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Prominent leader's assassination highlights the plight of Rohingya Muslims

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Abdus-Sattar Ghazali
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A prominent Rohingya Muslim leader has been shot dead in a refugee camp in southern Bangladesh.

Mohibullah, who was in his late 40s, led one of the largest of several community groups to emerge since more than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims fled Myanmar after a military crackdown in August 2017, Al Jazeera reported.

He was talking with other refugee leaders outside his office after attending evening prayers when a gunman shot him at least three times, Mohammad Nowkhim, a spokesman of Mohibullah's Arakan Rohingya Society for Peace and Human Rights (ARPSH), said.

A spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said the agency was "deeply saddened" by the killing.

Invited to the White House and to speak to the United Nations Human Rights Council, Mohibullah was one of the most high-profile advocates for the Rohingya, a mostly Muslim minority that has faced persecution for generations.

Mohibullah formed the ARPSH in a Bangladeshi camp months after the influx of refugees from Myanmar, and it helped investigate the carnage carried out by the Myanmar armies and the Buddhist militias during the crackdown.

In August 2019, he organized a massive rally at Kutapalong camp, the main Rohingya settlement, which some 200,000 Rohingya attended. The rally confirmed his top leadership among the refugees.

But in recent years, Bangladeshi security forces restricted the activities of Mohibullah's group and ARPSH was not allowed to hold any rallies during the anniversary of the crackdown in 2020 and 2021.

Who are the Rohingya?

The Rohingya are an ethnic group, the majority of whom are Muslim, who have lived for centuries in the majority Buddhist Myanmar. Currently, there are about 1.1 million Rohingya in the Southeast Asian country.

The Rohingya speak Rohingya or Ruaingga, a dialect that is distinct to others spoken throughout Myanmar. They are not considered one of the country's 135 official ethnic groups and have been denied citizenship in Myanmar since 1982, which has effectively rendered them stateless.

Nearly all of the Rohingya in Myanmar live in the western coastal state of Rakhine and are not allowed to leave without government permission. It is one the poorest states in the country, with ghetto-like camps and a lack of basic services and opportunities.

Due to ongoing violence and persecution, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled to neighboring countries either by land or boat over the course of many decades.

Since the 1970s, a number of crackdowns on the Rohingya in Rakhine State have forced hundreds of thousands to flee to neighboring Bangladesh, as well as Malaysia, Thailand and other Southeast Asian countries. During such crackdowns, refugees have often reported rape, torture, arson and murder by Myanmar security forces.

In November 2016, a UN official accused the government of carrying out ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya. It was not the first time such an accusation has been made.

In April 2013, for example, HRW said Myanmar was conducting a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya. The government has consistently denied such accusations.

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Author and journalist. Author of Islamic Pakistan: Illusions & Reality; Islam in the Post-Cold War Era; Islam & Modernism; Islam & Muslims in the Post-9/11 America. American Muslims in Politics. Islam in the 21st Century: (more...)
 

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