Genocide Remembrance Day: Declare crimes against Rohingyas genocide

On the occasion of Genocide Remembrance Day, the Rohingyas called on the governments across the globe, including the UK and US, to declare the crimes against the Rohingya community as genocide.

In a joint statement, on the fourth anniversary of the Rohingya influx, 10 Rohingya organisations called on the UN member states to impose targeted sanctions against the Myanmar military.

The statement also said that the UN was slow to show coordinated action to hold the propagators accountable for the crimes they committed on their land.

As the authorities did not allow any outdoor events, the Rohingyas held placards and spoke standing in front of their camps, mourning, remembering and calling for accountability of the crimes.

The statement said they back the efforts made in the International Court of Justice, and the international community's and the National Unity Government's commitment to international justice.

The organisations that signed the statement include Champions of Change, Education and Wisdom Development for Rohingya Women, Rohingya Refugee Committee, Rohingya Women Education Initiative, Rohingya Youth for Legal Action, Rohingya Youth Unity Team, Voice of Rohingya, Rohingya Student Union, Arakan Rohingya National Union, Rohingya Women Empowerment and Advocacy Network.

Some 750,000 Rohingyas fled genocidal attacks by the Myanmar military in the Rakhine state since August 25, 2017, and took shelter in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar.

Thousands of the Rohingyas were killed, women raped and their houses burnt.

Four years after the genocidal acts, the Myanmar military on February 1 this year overthrew the elected government in a coup and since then killed more than 1,000 men, women, and children and imprisoned several thousand others for opposing the junta's rule.

"The junta that controls the country is the same military junta that led genocidal attacks against our people and now are committing human rights violations against the whole country," the statement said.

Rohingyas are still at grave risk in Rakhine where the military continues to confine thousands of Rohingya to internment camps.

They said they support the resistance including the Civil Disobedience Movement, the National Unity Government (NUG) and all people working for democracy and human rights against the military junta.

They called on the NUG to expand on its Rohingya policy and appoint a Rohingya minister and other Muslim leaders into the NUG, which was formed under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi's National Democratic League.

The NUG had issued a statement committing to issue Rohingya citizenship, fundamental rights and justice.

"Four years on, we will work to be able to return to our homeland as citizens, to build a country that ensures justice and rights for people regardless of race, religion, or ethnicity."

In a separate statement, the Arakan Rohingya Society for Peace and Human Rights thanked Bangladesh for sheltering the Rohingyas.

The statement signed by its Chairman Mohib Ullah said there have been delays in the implementation of four provisional measurements ordered by the ICJ in January last year.

It said both the NUG and the Burmese military government have been complicit in the genocide of the Rohingya people.

The NUG did not include any Rohingya scholars in its membership, however, he said.

The organisation demanded the UN and the international community to refuse to recognise the NUG as a democratic or representative body until it includes Rohingya.