Sawt Falasteen - Rohingya tell UN of Myanmar bloodshed, suffering

Addressing a special UN conference on the Rohingya, Maung Sawyeddollah held up a photograph of dead women and children in civilian attire and said they had been killed by an armed group fighting against Myanmar's army.

"These people were killed in a drone attack by the Arakan Army on August 5, 2024," said Sawyeddollah, part of the Rohingya Students Network.

"These are not isolated cases, they are a part of a systematic campaign...Where is justice for Rohingya?"

The mostly Muslim Rohingya have been persecuted in Myanmar for decades, with many escaping the 2017 military clampdown that is the subject of a UN genocide court case and now finding themselves unable to return as fighting rages in Rakhine state.

The state, their homeland in western Myanmar, has been the site of some of the most intense fighting between the army and Arakan Army since the 2021 military coup that overthrew the democratic government.

"The Junta blocks aid, recruits Rohingyas as human shields and continues systematic oppression," said Wai Wai Nu, founder of the Women's Peace Network, who spent several years imprisoned in Myanmar.

The Rohingyas are now targeted by the Arakan Army, a predominantly Buddhist ethnic armed group that fights the junta and whose tactics "mirror" the junta's "massacre, force recruitment, arson, torture...sexual violence," she stated.

A number of UN officials corroborated her testimony.

"Their plight is somehow unique -- not only do they continue to be discriminated (against), deprived of rights and abused, a situation they have endured for decades, but they are also caught in one of several ethnic conflicts affecting the country -- except it is not their own," said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi.

He added that 1.2 million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are facing the impacts of drastic cuts in international aid.

- 'Dangerous and overcrowded' -

"We have also suffered deeply in the dangerous and overcrowded camps because of restrictions on livelihood opportunities", said Lucky Karim, who spent six years in a Cox's Bazar camp, adding she was grateful to Bangladesh for taking her in.

"Our goal is to return to our homeland safely with rights, but how do we get there?"

Earlier, UN Special Envoy on Myanmar Julie Bishop warned that bloody fighting between Myanmar's army and the Arakan ethnic armed group was proving an "insurmountable barrier" to the return of displaced Rohingya.

The human rights and humanitarian situation in Myanmar's Rakhine State has sharply deteriorated since November 2023, deepening the life-threatening conditions faced by the Rohingya living there.

The impoverished state -- a riverine slice of coastal Myanmar bordering Bangladesh -- has witnessed intense suffering in Myanmar's civil war, triggered by a 2021 coup deposing the democratic government.

Q.Jaber--SF-PST