Rohingya insurgents say they have no option but to fight Myanmar | Halek Hossain

 

Bangladesh police arrest ‘most wanted’ ARSA member at Rohingya camp

Bangladesh police said Monday they had arrested an ARSA rebel commander at a Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar who was among the most wanted criminals – bringing to three the number of suspects captured in the area this month with insurgent links.

Until lately Bangladesh government officials and authorities had long denied allegations about the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) rebel group, which is based in the neighboring state of Rakhine in Myanmar, having a presence in this southeastern district. Cox’s Bazar is home to camps and settlements near the Burmese border, where about 1 million Rohingya are sheltering.

Police announced the arrests of ARSA suspects Abu Bakkar, 37, along with Syedul Amin, 26, on Sunday, while Nur Mohammad, 47, was captured on July 7. The court in Cox’s Bazar has ordered all three to be jailed, according to Sheikh Mohammad Ali, the police chief in the Ukhia sub-district. 

Abu Bakkar, who acted as a camp leader for ARSA, has used aliases to avoid arrests in the past, said Md Kamran Hossain, the additional superintendent for Armed Police Battalion 8 (APBN-8).

“He was listed as most wanted on the police list of criminals in Cox’s Bazar,” Kamran told BenarNews, adding that Abu Bakkar was allegedly involved in killing six Rohingya in a single incident in October 2021 and allegedly had a role in a more recent killing.

APBN unit 14 commander Naimul Haque said Amin worked as a gun runner while Mohammad was chairman of ARSA’s fatwa committee. He said drone cameras had aided police in catching Abu Bakkar and Amin.

Haque said Amin had trained others to use weapons, including G3 battle rifles.

“Police recovered some photographs of Amin that showed he posed with a G3 rifle,” Haque said.

Amin told interrogators that he had undertaken weapons training in a Myanmar forest for six months, Haque said.

“Amin’s family is living here in Cox’s Bazar. He recently came here to meet family and police arrested him,” the APBN-14 commander said.

Like Abu Bakkar, Muhammad hid his identity, according to the police official.

“Muhammad used to run his organizational activities at night under the guise of a mawlana [Islamic preacher]. It helped him to operate more easily,” Haque said.

More than 800 arrests 

Haque told BenarNews that at least 836 Rohingya with alleged ties to ARSA had been arrested over the last six months, adding that officers confiscated three foreign-made handguns and at least 20 other firearms.

Since the September 2021 killing of internationally known Rohingya activist Muhib Ullah, police arrested nearly 2,000 Rohingya allegedly involved in criminal activities, including drug dealing.

Meanwhile, Rohingya and Bangladeshis in Cox’s Bazar have expressed fears about terror activities including killings and kidnappings inside the refugee camps.

Ayasur Rahman, the leader of a local neighborhood watch group made up of Bangladeshi citizens who live in communities that surround the camps, urged government officials to take serious action against ARSA members operating in the camps here.

Elsewhere, a Rohingya leader from the Ukhia-1 camp who requested anonymity over safety concerns said residents were afraid.

“ARSA people are now controlling and leading all illegal and unethical activities, including drug dealing inside camps,” the leader told BenarNews.

“Those people who are taking a stand against ARSA have become targets, that’s why no one is making any comment against them publicly,” he said.

Imrul Kayes Chowdhury, chairman of the local government at Ukhia, told BenarNews that members of the host community fear the terror activities inside the refugee camps.

“Incidents of killings and other criminal activities have us scared as law enforcement agencies are struggling to prevent crimes committed by Rohingya,” he said.

Rohingya Militancy: Myth or Reality?

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The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), a Rohingya militant group, came to global attention once again last year after unknown gunmen killed Mohibullah, a prominent Rohingya leader, in one of the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. Mohibullah’s brother Habibullah claimed that ARSA might have been responsible, angered by his advocacy of a peaceful non-violent approach to solving the Rohingya crisis, even though ARSA denied any involvement with the killing.

The denial of Rohingya rights is as old as that of the Myanmar state. After Myanmar’s independence in 1948, it adopted a policy of viewing Rohingyas as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Consequently, it has engaged in a series of expulsions of Rohingya from  Myanmar: Operation Nagamin (1978), Operation Pyi Thaya (1992), and a military “clearance operation” in 2017 all saw an exodus of Rohingyas from Myanmar to Bangladesh. The denial of the community’s rights was formally enshrined in 1982 with the passage of the Burma Citizenship Act, which helped transform the Rohingyas into the largest stateless community in the world.

