Michael von Tangen Page

Four years ago the most popular leader of Rohingya civil society in the camps, Mohibullah, was gunned down by unidentified Rohingya gunmen (probably ARSA). This is a photograph from a meeting with him and the Norwegian Ambassador just three days before he died. He will be missed today in New York.

(Part 1) High-level Conference on the Situation of Rohingya Muslims and Other Minorities in Myanmar - General Assembly, 80th session Conference to review the overall crisis and share perspectives on the situation on the ground in order to propose a comprehensive, innovative, concrete and time-bound plan for a sustainable resolution...

For those interested in today's UN Conference on the Rohingya there will be live coverage on this site from about 8pm BD time (NY 10 am) through this link webtv.un.org/en/asset/k13...

A red safety flag flying on a beach in Cox's Bazar at sunset

Not the Jolly Roger rather a beach safety flag in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. Sadly, from 30 September due to funding cuts the lifeguards will no longer be patrolling the tourist beaches

YouTube video by UNDP Bangladesh CARU: Data-Driven Solutions for the Rohingya Crisis in Cox’s Bazar | UNDP Bangladesh

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmaU...

Rohingya mujahid surrenders his weapon to Brigadier-General Aung Gyi, 4 July 1961. This was part of an agreement to establish the Mayu Frontier District, which saw what is now the Maungdaw District of Rakhine State established, giving limited autonomy to the Rohingya in this area between 1961 & 1964

I was very sorry to hear of the death of Gwen Robinson @robinsonbkk.bsky.social in Bangkok yesterday. Myanmar has lost one of its ablest chroniclers, and those of us who work on the country's politics have lost a key lynchpin who knew everyone and gave advice freely.

Just ended UNDP Bangladesh Country Office retreat in Cox's Bazar, it was good to welcome colleagues to CXB.

On the 8th January 1947 the future Pakistan leader Jinnah assured the future Burmese leader Aung San that he had no territorial aspirations for Northern Arakan (now Rakhine State). This is a policy which Dhaka/Dacca has adhered to constantly through multiple states and governments since.

This short book, published as the situation in Cox’s Bazar exploded is a useful primer on the Rohingya situation. It provides a short historical overview before looking at the situation that the Rohingya in Myanmar faced in the run up to the crisis of 2017.

As I close this thread (at least for now) it seems fitting that we end with Azeem Ibrahim’s ‘The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide’ (New Delhi: Tiger, 2017), picked up on a whim at an airport bookstall in Chennai on my way to a short consultancy in Cox’s Bazar in 2018.

Habiburahman provides a compelling account of his life in Myanmar from the 1970s until 2000 when he fled Rakhine and then gives a fascinating insight into the life of an undocumented and often illegal migrant living on the margins of international society.

What is notable about most of the books I have referenced is the lack of Rohingya voices in the literature. A notable exception to this is Habiburahman’s ‘First They Erased Our Name: A Rohingya Speaks’ (Haryana: Penguin, 2018) initially written in French with Sophie Ansel in 2018.

This Indian focus is a bit frustrating given the relatively small number of Rohingya in India compared to Bangladesh or more recently Indonesia and Malaysia. 2/2

The South Asian perspective of the Rohingya crisis is the focus of ‘The Rohingya in South Asia: A people without a State’ (New Delhi: Routledge India, 2018) edited by Sabyasaichi Basu Ray Chaudhury and Ranabir Samaddar. This multi author academic book examines the crisis through an Indian lens.1/2

The book's backbone is 76 micro-narratives, a couple of pages each, which do an excellent job of giving voice to the Rohingya. It also includes the most extensive annotated bibliography of the Rohingya issue I have seen. The book is worthwhile reading for these two bits of scholarship alone. 3/3

The book addresses the Protection dilemma faced by Rohingya and identifies the vulnerability of Rohingya whether in Bangladesh or Rakhine. The analysis of the threats faced by the Rohingya is extensive, but it is frustrating that wider regional and global actors are not really addressed. 2/3

