Will Bangladesh join US-backed proxy war with Myanmar junta?

SALEEM SAMAD

In recent times, there has been a gargantuan development in Myanmar (formerly Burma). Large swatches of the Rakhine state have been occupied by the rebel Arakan Army (AA) with a political objective of confederalism of the ethnic Rakhine community.

The Rakhine state in northern Myanmar borders 270 kilometers of Bangladesh. The battle-hardened foot soldiers of AA political objective is to achieve regional autonomy of the ethnic Rakhine community.

The AA, fighting since 2014, have seized control of 13 of the 17 townships in Rakhine State, including all townships along the border with Bangladesh. However, the state capital, Sittwe, and the port city of Kyaukpyu remain under the control of the Myanmar military junta.

Founded in April 2009, the AA is the military wing of the United League of Arakan (ULA). It is currently led by Commander-in-Chief, Major General Twan Mrat Naing. It is the military wing of the Rakhine ethnic people in Rakhine state, where they are the majority.

The majority are Buddhists and a mix of Christian and animistic tribes (describes the belief that natural objects and phenomena, such as plants, animals, rocks, and the weather, have souls or spirits).

The Rakhine seek greater autonomy from Myanmar’s government and want to restore the sovereignty of the Arakan people. It was declared a terrorist organization in 2020 by Myanmar, and again by the military junta in 2024, headed by a 69-year-old General Min Aung Hlaing, who has ruled Myanmar with an iron hand as the Chairman of the State Administration Council since seizing power in the February 2021 coup d’état. He assumed his position as President in July 2024.

Millions of ethnic Rakhine are victims of forced displacement due to the conflict and onslaught of the government forces, and another 1.2 million ethnic Rohingya Muslims are languishing in crowded camps in Cox’s Bazar in southeast Bangladesh.

The displaced Rakhine community are starving because of want food and do not have cash to buy food.

There is an unconfirmed report that a consignment of food from the international food aid has been clandestinely sent to the beleaguered Rakhine state.

The internally displaced refugees are demanding more food aid for their survival. Food and water supplies have been blocked by the Myanmar junta to regions held by the rebels.

The AA and rebel China National Army have reached out to Bangladesh for food aid and to reopen trade between the two countries. Bangladesh has not officially come up with a decision for food aid and trade.

Earlier on the government had said that they cannot hold talks with AA, as they are not a legitimate authority representing Myanmar. But, last week the Adviser, Tauhid Hossain, for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs said Bangladesh may hold dialogue with AA for a number of pressing agendas, including border security, fresh influx of Rohingya refugees and other crucial issues.

The nascent Interim Government is in a dilemma as to whether Bangladesh should okay the “Silkhali Corridor” proposed by the Americans to provide food and logistics to keep the people of Rakhine state, or to continue with the challenge against the military junta in Naypyidaw, the new capital of Myanmar.

For military and strategic development, a team of military strategists has identified Silkhali as a supply hub for operations in Myanmar’s Rakhine state.

Well, no construction has yet begun, but top military visits (including Bangladesh Army COAS General Waker-uz-Zaman) confirm a positive nod for the site, which is in proximity to the conflict zone.

Silkhali is a revenue village, 30 kilometer north of Teknaf, near the Naf River, which separates Myanmar and Bangladesh. The corridor is presumed for the planned Rohingya repatriation once the operation begins.

The site is adjacent to the Bangladesh Army’s artillery field firing range (used for Turkish field guns and anti-tank guided missile – ATGM’s mortars). The coastal location is ideal for artillery testing and covert logistics movement, and has a thick forest cover often visited by elephant herds.

A massive logistics hub near Teknaf is under construction for supply movement. Meanwhile, the Cox’s Bazar airport is being upgraded for Turkish UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) operations for the Silkhali Corridor.

Recently, three US officials, Susan Stevenson (Charge d’Affaires based in  Naypyidaw, Nicole Chulick (Deputy Assistant Secretary, South Central Asia) and Andrew Herrup (Deputy Assistant Secretary, East Asia-Pacific) flew into Dhaka. It is not clear whether they have visited Silkhali.

