Can UN Create A New State For Rohingya Muslims?

The genocide against Rohingya Muslims must be a global concern. Having been products of colonization and Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, African leaders who understand the impacts of repressions and denial of economic opportunities on humanity must impress upon United Nations to ameliorate the conditions of Rohingya Moslems in Myanmar. Africa can team up with the Moslem World to help UN find a lasting solution to the plights of Rohingya Muslims.

I think the circumstances that led to the creation of a permanent country of abode for modern Israel were not totally different from increasing persecution against the Rohingya Moslem minority in Myanmar. International pressure is needed to end the genocide against Rohingya Muslims.

However, Israeli-Palestinian friction must goad pundits to ponder; to divide into Buddhist Myanmar and Moslem Myanmar or not to divide, that is the question (An adaptation from Williams Shakespeare)!The point is both Rohingya Moslems and Myanmar Buddhists tension and that of Israeli-Palestinian are not free from religious factors.

In the year 1947 and almost two years after World War II (WW2), the United Nation Special Commission for Palestine assessed the Palestinian question and proposed that Palestine must be divided into Jewish and Arab States. During that same year UN adopted the Partition Resolution better known as Resolution 181 that was destined to split hitherto Britain’s Palestinian territory into Jewish and Arab States under aforesaid UN Palestinian plan. Under the Partition Resolution, the cultural and religious significance of the Jews and specifically that of Jerusalem was to become a Corpus Separatum regulated by the UN. The bottom line was that on May 14, 1948, the State of Israel was created.

The increasingly growing synergy between the Jewish leaders and United States on one hand and the UN on the other realized the birth of Israel. The imperative need of creating Israel was caused by the holocaust that had befallen on them during WW2. The history of cataclysm against humanity is highly debatable. For example, African American Historian and one of the standard bearers of Africana Studies, John Henrik Clark, claimed that the most egregious holocaust to befall humanity is the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade not the one led by Adolf Hitler and his Axis Powers during WW2.

Be that as it may, horrendous holocaust led to the dispersion of the Jews which necessitated the creation of their independent State. Parallel to the foregoing historical antecedent of modern Israel is the persecution of Rohingya Moslems in Myanmar. In 2013, the UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) cited the Rohingya Moslems as the most persecuted group in the world. If the situation of the Rohingya Moslems now is somewhat similar with the Jews in 1940s, why can’t UN create a permanent state for them? What is good for goose they say is equally good for gander!

Background to the Rohingya Genocide
The Rohingya Moslems are the most discriminated and persecuted group in the world. Their only crime is being Moslem minority within Buddhist majority in Myanmar. They are mostly domiciled in the Rakhine for some years. Nonetheless, the government of Myanmar (Erstwhile Burma) regards them as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Rohingya Moslems hover between hope and apprehension as their path to citizenship had been warped by Burmese legislations. What is particularly nauseating? Rohingya Moslems have lived in Myanmar for generations and practically they are without nationalities: neither Bangladeshi nor Burmese. Unacceptable, this is a big rebuke to human development!

The plights of the Rohigya Moslems were exacerbated by the happenings of August 2017. As an axiom goes, those who are dissatisfied always look for opportunity for vengeance. In August this year, a Rohingya Revolutionary group attacked police posts and army base in Rakhine resulting in the death of some Myanmar security forces. As anticipated, the vulnerable Rohingya Moslems became a ripe prey for the Myanmar military and as a corollary the latter revenged with calamitous implications on the former. In what has become known in the local parlance as “Clearance Operation” to flush out extremist terrorists many Rohingya Moslems have been murdered in cold blood.

There are reported cases of Myanmar military being on the verge of Rohingya Moslems cleansing rampage; burning villages belonging to their target group and subjecting them to rape, torture and murder. The hostilities against the Rohingya Moslems have precipitated a massive influx of the group into the neighboring Bangladesh. Reported cases of rape, torture, extrajudicial murders of the Rohingya Moslems are rising at bewildering pace. What is particularly irritable is that despite her lofty Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Myanmar leader, Aung San Suu Kyi had described the military brutalities and extinction of the Rohingya people as fake News. She has received a massive backlash from well-meaning individuals from across the globe.

Rohingya Moslems versus Aung San Suu Kyi
In his analysis of 1789 French Revolution, David Thompson opined that conflict might happen not because parties involved have natural instincts to engage in it, but because they might be saddled with delicate circumstances that could implicate them in hostilities. Needless to conclude also that when minority group is repressed and treated unfairly, it could be a potential recipe for conflict. Nevertheless, in some weird situations tyrant minority in power could destroy the underprivilege majority as in the case of Tigris minority regime in elsewhere Africa and a case of Ethiopia.

The situation of the Rohingya Moslems appropriately defines the scenario in which the Burmese Buddhist majority oppress their minority rivals in faith. Political abuse, religious or ethnic bigotry, repression and lack of access to economic opportunities are inimical to human survival. As Alfred Adler observed; individuals are motivated to strive from a perceived minus status to a felt plus status so as to compensate for inferiority. No sentient creature will love to be inferior forever and hence the August Rohingya Moslems insurgency in Burma.

However, the Rohingya Moslems must be condemned for attacking the Burma military and police post. A right approach must be adopted for a good cause. The attack was an ample testimony that the security of Myanmar was under threat. No responsible leader like Aung San Suu Kyi would appear unperturbed as the sovereignty of her country was under siege.

Myanmar leader has every right to describe the attack as an act of terrorism. Probably she is receiving a backlash because of her enviable Nobel Peace Prize. However, the Myanmar leader must be mindful of the fact that ethnic cleansing and genocide against Rohingya Moslems are also bereft of appropriateness. Not all the Rohingya Moslems attacked the Burmese security post. The best Aung Suu Kyi and her security forces could do was to find the perpetrators and prosecute them. Therefore, the torturing, raping, displacement and murdering of the Rohingya Moslems meet the UN criteria for a genocide.And what at all is “Bob UN” waiting for?

UN Must Collaborate with Moslem World to End Rohingya Genocide

On December 28, 2007, my friend and I were having a fun at a place in the Ghanaian city of Koforidua opposite Ghana Commercial Bank. Another friend remarked via phone call: “there is no peace in the city of Islam.” I responded: “that was very stereotypical,Theophilus!” No sooner had I reprimanded my friend about the prejudice against Islam than the news of assassinated prime minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, got to me.

I sighed and had a retreat of thought; Theophilus was right, there is no peace in the city of Islam, Islamabad, albeit the meaning of Islam as peace. Was it not oxymoronic if not paradoxical, for the city of peace to be without peace as demonstrated by the gruesome murder of Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in 2007? Also, the constant attacks on Ahmadiyya Moslems and Christians in Pakistan must stop.How can the Moslem world ignore the plights of the Rohingya believers of Islam while the religion stresses on hospitality?

Islam is a terrific monotheistic faith which emphasizes universal brotherhood and hospitality. People like Theophilus would conclude; there is no brotherliness and hospitality for Rohingya Muslims. The extent to which, the Moslem Nations are silent over the Rohingya Moslem persecution leave much to be desired. The Muslim World must collaborate with the UN to find a lasting solution to the Rohingya mass killings.

Perhaps the UN and the Moslem world leaders can team up to create a permanent country for Rohingya Moslems.It must be done with intensive dialogue so as not to replicate the Israeli-Palestinian tension.A lived experience of political oppression must motivate African leaders to join the bandwagon of Myanmar and Rohingya minority cease-fire! UN and the Moslem World must show some love to the Rohingya Moslems. We can conceive of a future without high-rises. But a humanity without music and love is not just inconceivable; it is impossible –George Leonard.