Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims live under dire conditions

RIMANEWS - Rohingya Muslims continue to live under extremely harsh conditions in Myanmar, with tens of thousands now being homeless, Press TV reports.

Locals accuse Myanmar authorities of instigating the situation by helping the Buddhist Rakhine locals in their sectarian battle against the Rohingya Muslims instead of bringing the violence under control.

“…in the name of curfew, they [Myanmar security forces] shoot Muslims,” a Rohingya man told Press TV on condition of anonymity.

Scores of the Muslim minority are being killed by Myanmarese authorities, and their homes are destroyed.

Many say the violence in the western region of Rakhine province in Myanmar is not communal sectarian violence, but state-sponsored ethnic cleansing.

Earlier on Thursday, demonstrators in Indonesia gathered outside Myanmar’s embassy in Jakarta to protest against Burma’s mistreatment of the Rohingya.

Reports say some 650 Rohingyas have been killed and thousands more displaced in recent months.

On August 1, the Human Rights Watch (HRW) called on Myanmar to “take urgent measures to end abuses by their forces, ensure humanitarian access, and permit independent international monitors to visit affected areas and investigate abuses.”

Over the past weeks, protests in support of the Rohingya have been held in countries such as Pakistan, Malaysia, and Iran.

The Buddhist-majority government of Myanmar refuses to recognize Rohingyas, who, it claims, are not natives, and classifies them as illegal migrants though the Rohingya are Muslim descendants of Persian, Turkish, Bengali, and Pathan origin, who migrated to Myanmar as early as the eighth century. [presstv]