Perhaps the most academic book in the collection is Imtiaz Ahmed and Niloy Ranjan Biswas’ ‘Rohingyas in Myanmar and Bangladesh: The Violence-Protection Dialectic and the Narratives of Certain Unsafety/Uncertain Safety’ (Dhaka: Centre for Studies, University of Dhaka 2022). 1/3

Buchanan does not mention the Rohingya but he outlines challenges faced by refugees who had recently fled across the Naf River following the Burmese invasion of Mrauk-U. He charts the challenges of integration and the social tensions caused by the first recorded refugee flow across the Naf River.

An interesting early modern account of the area we now call Cox’s Bazar District was published by the Dutch academic Willem van Schendel. ‘Francis Buchanan in Southeast Bengal (1798): His Journey to Chittagong, the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Noakhali and Comilla’ (Dhaka: University Press, 1992).

Published a year before the 2021 coup, the book seeks to explain Burmese antipathy towards the Rohingya, looking at the history of Arakan/Rakhine in the pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial periods. Usefully Galache looks at the emergence of ARSA in Rakhine and then the camps in Bangladesh.2/2

Spanish journalist Carlos Sardina Galache looks at the Rohingya issue through the Myanmar (or, as he says, Burmese) lens.‘The Burmese Labyrinth: A History of the Rohingya Tragedy’ (London: Verso, 2020) is an attempt to understand the largely Islamic Rohingya inside a majority Buddhist culture.1/2

It picks apart a history of persecution, outlining the traumas and insecurities faced. Imtiaz is sympathetic to the Rohingya plight. The failure of the International Community and Burmese extremism are blamed but a solution of more international focus is a bit utopian in the light of events. 2/2

Dhaka’s view of the Rohingya has been consistent since 1947. ‘The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas: responses of the State, Society & the International Community (Dhaka: University Press:2010) edited by Bangladesh genocide scholar Imtiaz Ahmed summarises Bangladesh’s pre 2017 crisis perspective.1/2

Singh starts with a short background to the crisis. The British (again) do not come out well with regard to divide and rule policies but the attitude of Myanmar and Buddhist extremism also play a role. However, Rohingya entering India are seen as a security threat part of a wider Islamic threat. 2/2

The Indian's view the Rohingya differently to the international and Bangladeshi perspectives. R. A. Singh’s ‘The Rohingya Crisis – Demographic Invasion by Illegal Immigrants’ (New Delhi:Raj,2018) is a summary of the Indian approach: sympathy for Rohingya but seeing them as an existential threat.1/2

It examines the rival historical narratives in Rakhine/Arakan before a conflict analysis. However, it suffers from the curse of publishing on contemporary issues being overtaken by events. The situation has changed dramatically with new actors, but helps understand the lead-up to the crisis.

Anthony Ware & Costas Laoutides’, ‘Myanmar’s “Rohingya” Conflict’ (London: Hurst, 2018) is an academic conflict analysis of the situation in Rakhine in the run-up to the crisis of 2017. The book opens with an examination of the context in Rakhine in the period before the crisis started.

Writing at the start of the crisis Bari does not address many post-2017 developments. However, his concluding recommendations to the Bangladeshi authorities are interesting. Bari argues for a more assertive, pragmatic foreign policy, which seems to have been adopted by the new Interim Government.3/3

Written as the 2017 crisis was unfolding this book concentrates on the historical origins of the conflict in Rakhine. Perhaps inevitably, as a British writer, Bari places a lot of the blame for the deterioration in Muslim-Buddhist relations in Myanmar on the colonial policy of ‘divide and rule’ 2/3

Book 3 is Muhammad Abdul Bari’s ‘The Rohingya Crisis- a people facing extinction’ (Markfield: Kube, 2018) is a well-written polemic setting out the Rohingya case in a short, readable monograph. 1/3