Qualla: Rohingya Genocide

Rohingya Genocide: Introduction

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Saahmadbulbul, CC BY-SA 4.0. They have been called the world's most persecuted minority. The Rohingya people of western Myanmar's Rakhine State speak their own language, practice their own faith, and trace their roots in the region back centuries. Yet since 1982, Myanmar's government has refused them citizenship, classifying them as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. That legal erasure laid the groundwork for something far worse. In August 2017, the Myanmar military launched what the United Nations called "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing," driving more than 700,000 Rohingya across the border into Bangladesh in the largest human exodus in Asia since the Vietnam War.

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Image: Saahmadbulbul | CC BY-SA 4.0

Rohingya Genocide: Stripped of Everything

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Zlatica Hoke (VOA), Public domain. The persecution predates the headlines by decades. Since at least the 1970s, the Rohingya have faced systematic restrictions that confined them to a kind of open-air prison within their own country. They cannot travel without official permission, cannot pursue higher education, a...

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Image: Zlatica Hoke (VOA) | Public domain

Rohingya Genocide: The August Reckoning

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kobokanaeru73, CC BY-SA 4.0. On August 25, 2017, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army attacked several Myanmar border posts. The military's response was catastrophic and indiscriminate. Within the first week, at least 130 Rohingya were killed in what the army called "clearance operations." By the end of the fi...

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Image: Kobokanaeru73 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Rohingya Genocide: Refuge Without Rest

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Zlatica Hoke (VOA), Public domain. The scale of displacement is staggering. Over a million Rohingya now live in refugee camps around Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, in one of the world's most densely populated refugee settlements. The tentative repatriation deal signed between Myanmar and Bangladesh in November 2017 has ...

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Image: Zlatica Hoke (VOA) | Public domain

Rohingya Genocide: A Wound That Keeps Opening

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Steve Sandford (VOA), Public domain. The violence has not ended. Since 2024, a new threat has emerged: the Arakan Army, an ethnic Rakhine insurgent group fighting Myanmar's military junta, has itself been accused of committing war crimes against the Rohingya. Reports describe drone and artillery strikes on civilians...

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Image: Steve Sandford (VOA) | Public domain

Rohingya Genocide: What Justice Looks Like

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Claude TRUONG-NGOC, CC BY-SA 3.0. The pursuit of accountability continues, haltingly. In 2018, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights declared that Myanmar's military generals should be tried for genocide. A Permanent Peoples' Tribunal found Myanmar guilty of genocide against both the Rohingya and Kachin minor...

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Image: Claude TRUONG-NGOC | CC BY-SA 3.0