THURSDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2014
I N T E R N AT I O N A L
Myanmar blockades Rohingya, tries to erase name
YANGON: Authorities sealed off villages for months in
Myanmar’s only Muslim-majority region and in some
cases beat and arrested people who refused to register
with immigration officials, residents and activists say, in
what may be the most aggressive effort yet to compel
Rohingya to identify themselves as migrants from
neighboring Bangladesh. Immigration officials, border
guards and members of the illegal-alien task force in
the northern tip of Rakhine state - home to 90 percent
of the country’s 1.3 million Rohingya - said they were
simply updating family lists, as they have in the past.
But this year, in addition to questions about marriages,
deaths and births, people were classified by ethnicity.
The government denies the existence of Rohingya
in the country, saying those who claim the ethnicity are
actually Bengalis. Residents said those who refused to
take part suffered the consequences. “We are trapped,”
Khin Maung Win said last week. He said authorities
started setting up police checkpoints outside his village, Kyee Kan Pyin, in mid-September, preventing
people from leaving even to shop for food in local markets, work in surrounding paddies or bring children to
school. “If we don’t have letters and paperwork showing we took part - that we are Bengali - we can’t leave,”
he said.
Chris Lewa of the Arakan Project, which has been
advocating on behalf of the Rohingya for more than a
decade, said residents reported incidents of violence
and abuse in at least 30 village tracts from June to late
September. While blockades have since been lifted,
arrests continue, with dozens of Rohingya men being
rounded up for alleged ties to Islamic militants in the
last week. Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist nation,
surprised the world in 2011 when a half-century of military rule ended and President Thein Sein, a former general, started steering the country toward democracy.
Critics, however, say reforms have stalled.
Peaceful protesters are again being thrown in jail;
journalists increasingly face intimidation, or even
imprisonment with hard labor. Most worrying to many,
the government has largely stood by as Buddhist
extremists have targeted Rohingya, sometimes with
machetes and bamboo clubs, saying they pose a threat
to the country’s culture and traditions. Denied citizenship by national law, even though many of their fami-
lies arrived in Myanmar from Bangladesh generations
ago, members of the religious minority are effectively
stateless, wanted by neither country. They feel they are
being systematically erased.
Almost all Rohingya were excluded from a UN-funded nationwide census earlier this year, the first in three
decades, because they did not want to register as
Bengalis. And Thein Sein is considering a “Rakhine
In 2012, Buddhist extremists killed up to 280 people
and displaced tens of thousands of others. About
140,000 people of those forced from their homes continue to languish in crowded displacement camps further south, outside Sittwe, the Rakhine state capital.
Tensions surrounding the family registration campaign
in northern Rakhine rose steadily after it began four
months ago, with most of the resistance felt in
RAKHINE: Rohingya children carry firewood collected from neighborhood at That Kabyin village
camp, north of Sittwe, Rakhine State, Myanmar. — AP
Action Plan” that would make people who identify
themselves as Rohingya not only ineligible for citizenship but candidates for detainment and possible
deportation. Most Rohingya have lived under
apartheid-like conditions in northern Rakhine for
decades, with limited access to adequate health care,
education and jobs, as well as restrictions on travel and
the right to practice their faith.
Maungdaw township. Many villages were placed under
lockdown, with police checkpoints set up to make sure
only those who have cooperated could leave, more
than a dozen residents confirmed in telephone interviews with The Associated Press.
In other villages, the names of influential residents
were posted on community boards with verbal warnings that they face up to two years in jail if they fail to
convince others to take part in the registration process,
Lewa said. Other Rohingya say officials forced them to
sign the papers at gunpoint, or threatened that they
would end up in camps like those outside Sittwe if they
didn’t comply, she said.
In some cases residents say authorities have shown
up after midnight and broken down doors to catch residents by surprise and pressure them to hand over family lists. Villagers also have been kicked and beaten
with clubs and arrested for refusing to take part,
according to Lewa and residents interviewed by the AP.
