How greed, money and power are fuelling the Rohingya’s suffering in Myanmar

Daniel Wagner says that the drive to exploit oil and gas resources in Rakhine State, led by Myanmar’s military and enabled by foreign clients, is the real reason behind the push to purge the country’s Rohingya population

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A Rohingya Muslim waits for help to transport her sick son to a nearby clinic in Taiy Khali, Bangladesh, on Wednesday. Photo: AP

Published: 9:51am, 22 Sep 2017Updated: 7:14pm, 22 Sep 2017

The Western media has rightly focused on two critical aspects of the Rohingya tragedy in Myanmar – the humanitarian crisis and Aung San Suu Kyi’s failure to publicly criticise the Myanmar government’s policy of ethnic cleansing in Rakhine State.

Left unsaid, however, is why the government is pursuing this policy, and the role of other nations in creating an atmosphere conducive to the crackdown. In short, it is a tale of greed, money and power.

The roots of the violence in Rakhine are multifaceted and rooted in British colonial officials’ failure to include the word “Rohingya” in censuses taken of the then-British colony, something subsequently used to falsely characterise the Rohingya as illegal immigrants from neighbouring regions, with no historical legitimacy in Myanmar.

That is, of course, not true, but thanks to the opening the British created, the former military regime and current democratically elected government have both denied the Rohingya full citizenship, strictly limiting basic freedoms of movement and suffrage.

Suu Kyi finds herself in a precarious position, re-emphasising her support for non-violent political change, while at the same time referring to the Rohingya’s disrespect for the “rule of law” as a justification for a strong military presence in Rakhine.

State counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi delivers a speech at the Myanmar International Convention Centre in Naypyidaw, on Tuesday, calling on the international community to cooperate in tackling the Rohingya issue. Photo: Xinhua

Suu Kyi was quite happy to be portrayed as a human rights icon while she was herself a political prisoner but, since becoming the country’s de facto leader, she may rightly be referred to as a garden-variety politician where the Rohingya are concerned, beholden to the power behind the throne (the military). The West appears to have been wrong to place her on a human rights pedestal.