MYANMAR’S ROHINGYA MUSLIMS: THE PEOPLE OF

NOWHERE
An analysis of the concept of genocide, how it fits into the
Rohingya picture, the role of international community and the
application of international humanitarian law.

History has borne witness to the so-called intelligent organisms we dearly refer to as humans
setting out to eliminating and exonerating each other for one reason or another but almost every
time the halt even if not as abrupt as we would all like to imagine has been provided by
mankind’s refusal to allow such methodical obliteration to occur. However time and again, the
world has turned a blind eye to the decimation of hundreds and thousands of innocent people.
After the initial stages of the Rwandan Crisis and the Armenian Crisis, the very recent ongoing
Rohingya Refugee crisis has revealed the ignorance and apathy of the global world which when
combined with the refusal of respective governments to take blame produces disastrous
consequences. This ignorance is what Adolf Hitler once propagated upon while persuading his
associates that a holocaust would be tolerated by the west stating, “Who, after all, speaks today
of the annihilation of the Armenians?”1. To move beyond the reminiscence of the dark days of
the past atrocities against humankind and live up to the true meaning of the jurisprudence behind
the Rome Statute, the Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and the
1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (the Genocide
Convention) , it has become pertinent for the global community at large to put under the
microscope the very concept genocide and how it fits into the Rohingya picture, which is what
has ultimately led to the Rohingyan Refugee Crisis.

1
Kevork B. Bardakjian, Hitler and the Armenian Genocide (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Zoryan Institute,
1985).
The Rohingya, a Muslim minority group in Rakhine state in the western coast of Myanmar, former
Burma, have long been damned. Their plight has borne them the label of being the ‘most
persecuted community in the world’2. In order to further delve into the very reason for this name
we need to look into its very source that emerged in the guise of the government’s 1982
Citizenship Act. Ever since then 1.3 million Rohingya have been denied citizenship and stripped of
all their rights3. The evolution from barbaric to civilized society involves recognition of human
rights primarily the right to life. In all earnest this is the priority of every government. However as
it has been seen in majority of cases the government itself becomes the infringer of this right, the
same is the predicament of the Rohingya Muslims of the Rakhine state. All this carnage puts forth
a very pertinent question that we need to answer seriatim4. Is genocide occurring in Myanmar’s
Rakhine State?

Revisiting the Concept of Genocide

Article 6 of the Rome statute of the International Criminal Court provides for the definition of
Genocide as any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a
national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b)
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on
the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring
children of the group to another group. It is pertinent to mention the flailing role of the
International Criminal Court or the Rome Statute in this regard as many nations have either not
ratified it or are not a signatory to the statute. Even the Member states are rescinding their
membership, the recent one being that of Russia’s. Myanmar like its fellow Asian nations like
India and China has never been a party to the Rome Statute. So the culpability attached to the
definition of Genocide as has been provided in the Rome Statute, when applied to the situation in
the Rakhine state can be easily averted by them by escaping through this technical loophole.
However much to the chagrin of the International Community the law on Genocide is jus

2
The Rohingyas: The Most Persecuted people in the World? , The Economist, June 13, 2015.
3
See more at http://www.rvisiontv.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Rohingya-1.pdf. Accessed on 10th December,
2016.
4
Latin Legal Maxim meaning ‘In Series’ or ‘point by point.’
cogens5.Furthermore the United Nations General assembly adopted the Genocide Convention in
1948 and it was entered into force in 19516.According to the provisions of the Convention, to
analyze whether genocide has been, or is being, committed, three questions need to be asked:

1. Whether the victims constitute a group under the Convention;

2. Whether the acts perpetrated are among those enumerated in the Convention’s definition; and

3. Whether these acts were carried out with intent to destroy the group, in whole or in part.

The proscription of the crime of genocide, as defined by the Convention, has become an
unequivocal part of customary international law.7

Genocide vs. ethnic cleansing: An answer to the myth

There has not been any clear distinction between ethnic cleansing and genocide provided in
International law. The terms have been use almost interchangeably. However is has been
propounded by all that Genocide is a much graver crime than ethnic cleansing. This is where the
woe of the Rohingya lies. To hide the shame that ipso facto8 the solutions provided in the
Rwanda crisis and the Nuremberg Trials, have not been congruent with the stopping the
annihilators of justice, the world has affixed the term ‘Ethnic cleansing’ to the plight of the
destitute Rohingya.
However, after placing the available facts available at hand from neutral sources monitoring or
working in Myanmar like the ICRC, Human Rights Watch, the UNHCR and the Medecins Sans
Frontiers (Doctors without Borders) about the situation in Myanmar, an attempt needs to be
made to answer the abovementioned questions put forth by the Convention on Genocide, in this
context.