Lewa said that when authorities ended the blockades,
they also stopped the registration campaign. Rohingya
said they didn’t want to register family members
because they worry the information might be used to
deny them citizenship. As international pressure
mounts to end abuses against Rohingya, the government has agreed to provide citizenship to anyone who
qualifies. But many Rohingya say they cannot meet the
requirements, which include submitting documents
proving that their families have been in Myanmar for at
least three generations. And under the plan Thein Sein
is considering, even that would not be enough for people who insist on calling themselves Rohingya rather
than Bengali. Myanmar Information Minister Ye Htut
did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
Win Myaing, a spokesman for Rakhine state government, said authorities’ effort to update family lists had
an added sense of urgency because of concerns that
Islamic extremists could try to slip across the border
from neighboring Bangladesh.
It was unclear whether there was a specific threat
from a new regional Al-Qaeda wing or Rohingya
Solidarity Organization militants. “We have to know
who’s who,” Myaing said. “We want to know who are
strangers and who are not?” He did not comment on
the allegations of abuses. As to why the government
insisted on calling the villagers Bengali, Myaing said,
“Because they are Bengali. What else should we call
them?” Soe Myint Tun, the director of the immigration
office of Kyee Kan Pyin, agreed. “We are only checking
the villagers’ family household lists and their identification cards. That’s all,” he said. “There are no ‘Rohingya’ in
this country and the government has said that as well.
We are just doing what we have to do.” — AP
Militants’ release ringing
alarm bells in Indonesia
Indonesian prisons - hotbeds of radicalism
SIALKOT: A Pakistani woman gestures beneath the damaged roof of her house,
allegedly caused by shells fired by Indian troops, at the Dhamala border village near
the eastern city of Sialkot in Punjab province. — AFP
Five more civilians die in worst
India-Pakistan fighting for years
SRINAGAR: Five civilians were killed and
thousands took refuge in camps in the disputed region of Kashmir yesterday after some
of the most intense fighting between
nuclear-armed neighbors Pakistan and India
in a decade. A total of nine Pakistani and
eight Indian civilians have been killed since
fighting erupted more than week ago in the
mostly Muslim Himalayan region. Kashmir is
claimed by both countries and has been a
major focus of tension in South Asia.
Each side has accused the other of targeting civilians and unprovoked violations of a
border truce that has largely held since 2003.
While exchanges of sporadic fire are common
along the de facto border dividing the region,
civilian deaths are unusual. Three Pakistani
and two Indian civilians were killed yesterday.
“We are all concerned and want an early solution to it (the fighting),” India’s Air Chief Arup
Raha told reporters. “We don’t want to let the
issue become serious.” A senior border security force official said Indian forces had retaliated to machine gun and mortar attacks on
about 60 positions along a more than 200-km
stretch of the border yesterday.
Some 18,000 Indian civilians have fled
their homes in the lowlands around Jammu
due to the fighting, and have taken refuge in
schools and relief camps. “If India and
Pakistan troops have hostility, let them fight.
What have we done to them?” said Gharo
Devi, 50, in Arnia, where five civilians were
killed on Monday. “We left our homes in the
dead of night and are living here in this
school in a wretched condition. We have no
food. We want end of the firing so that we can
return home.” Pakistani Major General Khan
Tahir Javed Khan said the number of mortar
rounds and bullets fired had surged in recent
weeks. “It is the most intense in decades,”
Khan said of the fighting. “My message to
them would be please de-escalate.”
Politics weighs heavily
The fighting comes at a time of changing
power dynamics in South Asia, with Pakistan’s
army taking a more assertive role in politics
and India’s new nationalist Prime Minister
Narendra Modi promising a more muscular
foreign policy. Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif has been weakened by opposition
protests that started in August. He won the
army’s backing but in the process ceded
space to the generals on some issues, including relations with India.
Modi is following through on a promise to
take a harder line with Pakistan in its border
disputes after being elected in May.
Although Sharif came to Modi’s inauguration,
the Indian leader has since cancelled a round
of talks with Pakistan, and in a further snub
did not meet Sharif at a U.N. meeting in New
York in September.
