Fighting in Burma’s Western state of Rakhine has left thousands of houses burnt down and an estimated 64 dead according to the Burmese government.

The victims were mostly Muslim Rohingya and satellite pictures released by Human Rights Watch show entire districts razed to the ground.

This recent rise in violence is but the latest in a long running civil war that has been ongoing since the country gained its independence from British rule in 1948. Shortly following Burma’s independence, the Burmese government, which mainly consists of Bamar people who make up two thirds of the population of Burma, created the Burmese constitution denying ethnic minorities constitutional rights or participation in government.

There are a total of 135 ethnic minorities officially recognized by the Burmese government as well as several unrecognized groups, the most notable of these being the Rohingya.

The exclusion of ethnic minorities from government is one the main reasons behind the civil war in Burma with many groups, such as the Shan and Chin people, having formed militias to fight for autonomy in their home areas as well as power in the decision-making process of the whole country.

The fighting has not solely been over ethnic minorities struggling to gain the power and rights they believe they deserve. The civil war is also being fought because, according to Burma Campaign UK the ”Burman dominated governments see their own race, culture and religion as the best and have been trying to impose it on others”.

This is particularly true of the Muslim Rohingya who mostly live in Rakhine state, which has been the center of violence last week and also last June. Called “one of the most persecuted minorities in the world” by the UN the Rohingya are officially stateless and not recognized as citizens in the Burmese Constitution. Despite the fact that they have resided in the country for centuries, the Rohingya are viewed by many Burmese as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Thein Sein, the current president of Burma, has called the Rohingya a threat to national security and stated his willingness to hand 800,000 Rohingya over to the United Nations refugee agency to be settled in another country.

With the president of Burma publicly expressing such views, it adds credibility to remarks made by Tun Khin of the Burmese Rohingya organization in the UK, who claimed on channel 4 news that last weeks events were “proper planned by Rakhine National Democratic party”  and that the state incited the local Muslim population to attack the Rohingya. This is confirmed by Burma Campaign UK who say ”what has happened in recent months is clearly mainly instigated and implemented by Rakhine and Burman nationalists with a mixture of overt and tacit backing from the government.” The government also recognized that the violence was not spontaneous, saying in a press release  ”… there are persons and organizations who are conducting manipulation in the incidents in Rakhine State behind the scene”. However they could not be contacted for comment on the matter.

As well as inciting and backing violence against the Rohingya, the government could be guilty of failing to properly protect the Rohingya. This is certainly the view of Human Rights Watch who said,”In Arakan State, the Burmese government inadequately responded to the sectarian violence between the ethnic Arakan and Rohingya populations. When it finally did take action, state security forces targeted the minority Rohingya for killings, mass arrests and looting, causing massive displacement.”

These attacks by either the government or local population on the Rohingya people come shortly after the government made steps towards democracy with several small reforms. First was the release of human rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi in 2010 after 15 years under house arrest. There was then the first elections after 49 years of military rule, even if the elections were widely regarded as being rigged. While these actions were a move in the right direction, these reforms have only distracted the international community from what is happening to the Rohingya.

Right now, the Rohingya are the only ones the government are targeting. But what happens when Thein Sein has successfully got rid of the Rohingya, will it stop there? The international community must wake up and realize that it is not just the Middle East that is in the midst of civil war. We cannot continue to pick and choose which countries we help, and which we ignore. The Libyans and Syrians are not the only ones being persecuted by their leaders, the world needs to hear what is happening to the Rohingya and other minorities in Burma and act to protect them.

Image Courtesy : Government of Thailand [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

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Aung San Suu Kyi is taking an historical trip through Europe where she will visit Switzerland, Norway, Britain, Ireland, and France. She is the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for her work in her native home of Myanmar and will be delivering her acceptance speech more than a decade after being awarded the prize. She has been under house arrest for almost a quarter of a century in Myanmar (Burma) because the government – a military junta that ruled the country – viewed her as dangerous to the stability of the country and its regime.