5
Latin Legal Maxim meaning ’ the principles which form the norms of international law that cannot be set aside’.
6
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted on Dec. 9, 1948, 78 U.N.T.S.
277 (1951) [Genocide Convention].
7
Prosecutor v. Goran Jelisic, Case No. ICTY-IT-95-10-T, Judgment, para. 60 (Dec. 14, 1999)
8
Latin Legal Maxim meaning ‘As a matter of Fact’.
Firstly, there is little doubt that the Rohingya make up a distinctive group under the
Convention’s definition of genocide as their characteristics and history indicate that they
constitute a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group. Although Myanmar officials contest the
historic presence of Rohingya in the country, historians trace the presence of Rohingya in the
present Rakhine State to as early as the ninth century.9

Secondly, the question of the ‘acts of genocide’ perpetrated against the community has been
seen through the government’s violent actions, the government’s inaction in curbing down
locally perpetrated violence, the untethered slaughtering, constant torturing by the NaSaKa and
the army of men and women alike , acts of sexual assault and rape by the NaSaKa, Myanmar
Army, and Myanmar Police Force against Rohingya women, the expulsion of Rohingya from
their homes into internally displaced persons (IDP) camps or out of the country and the
subsequent denial of medical care, sanitation, food, and paid labor opportunities, forced labor
and the subsequent imposition of birth control measures on the community.

Finally, even though critics have pointed out that the intent principle could not have been clearly
established in the Rohingya situation, it has been held that as to proof of specific intent, it may,
in the absence of direct explicit evidence, be inferred from a number of facts and circumstances,
such as the general context, the perpetration of other culpable acts systematically directed against
the same group, the scale of atrocities committed, the systematic targeting of victims on account
of their membership of a particular group, or the repetition of destructive and discriminatory
acts10.
According to a survey conducted by United to end Genocide, the Rohingya are forced to live in
Apartheid conditions where they cannot travel, work or even marry without permission11. Over
140,000 were forced into concentration camps after their homes and villages were burnt to the
ground in 2012, and remain there today while others fled to dangerous sea voyages.

9
The Muslims of Burma: A Study of a Minority Group, p. 2 (1972),Moshe Yegar
10
Prosecutor v. Jelisic, Case No. ICTY IT-94-10-A, Judgment, para. 47 (July 5, 2001).
11
See More at http://endgenocide.org/, Accessed on 9th December, 2016.
 Furthermore, the government of Myanmar denies their very existence, prohibiting the use of their
name and a pressuring foreign official not even to utter the word Rohingya. According to
Burma’s former President Thein Sein, “There are no Rohingya” in Burma.

Similar is the stance taken by Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, state counselor and foreign minister, among
others of the new N.L.D.-led government that took over in 2015. The United States Embassy
recently drew criticism for using the word ‘Rohingya’ in a statement expressing condolences for
the deaths of at least 20 people whose boat capsized on April 19, 2016, off the coast of
Rakhine.Nationalist Buddhists challenged the new Myanmar government to protest the Americans’
use of the word and staged a demonstration outside the U.S embassy in Yangon12 which led to Suu
Kyi raising the issue with the U.S ambassador the very next day.
Aung San Suu Kyi’s demeanor, while being a Nobel peace prize laureate apart from being the de
facto leader of the country has crushed the hopes of the Rohingya community .It has also garnered
several criticisms from international human rights activists and from the 14th Dalai Lama himself
who had twice requested his fellow Peace Prize laureate to address the issue and upon her refusal
to do so stating that things were not simple but very complicated, felt that in spite of all these she
can do something13. All this indirect evidence as to the’ intent to destroy’ objective, prove beyond
reasonable doubt that the mass exodus of the Rohingya Muslims is a resultant of Genocide.

The Final Verdict

In spite of the International community’s propounding so as to not having clear empirical evidence
in regards to the ‘intent to destroy’ part and due to popular argument of the Aung San Suu Kyi
Government that the carnage is par delictum14 , there is little space for doubt in the mind of one
who wants to see things as they are, that culpability is being shrug off by the International
12
Aung San Suu Kyi Asks U.S. Not to Refer to ‘Rohingya’, the New York Times, RICHARD C.
PADDOCKMAY, May 6, 2016.

13
Dalai Lama urges Suu Kyi to ease Rohingya Tension, Al Jazeera, 15th June, 2016.
14
Latin Legal Maxim meaning ‘By the fault of both parties’
community by labeling the jus cogens15 act of ‘Genocide’ as ‘ethnic cleansing’. Furthermore
considering that the information to which the Lowenstein Clinic has had access to is credible and
comprehensive and accurately reflects the Rohingyas’ situation, we find strong evidence that
genocide is indeed being committed against Rohingya16 .At this juncture the world needs to come
together to avoid another complete annihilation like Rwanda, Armenia, Darfur and also the
ongoing massacre in Aleppo. We need to save Humanity by Saving Rohingya. Let’s give the
People of nowhere their place back in this world.

15
The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties defines a jus cogens norm as one that is “accepted and recognized
by the international community of States as a whole as a norm from which no derogation is permitted.” Vienna
Convention on the Law of Treaties, adopted May 23, 1969, 1155 U.N.T.S. 331, art. 53 [Vienna Convention].
16
The Persecution of the Rohingya Muslims, Allard K. Lowenstein, International Human Rights Clinic, Yale law
school.