“This unrest is a logical consequence of
worsening political relations between India
and Pakistan,” said Michael Kugelman, Senior
Program Associate for South and Southeast
Asia at the Woodrow Wilson International
Center for Scholars. —Reuters
JAKARTA: The looming release of hundreds of militants from Indonesia’s prisons, hotbeds of radicalism where influential Islamists openly preach
extremist ideology, is ringing alarm bells and raising fears some will join forces with the Islamic State
group. More than a decade after Indonesia vowed
to dismantle terrorist networks to stem a series of
attacks, neglect of jails has allowed top detainees
to promote their views behind bars, and even
beyond thanks to smartphones and laptops.
About 200 convicted militants are due for
release in the next two years, and experts say inadequate deradicalisation efforts mean many will
leave jail with their ideology intact. “Prisons are still
the epicenter of terrorism in Indonesia. The most
dangerous militants are behind bars and recruitment is going on,” said terrorism expert Taufik
Andrie from the Jakarta-based Institute for
International Peace Building.
The alarming trend in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country comes despite
authorities’ growing concern about Islamic militancy and in particular Islamic State (IS), which has
declared an “Islamic caliphate” across swathes of
Syria and Iraq. Authorities say about 60
Indonesians are believed to have joined IS,
although most analysts believe the true figure is up
to 200, and concerns are mounting that they could
return and revive sophisticated militant networks.
Singapore has said that IS jihadists from Malaysia
and Indonesia have formed their own groupKatibah Nusantara Lid Daulah Islamiyyah, or Malay
Archipelago Unit for the Islamic State-which poses
a clear security threat to Southeast Asia.
Indonesia began a long clampdown on
extremists following the 2002 Bali bombings that
killed 202 people on the resort island, mostly foreigners. That attack and others were blamed on
the Al-Qaeda-linked Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), which
has since been severely weakened. The government has banned support for IS, while other
nations, including Britain and Australia, have
tightened counter-terrorism laws to prevent
nationals joining or supporting the and other
jihadist outfits. But experts say such efforts in
Indonesia are being undermined by a failure to
tackle the prisons problem.
IS pledges behind bars
Abu Bakar Bashir, the former spiritual leader of
JI, was photographed pledging allegiance to IS in
jail. The photos were posted on radical websites
almost in real-time. Aman Abdurrahman, an influ-
SOLO: Masked Indonesian Islamic militant waving the flag of Islamic State, stage a rally
against Syria’s President Bashar Al-Assad in Solo, central Java Island where they signified their
preparedness to join the war in Syria against Bashar Al-Assad’s regime. — AFP
ential Islamist cleric, is Indonesia’s main translator Indonesia during bouts of religious conflict, a
for IS and has been able to disseminate informa- source with knowledge of his case told AFP. Falah
tion online from inside a maximum-security prison, claims he went to give aid. Just three deradicalisaincluding the group’s recent call on Muslims to kill tion sessions were held during his time in prison,
Westerners indiscriminately. Their oaths were fol- involving dialogue with moderate Islamic clerics.
lowed by a wave of IS pledges by large radical “It was interesting enough, but it didn’t change
groups, as well as by 23 inmates imprisoned with anything about the way I think,” he said. Falah is
Bashir, according to Jakarta-based think-tank, the now a senior figure of another offshoot group,
and says that while IS is “too extreme” he supports
Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC).
The government’s deradicalisation schemes jihad in Syria and backs the Al-Qaeda-linked Alremain so ad-hoc and poorly targeted that they Nusra Front.