Her father was General Bogyoke Aung San, the founder of modern Burma. He was assassinated when Aung San Suu Kyi was only two years old.

While under house arrest Kyi was isolated from her supporters and her family. She claims that her sanity was maintained with the help of her piano and the BBC, which she listened to every day. Having the support of the world also helped. She stated, “it’s all of you, and people like you who have given me the strength to continue.” Her husband died in 1999 of cancer, eleven years after she left the United Kingdom. While in Britain, Kyi will have a family reunion with her sons Kim and Alexander Aris and her grandchildren.

Kyi returned to Myanmar from the United Kingdom in 1988 to look after her sick mother. While she was in the country, protests broke out and she has remained in the country under house arrest since. She was a political prisoner in Myanmar until late 2010 when the new government began to release political prisoners as part of its democratic reforms. She then ran for and won a seat in parliament in April. Previous to 2010 she refused to leave Myanmar – even when she received the Nobel Peace Prize and when her husband was dying of cancer in the United Kingdom – because she was afraid that the government would not let her back into the country.

Kyi officially accepted her Nobel Prize on June 16. In her acceptance speech she warned that world leaders should be cautious of “reckless optimism” in regards to the democratic reforms occurring in Myanmar. She argued, “unless justice is done, and seen to be done, we cannot believe in genuine reform…the progress that we hope to make with regard to democratization and reform depends so much on an understanding and acceptance of the importance of the rule of law.”

In addition to receiving her Nobel award Kyi will receive Amnesty International’s Human Rights award in Dublin from Bono.

This is the second time Kyi has left the country since being released from house arrest; she traveled to Thailand in May and vowed to help the Myanmar refugees there. Before she left for Europe she expressed her excitement to reporters stating, “each country will be different. I will know how backward [Burma] is when I reach the other countries…[I] would like to do my best for the interests of the people.”

Shortly before Kyi arrived in Europe the International Labor Organization (ILO) lifted restrictions on Myanmar for the progress the country has made in getting rid of forced labor. In 1999 The ILO banned Myanmar from meetings and assistance because the government would use forced labor for infrastructure projects. The Myanmar government signed an agreement with the ILO in March to end forced labor by 2015. The ILO issued a statement saying, “The International Labor Organization has lifted its restrictions on the full participation of Myanmar in its activities and decided to review the progress on the elimination of forced labor in the country next year.” This decision from the ILO could help to lift the remaining sanctions from the European Union nations according to the Chicago Tribune.

Currently Myanmar has seen violence in the western Rakhine state between the Rakhine Buddhists and the Rohingya Muslims. The Rohingya Muslims have been persecuted for many years by the government and majority groups within Myanmar. Many Rohingya Muslims living in Myanmar and refugee camps in Bangladesh have asked Aung San Suu Kyi for help.

Mahammad Islam, a Rohingya Muslim refugee, has stated, “Aung San Suu Kyi hasn’t done or said anything for us, yet the Rohingyas including my parents, campaigned for her in the 1990 elections. Like most other Burmese people, she is silent about the rights of Rohingyas.” According to Islam she has yet to mention the conflict in the Rakhine state and the plight of the Rohingyas.

Aung San Suu Kyi is also featured in the documentary entitled “The Lady” which was released in 2011.

Image Courtesy of the UK Department for International Development

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The Human Rights Watch Group has been working with Dhaka, a global human rights group, in an effort to convince Bangladesh to take in more Myanmar Refugees. Dhaka is urging Bangladesh to keep its borders open to the refugees of Myanmar, who are seeking refuge from the violence going on in western Myanmar. Additionally, according to the Associated Press, “New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement that Bangladesh should also allow independent humanitarian agencies free and unfettered access to the border areas.”