Sources privy to the development said the US diplomats held secret parleys in Dhaka with representatives of the Arakan Army and the Chin National Front (CNF).

The AA and CNF refused to ally with the jihadist Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) as a condition for the secret meeting, the source said.

Their refusal led to the recent arrest of ARSA supremo Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi from the fringe of the capital Dhaka. He is accused of waging deadly 2017 attacks that led to a brutal military crackdown in Myanmar and forced 750,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee to Bangladesh.

It could not be ascertained which agency ensured the safe passage for the Myanmar rebels to Dhaka and return to their secret headquarters in Rakhine and Chin states.

However, a senior diplomat with the US embassy in Dhaka denied such meetings with Myanmar rebels. He also said he does not know whether any dialogue with the rebels is planned to finalise logistics support for the supply of food aid.

Well, the plan for logistics and supply to Rakhine state will not include the Bangladesh Army’s role in the US-backed operation.

Bangladesh government of Prof Muhammad Yunus is strict in ensuring that the army’s 10th, 17th, and 24th Divisions will not get involved in any combat role except for facilitating logistics.

The United States Army Pacific (USARPAC) has been deployed for the proxy war and logistics at the Silkhali Corridor.

Highly placed sources said that the mission is to support a US-backed proxy war in Rakhine state against the Myanmar military junta. The mission will provide weapons, training to AA and CNF guerrillas, food and other supplies.

Myanmar is staunchly anti-US and anti-West. This diplomacy has pushed Naypyidaw to develop strategic and military alliances with China and Russia. On the other hand, America, the European Union, as well as the United Nations have imposed several economic and diplomatic sanctions against Myanmar.

Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, head of the Myanmar military junta, is facing an international arrest warrant issued in November 2024 by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands, for crimes against humanity committed against the Rohingya Muslims.

At least 6,700 Rohingya, including at least 730 children under the age of five, were killed in the month after the violence broke out in 2017, according to medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and Amnesty International says the Myanmar military also raped and abused Rohingya women and girls.

The primary objective of the US proxy war is to capture the most wanted war criminals, especially General Hlaing and six other Myanmar senior military officials responsible for the genocide against the Rohingya people, to stand trial in the ICC.

Washington is actively working with the National Unity Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (NUG), under the leadership of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, currently imprisoned in Yangon (formerly Rangoon) for sedition. NUG has been able to ally to share power and bury differences and frictions with most of the ethnic rebel groups that took up weapons for confederalism and have overrun two-thirds of the territories once held by the junta.

First published in the Strathieia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan, on 25 April 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Why Rohingya repartition plan to Myanmar has hit a roadblock

SALEEM SAMAD

The million Rohingya refugees living in squalid camps in southeast Bangladesh refused to be resettled into another encampment in Myanmar.

The refusal of the refugees to return to Myanmar has not come as a surprise. They argue that unless Myanmar guarantees their citizenship rights, freedom of movement, access to livelihood, healthcare and education, a sustainable repartition will be half-hearted.

The response by the Rohingya refugees follows Myanmar government’s sudden offer to repatriate by the end of the year 6,000 Rohingya who were regarded as “illegal migrants” in Myanmar.

In persuasion of the repartition offer, a delegation of Rohingya refugees along with Bangladesh government officials recently visited Maungdaw Township and adjoining villages in the Rakhine State resettlement plan.

The settlements were built with support from China, India and Japan. Altogether 3,500 Rohingya will be accommodated in 15 villages, says Rahman.

Bangladesh’s Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner (RRRC) in Cox’s Bazar, Mohammed Mizanur Rahman who led the delegation observed that “repatriation was the only solution to end the refugee crisis”.

However, on their return, they expressed dissatisfaction over the arrangements and facilities made by the Myanmar authority.

Myanmar’s capital Naypyidaw conspicuously remain silent over the returnees citizenship rights, but assured that the Rohingya will be given a c, which the Rohingya refugees regard as too little and too less.

The controversial Citizenship Law of 1982 requires individuals to prove that their ancestors lived in Myanmar before 1823, and refuse to recognise Rohingya Muslims as one of the nation’s ethnic groups or list their language as a national language.

