Rohingya

Let’s hope this does not become yet another Asean family scandal swept under the rug.

Last week, journalists got wind of hundreds of boat people landing near the lush tourist resorts of southern Thailand. Dehydrated and starving, the boat people were dragged back out to sea by Thai authorities. Nothing was heard of the fate of these boat people.

Bangkok’s first reaction was to deny the incident ever happened. Soon enough, photographic record of the event was produced and the Thai army was forced to admit that the incident did happen. They offered the lame excuse for their inhumane behavior saying the boat people were “economic refugees.”

And soon enough, too, the boat people turned up on Indonesian shores. They reported being brutally treated by the Thais, showing the lacerations from the experience. A number of them died in the course of this desperate voyage.

Under the glare of the world’s media, Indonesia could not do to these boat people what the Thais did earlier. But no one quite knows what to do with them. More important, what to do about them.

We know now who these boat people are. They belong to a small minority ethnic group in Burma (Myanmar).

They are, in fact, doubly minoritized: by ethnicity and by religion. The ethnically distinct Rohingya people are Muslims.

That is not their only problem. The Rohingya minority is not recognized by Rangoon. They are not accepted as citizens of Burma even if they reside there. That has made them not only desperately poor but also stateless. They have nothing to live by and no country to live for.

Repatriating the Rohingya now becomes a major regional problem. Since Rangoon does not recognize their existence and denies them citizenship, it is unlikely that this bizarre dictatorial regime will accept their return.

Until hundreds of them crammed in small boats appeared on Thai beaches, few knew the Rohingya people even existed. Now we are not even sure how many there are, although some media reports put the number of ethnic Rohingya people at about 800,000.

Since Rangoon does not officially recognize their existence, we cannot rely on this brutal government to provide us statistics on this ethnic group. How do they survive and persist even as they are regarded as non-persons by the government of the country they live in?

Recall that the same military government Rangoon had blocked international assistance when a murderous storm struck two years ago. To this day, the world does not yet know how many exactly perished in this calamity.

Inasmuch as it is unlikely that Rangoon will accept these people, they have become a regional problem. Now held in Indonesian camps, few have come forward to show interest and offer support for the plight of the Rohingya boat people: not the International Committee of the Red Cross and not the UN High Commission on Refugees that has its hands full with such humanitarian crises as that in Darfur or the Gaza.

And not the Asean.

There is an unwritten — but scrupulously observed — code among the member-states of our regional association: each government tries its very best not to ruffle the feathers of another. That is officially referred to by a more sublime phrase: the principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of another state.

Taking official cognizance of the plight of the Rohingya people will, no doubt, ruffle the dirty feathers of the tyrants of Rangoon. So, to date, not a single Asean government has raised this as a regional concern that ought to be put at Burma’s doorsteps.

Not one. Not even Indonesia, even as this nation now finds itself taking responsibility for the care of desperate refugees washed onto its shores.

It could be that the Rohingya people are too few and too poor to matter. They are not worth rocking the regional boat for. Better to sweep the matter under the rug and pretend, like Rangoon does, that they do not exist.

But, sadly, they do. It might be inconvenient for governments to take this matter up with Rangoon. How do we tear off from our collective conscience that fact that we now know they exist?

The condition of the rest of the Rohingya people could not be much less miserable than the condition of those among them found on fragile boats long away from their communities. From testimony, we know that the Rohingya people are treated badly at home, persecuted brutally and severely on the brink of dying off from their poverty.

They have a clear cultural identity but no rights. They have a country but no citizenship. They have a religion but no sanctuary.

They are extremely vulnerable. Surely, in the worst imaginable state of despair. Some of them have dared the high seas, fleeing from uncertainty to even more uncertainty, investing all they had in the hope that, out there, they might find a human civilization that will not find it a nuisance to offer them care and protection. That will find their plight, not an inconvenience, but a serious humanitarian concern.

We are about to disappoint them.

Our regional association finds them an inconvenience. Our governments find their plight a trifle not worthy of even a statement of grave concern. To date, no private grouping has offered them material support and, most important, encouragement.