Both groups got involved after word got out that Bangladesh turned away approximately 1,000 Muslims that came over in three boats. By doing this, “Bangladesh is putting lives at grave risk,” said Bill Frelick, Refugee Programme director at Human Rights Watch. Frelick also added, “Bangladesh has an obligation under international law to keep its border open to people fleeing threats to their lives and provide them protection.”

The violence is Myanmar has escalated between minority Muslims (known as Rohingyas) and Buddhists. As the tension grows between the two religious groups, hundreds of homes have been burned in Myanmar.

While Frelick believes it is Bangladesh’s duty to help these refugees, Foreign Minister Dipu Moni of Myanmar disagrees. At a news conference in the country’s capital, Dhaka, he stated, “it was not in Bangladesh’s interest to accept any refugees because the impoverished country’s resources already are strained.”

Buddhists are outraged about the Rohingyas living in Myanmar, claiming that the Royingyas are illegal immigrants and should be denied citizenship. Meanwhile, according to the Associated Press, “Bangladesh says Rohingya have been living in Myanmar for centuries and should be recognized there as citizens.”

Not knowing where to go or turn, Rohingyas are turning to Aung San Suu Kyi, a Burmese opposition politician and General Secretary of the National League for Democracy in Burma, to help end their persecution.

According to the Sunday Times Newspaper in Sri Lanka, “Bangladesh, which shares a 200-km (125-mile) border with Myanmar, is home to an estimated 300,000 Rohingya refugees, about a tenth of whom live in squalid conditions in UN-assisted camps.”

Mohammad Islam, leader of Rohingya refugees living in Nayapara camp in the Bangladesh border town of Teknaf, stated, “in her [Suu Kyi] first visit outside Myanmar in 24 years, Suu Kyi last month met thousands of Myanmar refugees now living in a Thai border camp. She promised to try as much as she could to help them return home, vowing not to forget them.” Islam added, “we heard the relations between the government and Suu Kyi have mended and there are now reforms sweeping the country. But for Rohingya, these changes mean nothing.”

Still Suu Kyi is hopeful and has no plans of giving up on the refugees.

“I would like to do my best for the interests of the people,” she said.

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In an interview with the BBC, Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma’s democracy campaigner and Nobel peace laureate, said she believes Burma will hold democratic elections “in my life time”. She is the most prominent Burmese opposition politician and general secretary of the National League for Democracy.

Suu Kyi has been revered as a symbol for the democratization of Burma, an icon for the removal of injustice, and has been fighting for political reforms for more than 20 years. In an exclusive interview with the BBC, she said she is hopeful about democratic elections in Burma but was unsure when would take place.

Recently, Aung San Suu Kyi formally registered her National League for Democracy (NLD) as a political party and last week government approved NLD as political party and to run in the upcoming by-elections.

The year 2011 was significant to the people of Burma as a year of reforms and transformation in the economic and political as well as administrative sphere. One of the most magnanimous and unparalleled action taken towards democracy and freedom by the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) has been the release of Suu Kyi from house arrest. In November 2010, the first polls in a period of 20 years were held, replacing military rule with a military-backed nominally civilian government.

To Associated Press, Aung San Suu Kyi said that she is cautiously optimistic about the progress to be made. She cautioned that democratic reforms started by the nominally civilian government are unstoppable. Nevertheless, she clearly reminded the West not to get carried away with these reforms, as Burma’s military still hold considerable power to derail democratic efforts.

Burma’s civilian government has initiated a series of reforms, including the establishment of a national human rights commission, deployment of new labor laws, initiating dialogue with the pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and relaxation of press censorship and regulation of currency practices.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague recently visited Burma, a British first since 1955. Mr. Hague said to the BBC that the momentum for change in Burma is “real.” Mr. Hague further said, “This is a very exciting time because there is a chance that what she and her colleagues have hoped and longed for so long will actually take place in this country.”