“There have not been useful programs on a
barely make up a program at all, critics say. Irfan
Idrus, head of deradicalisation at the national national scale inside the prisons that you can point
counter-terrorism agency, admitted there was no to clear impact,” said IPAC director Sidney Jones,
system in place to identify those who have devel- adding that Indonesia’s deradicalisation drive was
oped extremist views and need post-release moni- “vague” and a “bit of a mess”. She pointed to a protoring. When Haris Amir Falah was freed after serv- gram to educate convicted terrorists about the
ing three years for terrorism offences, he went “Pancasila”-Indonesia’s five-point state ideology
straight back to his Bashir-led extremist group. that celebrates “unity in diversity”-to inculcate a
Falah was convicted of funding a militant training sense of nationalism in them. “But it wasn’t as if
camp that was planning gun attacks on “enemies these prisoners didn’t feel Indonesian, so it was the
wrong solution to the problem. A lot of these proof Islam”, including the president.
Before that he had fought with JI in parts of grams have been equally misguided.”— AFP
5 Afghan men hanged for brutal gang-rape
KABUL: Five Afghan men were hanged yesterday for the gang rape of four women
despite the United Nations and human
rights groups criticizing the trial and calling
for new president Ashraf Ghani to stay the
executions. The brutal attack in Paghman,
outside Kabul, provoked a national outcry
with many Afghans demanding the men be
hanged, and then-president Hamid Karzai
signed their death sentences shortly before
leaving office last week. “Five men in connection to the Paghman incident and one
other big criminal were executed this afternoon,” Rahmatullah Nazari, the deputy
attorney general said.
There was no immediate comment from
the office of President Ghani, who faced
strong public pressure to not stay the executions after he came to power on August
29. “The court’s verdict has been implemented and all the convicts have been executed-five from the Paghman case, plus
Habib Istalifi, who was head of a notorious
kidnapping gang,” the attorney general’s
chief of staff Atta Mohammad Noori said.
The men were executed in Pul-e-Charkhi
prison near Kabul. Franz-Michael Mellbin,
the EU ambassador in Kabul, strongly criticized the hangings, and questioned Ghani’s
failure to intervene.
“Today’s executions cast a dark shadow
over the new Afghan government’s will to
uphold basic human rights,” Mellbin said on
Twitter soon after the news broke. In
August the armed gang members, wearing
police uniforms, stopped a convoy of cars
returning to Kabul at night from a wedding
in Paghman, a scenic spot popular with
day-trippers.
The attackers tied up men in the group
before raping at least four of the women
and stealing valuables from their victims.
But the court process raised major concerns, with the trial lasting only a few
hours, allegations of the suspects confessing under torture, and Karzai calling for the
men to be hanged even before the case
was heard.
In a statement before the executions,
the UN High Commission for Human Rights
“called on President Ghani to refer the cases
back to the courts given the very serious
due process concerns”. Amnesty said the
trial had been rushed, giving lawyers little
time to prepare the defense. It was only
nine days between the arrests and the
handing down of death sentences by the
primary court. The trial was “marred by
inconsistencies, un-investigated torture
claims and political interference”, Amnesty
said. “(Karzai) himself said that he urged the
Supreme Court to hand down death sentences.”
National anger
The accused were found guilty and sentenced at a nationally-televised trial, which
attracted noisy rallies outside the courtroom calling for the death penalties.
Applause erupted inside the courtroom
when Kabul police chief Zahir Zahir also
called for the men to be hanged. The sentences were quickly confirmed by the
appeals court and the Supreme Court. “The
horrendous due process violations in the
Paghman trial have only worsened the
injustices of this terrible crime,” said Phelim
Kine of Human Rights Watch. HRW said the
case included a manipulated lineup for
identification and a trial with little evidence. The crime in the early hours of
August 23 has become a symbol of the violence that women face in Afghanistan,
despite reforms since the Taleban regime
fell in 2001.
Women’s rights have been central to the
multi-billion-dollar international development effort in Afghanistan, but they still
endure routine discrimination, abuse and
violence. Under the Taleban’s harsh version
of Sunni Islamic law, women were forced to
wear the all-enveloping burqa, banned
from jobs, and forbidden even to leave the
house without a male chaperone. The
gang-rape unleashed a wave of public
anger via protests, the media and the
Internet, echoing the response to recent
similar crimes in India-including the fatal
attack on a student on a bus in New Delhi
in 2012. —AFP