Hope and anticipation prevail amongst Rohingya as UN conference nears

A Rohingya woman inside a refugee camp in Bangladesh (Image: Internet)
A Rohingya woman inside a refugee camp in Bangladesh (Image: Internet)
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Arakan News Agency | Exclusive

By the end of this September, the United Nations will for the first time hold a high-level conference on the issues of the Rohingya and other minorities in Myanmar, to mobilize international efforts to find solutions to the Rohingya refugee crisis and find ways to achieve their return to their homeland in Myanmar.

The step comes with both optimism and anticipation, as many hope it will be a renewed push for international efforts to end the Rohingya crisis. However, there is concern that words, not actions, will dominate, and that the results will be limited to resonant statements affirming Rohingya’s plight and calling for justice without concrete steps.

Several Rohingya refugees in various countries, including Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Turkey, expressed to Arakan News Agency, their happiness with the high-level UN conference. They unanimously expressed their desire for it to be a step towards achieving a safe, voluntary, and dignified return of Rohingya refugees to their homeland in the Arakan state in western Myanmar.

A refugee in Bangladesh said that the primary demand of the refugees is to return to their homeland with full rights. Another confirmed that the Rohingya do not want to stay in refugee camps in Bangladesh and live there any longer.

Another refugee called for strong political action to ensure the Rohingya’s rights to citizenship and a safe, dignified, and just return. Another called for the recognition of the Rohingya as an ethnic group on par with the other 135 ethnic groups in Myanmar.

A different refugee expressed hope that the conference would bring new opportunities for the Rohingya worldwide, especially educational opportunities for young people in the camps in Bangladesh. Several refugees in Indonesia said they live in difficult conditions without adequate housing, education, or services, and called for their urgent issues to be raised at the conference.

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In a special statement to the Arakan News Agency, Dr. Taher Al-Arakani, President of the Burma Forum for Peace and Development, said that the main demands expected from the UN conference in New York are international recognition of the Rohingya genocide, holding the perpetrators accountable before international justice, and ensuring the safe and dignified return to Arakan under international protection.

Al-Arakani also emphasized the need to restore full citizenship and political and legal rights to the Rohingya people, improve the conditions of refugees in the camps in terms of education, health, and economic empowerment, and include Rohingya representatives in any dialogue or negotiations concerning Myanmar’s future.

For his part, Rohingya activist Nay San Lwin, co-founder of the Arakan Rohingya National Coalition (ARNC), said that the conference would raise awareness about the Rohingya crisis and seek a sustainable solution to implement plans for their return to their homeland. He pointed out that implementing any decisions resulting from the conference would require significant efforts and an unpredictable amount of time.

He added that the main demands of the Rohingya from the UN conference are to provide protection for the Rohingya and stop the ongoing genocide against them, stressing that this should be the main demand of global leaders. He cited the flight of at least 150,000 Rohingya from Myanmar to Bangladesh since last year due to continued violence against them.

The activist also expressed hope for a comprehensive solution resulting from the conference but confirmed that implementing the solutions would not be easy and that there would be no immediate changes. He emphasized that after the conference, there should be many mechanisms to implement its decisions.

On Saturday, hundreds of Rohingya refugees gathered in one of the camps in Bangladesh to make an urgent appeal to the United Nations and the international community to achieve justice and recognize their rights. They raised banners and chanted slogans demanding justice, dignity, and lasting peace, stressing that their decades-long suffering of displacement, statelessness, and persecution should not be forgotten.

In November last year, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution to hold an international conference to find sustainable solutions to the Rohingya crisis, following a proposal by the Prime Minister of Bangladesh last September.

Bangladesh hosts more than a million Rohingya refugees in the “Cox’s Bazar” camps, which the United Nations classifies as the largest refugee camp in the world. The refugees have been living there in difficult humanitarian conditions since fleeing Myanmar in 2017 due to the “genocide” campaign launched against them by the Myanmar army. Their displacement to Bangladesh has been renewed since the outbreak of fighting in the Arakan state between the Myanmar army and the Arakan Buddhist militias (Arakan Army) in November 2023.

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