Democracy has been hailed as a constructive and instrumental source of economic and political freedom around the world. Its effect on the economy, however, should not be the main focus, rather, democracy plays a key role in human life and freedoms. With hope unshaken and a determination in fight for democracy, Burma may have a real chance at removing itself from the shackles of military rule.

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The Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi spoke of unity as she visited Bago, north of Rangoon, in what was her first political trip since the end of her house arrest nine months ago.

Ms Suu Kyi was met by cheering crowds while her cortege drove through the countryside. Financial Times could report that she visited a temple and opened a library funded by her outlawed National League for Democracy party (NLD).

“I know what the people want and I am trying my best to fulfill the wished of the people,” she said during the library inauguration. “However, I don’t want to give false hope.”

The last time Ms Suu Kyi, 66, went on a similar trip, her convoy was attacked by a mob which was widely considered to be affiliated with the old military government. The incident left up to 70 NLD supporters dead and resulted in the opposition leader’s seven-year-long house arrest. The regime initially argued that the detention was for her own protection.

The Burmese had warned about similar consequences today and security agents were present to monitor the convoy. However, BBC reported that recent talks between the de facto opposition leader and a government minister revealed interest from both sides to move closer for a more stable and democratic Burma.

The signs of relaxation on behalf of the government were apparent as Ms Suu Kyi managed to reach the library safely and delivered a speech to about 600 people who had turned up in hopes of seeing the living legend.

“We can develop this country only when we all work together,” she said. “Unity is a strength, unity is needed everywhere and it is needed especially in our country.” She also vowed to continue her work “as much as I can,” wrote the BBC.

Last years elections were boycotted by Aung San Suu Kyi’s party on grounds that it was riddled with intimidation and vote-rigging. Critics of the current government say that little has changed since November because the civilian administration is led by retired military figures — and thus a proxy for the former junta, according to Financial Times.

Ms Suu Kyi was released in November shortly after the elections, after seven years of house arrest. Two thousand political prisoners have yet to be granted their freedom.

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Michelle Yeoh, 48 a Malaysian actress who is known for performing her own stunts has been thrown out of Burma, due to her role as a pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi in an upcoming film. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) nominated actress was deported on the day of her arrival at Rangoon Airport because she was “blacklisted” according to Skynews.com.

The actress has starred in many movies some of which being The Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Babylon A.D, Memoirs of a Geisha, The Mummy:Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, True Legend and Kung Fu Panda 2. The former Miss Malaysia, rose to fame when she starred in the James Bond movie Tomorrow Never Dies in the year 1997 with Pierce Brosnan.

The government has “routinely rejected visa requests of journalists and perceived critics for years. The film, which is named “The Lady” by Luc Besson, is due to come out later in the year. Yeoh describes how she hopes “her portrayal of the Nobel Peace Prize winner would raise awareness about her story.”

Aung San Suu Kyi, 66 who had been detained right before the elections under house arrest for almost 15 yrs, was released last year in November 2010. According to Skynews.com her release was “just days after an election that her party boycotted and in which she was barred from being a candidate.” The nation’s vote was the first in almost 20 yrs, “the junta appeared to hand power to a civilian government” in the month of March.

In December, Michelle Yeoh who had visited Burma to spend time with Aung San Suu Kyi for the film shot the movie in Thailand, England, France and her own Burma. The movie according to michelleyeoh.info, describes the life of Aung San Suu Kyi, a Burmese democracy icon who had been detained unjustly “by the government of Burma” and was “under house arrest for 15 out of the past 21 yrs.”

The film shows a touching love story of the “world’s most prominent prisoners of conscience, Aung San Suu Kyi, and the last ten years of her marriage to the academic Dr. Michael Aris who remained in Oxford <raising> both their children in her absence.” The movie describes how she was given a choice of choosing between her family which included her children and a sick husband who was diagnosed with terminal cancer and her country which if she left would never take her back.  Co-starring with Michelle Yeoh is David Thewlis who plays the character of Dr. Micheal Aris.

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