evidently the enemies are so united as one.
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So Buddha was a Kalar, not even a “Ku la: phru” (I can speak Burmese like a Rakhaing, many of whom, by the way, have some Kalar genes (including Portuguese genes) I, myself, am probably 1/4 Rohingya-Kalar genetically speaking!
There are even remnants of lost Jewish tribes in the Mizoram area who have recently been allowed to immigrate to Israel:
http://www.i24news.tv/en/news/israel/society/131019-lost-tribe-of-jews-in-india-immigrating-to-israel
so how should we call these people in Burmese? Kalar-Jews or what?
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Tocharian,
First of all the ‘Jews’ of Mizoram and Aizawl
are ethnically Sino-Tibetan and are not Indo-Aryan, which means they are similar to other ethnic tribal groups in Burma. Secondly, DNA genetic evidence conducted on the Mizoram ‘Jews’ show little ethnic allelic (genetic)
homology (similarity) with Jews from India
(Kerala, Mumbai, Calcutta) or Jews from the Middle-East or elsewhere. In fact, the Mizoram tribes, who claim to be one of the ten lost tribes of Israel, are genetically similar to other non-Jewish tribes in Assam, Mizoram and Burma. As these people are not Indian origin, as I have explained that Kalar and Kallar refer only to Indian castes of Indo-Aryan orgin, these Mizoram tribes cannot be called Kalar-Jews. Thirdly, most of these Mizoram tribes converted to Christianity long long ago by Missionaries in Northeastern India, and are not Jews by birth. The sole claim to Jewish origin among the Mizoram tribes is a superficial resemblance of some of their religious practices (before Christianity) to aspects of Judaism, like the Mizoram don’t eat pork, and they have names for prophets that sound like Hebrew names, and they fast on the same day as contemporary Jews, so some liberal Jews went to Mizoram and asked whether any of them wanted to immigrate to Israel, some said yes (some also said no and remain in Mizoram). Of those who chose to immigrate to Israel, you must understand, that there is no clear genetic evidence (so-called ‘Jewish genes’) tying the tribal people to other Jews. For example, it might be more accurate to call the Jews from Kerala in Southeastern India as Kalar-Jews, though nobody referred to Jews in India as Kalar generically and historically. The Kerala Jews have similar alleles as Jews from Yemen, thousands of miles away, so nobody disputes the Jewishness of Jews from Kerala
(or Mumbai or Calcutta). The other point you
must remember is that only Orthodox (strict)
Judaism is allowed in Israel, that means since most the Mizoram ‘Jews’ were Christians
or followed tribal beliefs, by Israeli Law, they had to formally convert to Judaism from Christianity in order to obtain Israeli citizenship. The situation also happened with
many Ethiopian Jews, some of whom remained Jewish for centuries, but others converted to
Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity and had to convert to Judaism to reside in Israel as citizens claiming Jewish belief. I will not address the ‘rightness’ or ‘wrongness’ of this process, but the facts remain that almost all the Mizoram ‘Jews’ had become Christians, lack genetic alleles common to other Jews, and only had rituals and oral history that claimed descent from the one of the lost tribes. As some Mizoram tribal people agreed to undergo conversion upon arrival in Israel, and follow standard
Jewish practices, subsequently they are as Jewish now as a German, Russian, Indian, Brazilian, American, Iraqi or any other recognized Jew. Therefore, in Burmese, you should call them by the same name they call themselves in the Mizoram or Assamese language, or refer to them as Mizoram tribal people as transliterated into Burmese. Kalar-Jews or even Mizoram Jews would be inaccurate for the reasons I have stated. Would you call a Christian a Jew, just based on the fact that they might recognize the Old Testament (even if they follow the New Testament which Jews don’t recognize) as holy scripture or because Jesus was born a Jew ? No, you wouldn’t call a Christian a Jew, unless the became a Jew and followed Jewish practices, so it is the same with the Mizoram tribes, who by the way, are unfamiliar with the Five Books of Moses, a key component of Jewish belief and philosophy. Maybe in the U.S., where there are Reform Jews (so-called liberal Jews who have liberal view of religion), the Mizoram can be converted in
a Reform Jewish Temple, but they conversion will not be recognized in Israel, and apparently many Mizoram tribal people are so devoted to the notion of their Jewish origins, they only want to go to Israel or stay where they are. You won’t find many Mizoram tribal people in the West.
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TYPO ERROR:
“For example, it might be more accurate to call the Jews from Kerala in Southwestern India..”
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This primitive tribal racial/ethnic classification is too complicated for my pea-brain and is totally obsolete and oxymoronic in this day and age of Higgs Bosons, although I am still proud to be descended from amphibians!
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Mr. Cohen,
Happy to be called a Kerala native, but I’ve never been there. I’m a Vermonter and a Jew. And yes, I speak better Burmese than any USG official I knew in the Embassy there. I respect your grasp of ethnography and history. I’m well aware of how the Thai border-based guerrilla groups “own” US public opinion on Myanmar and how they absolutely do not represent the views of Myanmar’s ethnic tribes.My informants on these subjects are the border guerrillas themselves and their victims–generally fellow Karen, Kachin, and Shan peoples. It was invariably stated as gospel truth by USG personnel that South Korean and Thai military dictatorships were the only vehicles for stability in their countries. For some reason the Tatmadaw was never given the same courtesy pass. In my view, they should be.
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Hmmm..
Well, most Jews in Kerala aren’t named “Thomas.” That’s a name typically taken
be Kerala Christians who are members of the
Syriac or Jacobite Syrian Orthodox Church,
one of the St. Thomas Christian Churches
in Kerala. But if you say so; just strange you don’t have a typically Malayalam Jewish name like most Cochin or other Keralite Jews.
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Mr. Cohen,
I guess I was too clever by half: I have absolutely no connection with India save for the most superficial knowledge with some awareness of Sanskrit/Pali from my Thai/Cambodian/Burmese study. I really am an Anglo Vermont Yankee/Jewish mixture.
George Thomas
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Perhaps because they’ve killed and maimed publicly too many too often even for the USG to turn a blind eye as usual, plus a very high profile and attractive prisoner of conscience for too long.
Well, what do you know – it’s a happy ending for the USG and our military rulers, finally reconciled. They enforce stability and they consistently remain staunchly anti-communist even if they called themselves socialist at one point. All’s well that ends well, eh?
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1/ get rid of corrupt border/immigration police avoiding new “unwanted” people come in illegally.
2/ accept the fact that the ones that are in now are in and are there to stay (unless they wanna go elsewhere). ACCEPT that, provide them shelter/land.
3/ educate people, burma is so bloody backward.
conflict is inherent to the human nature. no religion has ever done anything good about that.
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