Keep a safe distance
Source: By Swapan Dasgupta: The Telegraph
In an ideal world, Malala Yousafzai should have been enjoying some quality time with her family and friends in Birmingham before setting off to the excitement of undergraduate life in Oxford. Unfortunately, the celebrity status that comes with winning a Nobel Prize demands unending endorsements for causes that also look nice and are deemed noble. Solidarity with the beleaguered Rohingyas in the Rakhine province of Myanmar happens to be the flavour of the season among those inWestern Europe who are forever in search of issues that provoke indignation.
The cause of the Rohingyas is also deliciously appetizing because it involves destroying the halo around Aung San Suu Kyi, once a familiar figure in Oxford, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1991 for her doughty and dignified battle for the cause of democracy in Myanmar. Once an iconic figure in the West, Suu Kyi's reputation as a modern- day Mahatma Gandhi (who, incidentally was turned down for the Nobel Prize) has been punctured by her refusal to join the Rohingya bandwagon.
In the case of both women, the wheel has turned a full circle. When she was awarded the Nobel Prize, Suu Kyi had to fight charges of being a handmaiden of sinister Western designs to unsettle Myanmar and erode its strong Buddhist identity. Likewise, Malala and her family had to seek asylum in the United Kingdom to uphold a woman's right to education in the face of obscurantist Islamist objection. Malala acquired iconic status in the West but within Pakistan she was often seen as an instrument of Islamophobia. Today, with her statement pleading for rights for “Muslim" Rohingyas — an issue that has incensed the entire umma — Malala has successfully rehabilitated herself with her own people, without jeopardizing the liberal ecosystem that has sustained her. On her part,Suu Kyi has bolstered her Buddhist credentials and strengthened herself politically within Myanmar.
However, this sensitivity to domestic public opinion has cost her dearly in the West. She is being perceived as a betrayer by Guardian readers for putting her country's interests above her personal image. Had the impact of the Malala- Suu Kyi spat been confined to the Junior Common Rooms of Oxford colleges — where it will no doubt be passionately discussed after Term starts — it would have been an amusing sideshow? Unfortunately, thanks to the hyper- activism of human rights groups and the United Nations bodies, the Rohingya issue has touched India.
Even before the August 25 attacks on the military that triggered the latest round of retaliation and refugee exodus from Rakhine province, the presence of Rohingyas in India had become a debating issue. The presence of an estimated 25,000 or so Rohingyas in Jammu and Ladakh (but, curiously, not in the Kashmir Valley) has become a cause of consternation not least because India's northern- most state is a very long way from the Indo- Myanmar border. Some of them have flaunted their Aadhaar and voter cards for photographers. How did they get there? Who brought them there? The matter has come to a head following the Centre's commitment to initiate deportation of these illegal residents. Public interest litigation has been filed in the Supreme Court by two Rohingyas and others calling on the government to desist. At the same time, the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugeeshas appealed to the government to open the door for the entry of those Rohingyas fleeing from the post- August 25 violence in Myanmar. This appeal has secured the endorsement of some non- governmental organizations and politicians such as the Congress MP, Shashi Tharoor.
The question is sly and aimed at securing brownie points among the strange alliance of Islamists and liberals that has been forged over the Rohingya issue. India has offered sanctuary to many people from neighbouring countries. These include Tibetans, Chakmas, Sri Lankan Tamils, Afghans and Hindus from Pakistan and Bangladesh.
This is not to mention persecuted individuals from Bangladesh and, in an earlier phase, Myanmar. Had Yazidis fleeing the brutal persecution of the Islamic State in Iraq sought sanctuary in India, it would have been readily offered. Why then is there great hesitation in opening thefloodgates of a Rohingya influx into India? In Myanmar, the Rohingyas are regarded as settlers from neighbouring Bangladesh. The authorities label them Bengalis. Following the August 25 violence, it is claimed that anything between 60,000 and 87,000 Rohingyas have crossed over into Bangladesh. In normal circumstances, it would have been expected of Bangladesh to have made the greatest amount of noise and raised the Rohingya issue at an international level. Since Rohingyas speak a dialect of Bangla, they should also have been welcomed into the country, at least as kinsmen. On the contrary, Dhaka has been anything but welcoming to the Rohingyas. It has even tried, not very successfully, to push the Rohingyas back into Myanmar.
Since the Japanese occupation of Burma in 1942, the Buddhist- Muslim schism has increased. The Muslims were pro- British while the Burmese nationalists entered into an expedient alliance with the Japanese occupiers. Along with the larger war Japan fought against the Allies, the Arakans witnessed a parallel civil war. As documented in Azeem Ibrahim's The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar's Hidden Genocide (2016), theRohingyas formed an army and sought incorporation into East Pakistan in 1947, a demand that was repeated in the Burmese Constituent Assembly in 1948. Since then, the Rakhine province has witnessed a low intensity Muslim insurgency whose character became increasingly more religious with the involvement of Islamists in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and, of late, even India.
The International Crisis Group Report (2016) assessment of theNovember 9, 2016 attacks on the Myanmar army stated: " The insurgent group, which refers to itself as Harakah al- Yaqin (Faith Movement, HaY), is led by a committee of Rohingya émigrés in Saudi Arabia and is commanded on the ground by Rohingya with international training and experience in modern guerrilla war tactics. It benefits from thelegitimacy provided by local and international fatwas... in support of its cause and enjoys considerable sympathy and backing from Muslims in northern Rakhine State, including several hundred locally trained recruits." This is revealing and explains why a country such as Bangladesh is wary of taking in refugees, many of whom have been indoctrinated by religious extremists.
The possibility of refugees becoming a fifth column in the country of sanctuary shouldn't ever be discounted. The example of asylum seekers becoming terrorists in Western Europe is before the world. India cannot ignore the warnings in attempting to uphold lofty traditions. Of course, this does not distract from the need to persuade the authorities in Myanmar to open the window for religio- ethnic reconciliation.
The cancellation of the White Cards of Rohingyas in 2015 which led to their disenfranchisement was needless and gave succour to the Rohingya separatists. While recognizing that the issue is an internal matter of Myanmar and acknowledging the ferocity of feeling against those who have desecrated Buddhist shrines, Myanmar must be told that its unwanted non- citizens cannot be dumped on neighbouring countries.
Alas, the over- sanctimonious attitude of many European countriesisn't helping matters and the gratuitous advice of the NGOs and the likes of Malala are contributing to greater Buddhist intransigence inside Myanmar. On its part, India cannot afford to be pressured by a minority of dogooders into compromising its national security in the sensitive Northeast. The Rohingya insurgency in Myanmar wasn't the creation of India and it must not become its problem.
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