Myanmar\u2019s military is building bases where Rohingya homes and mosques once stood, Amnesty International said on Monday, citing new evidence from satellite imagery.<\/p>\n
Nearly 700,000 members of the Muslim minority fled to Bangladesh in 2017 after Myanmar launched a brutal crackdown on insurgents that the US and UN have called ethnic cleansing. Myanmar rejects that accusation, saying it was responding to attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army in late August.<\/p>\n
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\nDuring the crackdown, more than 350 Rohingya villages in western Myanmar\u2019s Rakhine state were destroyed by fire.<\/p>\n
The Amnesty report echoes previous studies saying the remains of some of those villages \u2013 and some buildings not previously damaged \u2013 had been bulldozed.<\/p>\n
As well as rapid housing and road construction in the area, at least three new security facilities were under construction, the human rights group said. In one case, Rohingya villagers who had remained in Myanmar were forcibly evicted to make way for a base, it said.<\/p>\n
\u2018Land grab\u2019
\n\u201cWhat we are seeing in Rakhine State is a land grab by the military on a dramatic scale,\u201d Tirana Hassan, Amnesty\u2019s crisis response director, said in a statement. \u201cNew bases are being erected to house the very same security forces that have committed crimes against humanity against Rohingya.\u201d<\/p>\n
Myanmar government is rogue and evil, says Bangladesh minister
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\nAt least four mosques that had not been wrecked by fire have been destroyed, or had their roofing or other materials removed, since late December, a time when significant conflict was not reported in the area, Amnesty said.<\/p>\n
In one Rohingya village, satellite imagery showed buildings for a new border police post appearing next to where a recently demolished mosque had stood.<\/p>\n
Spokespeople for the government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and the military were not immediately available for comment. Myanmar officials have said villages were being bulldozed to make way for new homes for returning refugees.<\/p>\n
Myanmar and Bangladesh reached a deal in November to repatriate those who fled. Myanmar has said temporary camps to house returnees are ready, but the process has yet to start.<\/p>\n
Amnesty said Myanmar\u2019s \u201creshaping\u201d of the region where the Rohingya lived appeared to be designed to accommodate more security forces and non-Rohingya villagers, and could deter refugees from agreeing to return.<\/p>\n
\u201cRohingya who fled death and destruction at the hands of the security forces are unlikely to find the prospect of living in close proximity to those same forces conducive to a safe return,\u201d the group said, \u201cespecially given the continuing lack of accountability for human rights violations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Myanmar\u2019s military is building bases where Rohingya homes and mosques once stood, Amnesty International said on Monday, citing new evidence from satellite imagery. Nearly 700,000 members of the Muslim minority fled to Bangladesh in 2017 after Myanmar launched a brutal crackdown on insurgents that the US and UN have called ethnic cleansing. Myanmar rejects that accusation, saying it was responding… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":72,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/72"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1572"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1573,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572\/revisions\/1573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}