Wednesday, August 01, 2012

Arakan

http://www.nl-aid.org/domain/human-rights/arakan/
The Burmese government announced that it would grant Burmese citizenship to Muslims in Arakan in June 2012. This woke up the violence between Buddhist Rakhine people and Muslim Rohingya villagers repeating the Rohingya massacre of 1942 (only the number of the deceased is still unknown).
 Violence started after Buddhists attacked a bus carrying ten Muslim scholars were returning from Umrah, when over 400 Buddhists participated in the massacre, and honor as usual was the excuse as the Buddhist claim was that one scholar raped a Buddhist girl. Subsequently, Buddhists tour neighborhoods with swords and sticks, burn people in their houses and slaughter before security forces, who rather not be involved. Muslims in Arakan started to escape overnight across the Bengali gulf to neighboring States, where many die while escaping. 
Amid media silence (because burning people alive here cannot be instrumented as was the case with the holocaust), more than 10 million Muslims are subjected to systematic genocide and terror. 
Sharing videos of how the butchering takes place will not get anywhere. At this point, the Burmese government accepts no aid. While refugees at the Bengali gulf can benefit from aid, what you can do instantly is spread it through your personal and professional networks, if you know someone working in the media, if you write or know someone who does. Lobbying starts when the case is recognized and this should be at an individual level since civil society entities are busy collecting funds. 
This is not about religion. It is not a competition of the worst-case scenario so every time you have to do something you look the other way because only people within the scope of your cause deserve support, or simply because the world is a mess. If the mosquito can make a difference, have a better appreciation for the being you are and make one.

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