The government of Bangladesh should immediately cease its punitive restrictions on international organizations providing lifesaving humanitarian aid to the more than 200,000 Rohingya Muslims in Bangladesh, Human Rights Watch said. “The government should also open its borders to Rohingya fleeing sectarian violence and abuses by Burmese security forces in Arakan State in western Burma,” it said in a statement. In late July 2012, the Bangladesh government ordered three prominent international aid organizations – Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), Action Contre la Faim (Action Against Hunger), and Muslim Aid – to cease providing assistance to Rohingya living in Cox's Bazaar and surrounding areas. “The Bangladeshi government is trying to make conditions for Rohingya refugees already living in Bangladesh so awful that people fleeing brutal abuses in neighboring Burma will stay home," said Bill Frelick, director of the Refugees Program at Human Rights Watch. “This is a cruel and inhumane policy that should immediately be reversed. The government should be welcoming aid organizations that provide life-saving aid, not shutting down their programs to assist refugees." Since mid-June, Bangladesh authorities have admitted to forcing back at least 1,300 Rohingya trying to flee to Bangladesh, though the actual number is likely substantially higher, Human Rights Watch said. Rohingya are escaping killings, looting, and other sectarian violence in Arakan State, as well as abuses by the Burmese authorities, including ethnically motivated attacks and mass arrests. A United Nations senior official earlier this month expressed serious concern about reports of human rights violations committed by security forces in Myanmar's Rakhine state, after clashes between its Buddhist and Muslim communities reportedly killed at least 78 people and displaced thousands last month. “We have been receiving a stream of reports from independent sources alleging discriminatory and arbitrary responses by security forces, and even their instigation of and involvement in clashes," the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said in a news release. “Reports indicate that the initial swift response of the authorities to the communal violence may have turned into a crackdown targeting Muslims, in particular members of the Rohingya [Muslim] community," she added. According to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in the state, located in the country's west, was triggered when an ethnic Rakhine woman was raped and murdered on May 28. This was followed by the killing of 10 Muslims by an unidentified mob on June 3. Pillay called for a prompt, independent investigation, noting that the crisis reflects the long-standing and systemic discrimination against the Rohingya Muslim community, who are not recognized by the Government and remain stateless. “The government has a responsibility to prevent and punish violent acts, irrespective of which ethnic or religious group is responsible, without discrimination and in accordance with the rule of law," Pillay said. She also called on national leaders to speak out against discrimination, the exclusion of minorities and racist attitudes, and in support of equal rights for all in Myanmar. She also stressed that the UN was making an effort to assist and protect all communities in Rakhine state. “Prejudice and violence against members of ethnic and religious minorities run the risk of dividing the country in its commendable national reconciliation efforts, undermine national solidarity, and upset prospects of peace-building," Pillay said. Meanwhile, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said it is delivering aid to the more than 30,000 people that were affected by the violence. “As we speak, additional tents are being airlifted from the Republic of Korea to meet urgent shelter needs on the ground," a UNHCR spokesperson, Andrej Mahecic, told reporters in Geneva.
