Global Overview
Unfortunately, it is a global phenomenon that people are fleeing their countries and are looking for a safe environment. There are currently about 80million refugees worldwide. This is the population of Germany (or 1,23 times the population of France).
Migration is often triggered by economic interests, but refugees are people who do not leave their countries for economic reasons, but who are fleeing because of fear of persecution due to his/her ethnicity, religion, nationality, political believes or due to his/her affiliation to a certain social group like LGBTQ+. War, violence and human rights violations force the people to leave out of fear for their own lives or their families’ and friends’. Other reasons forcing people to flee are climate change, environmental catastrophes and of course hunger if the land does not provide enough food anymore.
As of the end of 2017 55% of global refugees were coming from only 3 countries: Afghanistan, South Sudan and Syria, all war-torn countries.
In Germany, most refugees are coming from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, where wars and violent conflicts have been going on for years.
Refugees do not necessarily flee to other countries but can also flee within their own country to safer areas. Almost two-thirds of all refugees flee within their countries and often live in IDP camps (internally displaced people). Here the top three countries are again Syria and Iraq, but also Colombia, where gang violence, drug wars etc. are a huge issue.
In this post, I want to provide some information on Myanmar and China and their actions against the Muslim minorities in their countries. Information on other countries/regions will follow. I do not intend to cover all conflicts/refugee situations in the world – there are too many of them.
Myanmar and the genocide against Rohingya
Another refugee crisis which received worldwide attention is the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar (often referred to as “Burma”). I travelled to Myanmar in 2017, just after the conflict completely escalated. Tourists are forbidden to travel to certain states, the government does not want tourists to see what is going on. Even UN officials were not allowed to enter certain areas. In the city of Rangoon, you can even visit a museum showing and celebrating the cultural/ethnical diversity of Myanmar, but if you speak with a Burmese about the topic (of course you need to be careful how to ask), you notice very quickly, what Burmese people think about the other ethnicities… Myanmar is also a war-torn country. Actually, in WW II the Japanese and British forces fought in Myanmar leaving a destroyed country behind. In 1948 Burma (Myanmar) became independent of the British Empire and since then armed conflicts between the different ethnical groups are ongoing. In Myanmar, the majority of the population are Burmese – Buddhists -, followed by Shan, Karen (Christians), the Rohingya (Muslim), Mon and Chin, Kachin, Indians and Han. Overall, there are more than 100 ethnical groups in Myanmar. Though all religions, like Buddhism, Christianity and the Islam, are promoting no violence and murder is considered a crime in all of these religions, violence, crimes and murders are being committed and tolerated by those who claim to be religious – many Buddhist monks in Myanmar approved of the genocide against the Rohingya. Instead of meddling in politics, they should just go back and study what Buddhism is about.
The ethnical minorities were and are striving for more independence and against the oppression by Burmese. For example, the Myanmar nationality law does not consider Rohingyas as an ethnic group of Myanmar, but as a group from Bangladesh and hence denying them citizenship, though they/their families have lived in the same area before Myanmar was even an independent state. In 2003 the UN also considered the Rohingya as a vulnerable group and one of the most persecuted minorities in the world. Rohingya Muslims have been forced to flee their land for decades. Between 1990 and 1995 250.000 fled to Bangladesh. In 2016/2017 the situation escalated again. End of 2016 a group of rebels (Rohingya) launched attacks on border officials on the border between Bangladesh and the Rakhine state in Myanmar, where most of the Rohingya had been living. The military reacted with a brutal crackdown on all Rohingya. In 2017 the situation between Rohingya and the Burmese army escalated further when the military started a “cleaning operation” in the Rakhine state to “solve” the Rohingya problem, which was of course followed by counter-attacks by Rohingyan militants. However, the Burmese army did not target the militants in their following actions but committed a genocide against all Rohingya living in Myanmar including extrajudicial executions, gang rape of women and girls, and people – even babies – being burned alive – thrown into the fire before their mothers’ eyes. The ones who could flee fled mainly to Bangladesh, an extremely poor country with a dense population.
Only in January 2020, the international court of justice has ordered Myanmar to prevent a genocide of the remaining Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar. This follows the filing of a case against Myanmar at the UN court by the Gambia end of last year. I am very proud of the Gambia for doing this. This was long overdue, and I am at the same time disappointed in the world and our governments for not taking more actions earlier.
Just this week, the Myanmar government again shut down internet services in communities in the Rakhine and the Chin State. The government announced that this must be done due to security requirements and in the public interest. However, it prevents locals from accessing communication services, making it more difficult or even impossible to call for help when needed and for humanitarian agencies to assist people in need.
Another human rights violation in Myanmar is what is happening to Kachins, who are mainly living in the Kachin state. There are also armed conflicts between Kachin and Burmese, forcing many Kachin to flee their lands and live in refugee camps (IDP camps – internally displaced people) controlled mainly by the Myanmar government. The border to China is close, so many people envision a better future by working in China, where salaries are higher than in the IDP camps, but many jobs are actually traps and human trafficking is a huge issue. China has a lack of women due to the one-child policy and son-preference. So, you have families in urgent need of money on one side of the border and a lack of women on the other side. The result: human trafficking of women and girls. Sometimes they are kidnapped or even sold by a family member against their will to a Chinese family, where they are expected to give birth to an heir, so abuse and rape are part of the “daily routine”. Once their duty is done and a kid or kids are born, the women are often free to leave, but without the kids of course. Not stepping up to stop human trafficking on the Myanmar border is one of China`s many failures and neglects when it comes to human rights.
China and its minorities
Here I at least can find a reason for not intervening in the doings of China – China is an important partner for other countries when it comes to the economy so that human rights issues might be addressed in a “side talk” but not at all to an extent you could consider as intervention… I am not saying that this is an excuse for not doing more – it is not. Considering how important exports are to China, governments and companies around the world could have a huge influence on China, if they stood together to enforce human rights….
In China, minorities are oppressed as well. If you live there as an expat, you should not even text “bless you” or “I will pray for you” or similar to a friend. Social media is controlled by the government and everyone who does not play after their rules, will be expelled from the country or in case of Chinese citizens – forced disappearance is often the answer. China is a huge country with many ethnical and religious minorities, like the Uighur Muslims. Many have already fled to Turkey. Since a while, Uighur has been forcibly disappearing in China. The government in Beijing claims, that Uighurs have been sent to “re-education camps” or even “boarding schools”, but strangely their family members cannot get in touch with them anymore, what should not be the case if you are just attending a boarding school. Around one million people in the Xinjiang province have been detained (mainly Muslim Uighurs) since 2014 and brought into re-education camps where torture seems to be one of the means used to promote the “re-education”. Last year it has also been brought to the attention of the UN human rights council, that organs have been harvested from healthy (living!) prisoners (e.g. Uighurs) who of course died in the proceedings given that their heart and/or other vital organs had been removed. The government claims, that this is not true and that all organ transplantations were voluntary and for free. However, a group of international experts analysed the China Organ Transplant Response System and found some anomalies in the data suggesting that the data might have been manipulated to coverup a state-run mass murder of people for organs. It seems that there is not yet a final statement/ruling by the UN on these topics.
For more information around those topics, you can check Human Rights Watch or the information provided by the UN and its different functions (e.g. Human Rights Council or the agency for refugees: https://www.unhcr.org/)
For China you can have a look at the following links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_O8vfUpXZQI
Wanderlust 