The origin of Rohingya militancy dates back to the early days of the Myanmar’s independence, when violence was a tactic of mainstream political actors in Myanmar, including the central authorities (the national government and military) and various political and ethnic minority groups, including Rohingya Mujahid fighters. Even though these Mujahid wished to be part of the then East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), they eventually surrendered to the Myanmar central authority. This resulted in the establishment of the Mayu Frontier Administration (MFA) in Rakhine State, which brought political legitimacy for the Rohingyas in 1961. But with the military coup in 1962, the dream of the special status of the MFA ended and a new era of persecution and displacement began.

The post-1962 political situation in Rakhine State led to the creation of a range of Rohingya organizations, including the Rohingya Independence Force, the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation, the Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front, the Rohingya Solidarity Alliance, and the Rohingya Patriotic Front. Some of these groups chose the path of armed resistance, while others remained non-violent in their approach. Access to arms and support within Rohingyas were “extremely limited and factionalized.”

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The latest Rohingya militant group, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), was initially known as the Harakah al-Yaqin (Faith Movement). Experts contend that the group “is a result of many years of persecution of the Rohingya people in Rakhine.” This group attracted media attention after it allegedly attacked security forces twice in 2016 and 2017. These two attacks acted as a casus belli for the Myanmar government to unleash a disproportionate attack on Rohingya civilians, including women and children, even though these ARSA militants were not heavily armed. This resulted in the forced exodus of nearly 1 million Rohingyas to Bangladesh in 2017 and 2018. A United Nations fact finding mission later determined that this “clearance operation” amounted to possible genocide and foreign nations including the United States slapped sanctions on some military personnel in 2018.

Even before the ARSA attacks in 2016 and 2017, organizations such as the International Crisis Group, RAND Corporation, Counter Extremism Project, and individual scholars have expressed concerns about a forthcoming wave of Rohingya radicalization. Some scholars identify internal and external factors for the rise of Rohingya militancy. Internal factors include the trauma caused by torture in Myanmar, the denial of basic and fundamental rights, the dream of an independent Rakhine State, and the social structures of the refugee camps. External causes include ideas of Muslim brotherhood, jihadism provoked by transnational groups, prejudice against non-Muslims, and the convenient environment for the development of such organizations. As a result of these factors, the sentiment of ummah (Muslim community) could well grow among Rohingyas, given that they have “long suffered suppression and persecution by both the Myanmar government and extremist Buddhists.” Rohingyas’ contested identity has also been identified as a catalyst for radicalization.

These academic prophecies became reality after the expulsions of 2017, when transnational militant organizations started exploiting the plight of the Rohingyas. In September 2017, al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri urged “all mujahidin brothers in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and the Philippines to set out for Burma to help their Muslim brothers.” Some analysts contend that al-Qaida will “try to further expand to Myanmar, either by trying to absorb parts of ARSA or by creating its own local jihadist network.” In its magazine Dabiq the Islamic State mentioned that it “aims to develop a stronghold in Bangladesh and use it as a platform to launch attacks on Myanmar.” Hizb ut Tahrir, another transnational militant group, distributed leaflets in the city of Cox’s Bazar stating that “the only way to liberate the Muslims in Myanmar is by establishing and expanding Arakan (Rakhine State) as a caliphate.” It is worth mentioning here that ARSA has denied having connections with any transnational militant groups.

Surprisingly, none of the militant organizations have yet established a sound footing in the Rohingya camps in Bangladesh, although Bangladesh banned some NGOs from working in the camps in 2018, due to alleged connections to terror funding. What could be the possible reason for Rohingya resilience against militant provocation? I think the answer lies in the recent research exploring the drivers of radicalization in Bangladesh. One recent book claims that the current phase of militancy in Bangladesh is deeply influenced by the radical ideology of the global caliphate. That means the catalyst for this wave radicalization is global in nature and follows global trends. As a result, since 2018, as the Islamic State has lost its physical territory and its Caliph as well, it has not been able to attract as much attention in the Rohingya camps.

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It would appear that the refugee camps of Cox’s Bazar still offer fertile ground for radicalization, requiring just a seed – that is, an ideology having a global or regional element– to be fertilized. That said, Rohingya militancy has so far been more a myth than a reality, with ARSA militants having very limited successes. Therefore, too much emphasis on Rohingya radicalization might distract us  from sustainable solutions to the Rohingya refugee crisis. Rather, all actors including national and international organizations must focus on finding respectful solutions for Rohingyas before they fall prey to radical ideologies.

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