“We don’t want to be confined in resettlement camps,” remarked Oli Hossain, a refugee delegate. He explained that they will never accept NVC, which apparently identifies the Rohingya as ‘aliens’.

Bangladesh authorities also told the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) or UN Refugee Agency, which advocates for the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable repatriation of 1.2 million Rohingya refugees who fled the ethno-religious strife in 2017 amid a military crackdown.

The crackdown was sparked after the Islamic jihadist Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) overran a couple of Myanmar Border Guards Forces outposts in August 2017.

Naypyidaw for several years refused to hold dialogue regarding the return of Rohingya, stating that they are not citizens of Myanmar.

Bangladesh has raised the refugee crisis at several international platforms and other global summits. The world leaders lauded Bangladesh leader Sheikh Hasina for providing food and shelter to a million ‘stateless’ Rohingya.

Unfortunately, several attempts to repatriate the refugees fell flat in 2018 and 2019. Instead, Bangladesh blames the intransigent policy of the Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi who was placed under house arrest in February 2021, in the wake of her government’s ouster by military leaders.

Finally, Myanmar’s ‘all-weather friend’ China could pursue Naypyidaw to renew the negotiation on repartition.

Recently, at a critical tripartite meeting of the Foreign Ministry officials between Bangladesh, China and Myanmar in Kunming, despite reservation from the UN Human Rights Office and UN Refugee Agency that Rakhine State is unsafe for repatriation.

Beijing has a crucial regional agenda and several mega Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects are in progress with Naypyidaw.

Some hiccups have emerged in ties between Bangladesh and China especially after Dhaka gave a thumbs-up to join the Indo-Pacific security axis.

Furthermore, Bangladesh has cancelled the deep-sea port in the Bay of Bengal, a multi-purpose barrage over the Teesta River and a couple of other projects after India raised objections.

Researchers on forced migration said they do not see any light at the end of the tunnel for the refugees to return to their homes by the end of this year.

First published in the India Narrative, 29 May 2023

(Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. Views expressed are personal. Twitter: @saleemsamad)

Pakistan’s fingerprints in formation of Rohingya militant group ARSA are unmistakable

SALEEM SAMAD

Initially Bangladesh, Myanmar and India failed to accept Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) a jihadist outfit. The militant group was described as ‘Rohingya Muslim vigilantes’ with a limited ordinance, disorganised, therefore nothing to be worried about.

The name ARSA first surfaced in August 2017, when the outfit claimed responsibility for attacks on several border police and army posts of Myanmar at the international borders with Bangladesh.

The attacks sparked Tatmadaw’s (Myanmar military) brutal genocidal campaign against Rohingya Muslims. The troops torched hundreds of villages and went on a killing rampage.

The ethnic community was forced to flee from the volatile Rakhine State of Myanmar and later sheltered in Bangladesh. The country hosts nearly 1.2 million Rohingyas.

The panicked Rohingyas poured into Bangladesh, through porous international borders, fuelling a historic migration crisis in Asia.

India is now worried that the jihadist outfit’s presence at the border of Bangladesh-Myanmar-India. ARSA’s recent skirmish with Myanmar troops has raised their eyebrows, while Bangladesh is alarmed by the visible presence of ARSA in the territory.

The ARSA militants are mostly recruited from the Rohingya refugees. It was not to anybody’s surprise that the leadership are Pakistan-born Saudi émigrés. They raise funds mostly from Rohingya living in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Meanwhile, news surfaced that an undisclosed partnership between Bangladesh and Myanmar military led to a joint operation to address the ARSA insurgency.

The documents from a December 23 meeting of the Central Committee for Counter-Terrorism of the Myanmar Home Affairs Ministry, published by a private ‘Khit Thit Media’ on last January 10 have been verified by security experts.

The document stated that “During 2022, there have been only 4 skirmishes between our [Myanmar] forces and ARSA. We were able to meet, discuss and coordinate with the Bangladesh Border Guard Force over ARSA.

“The result was that Bangladesh special forces launched a military operation in the refugee camp where ARSA took shelter, killing the ARSA’s 2nd in Command and 2 terrorists. From one intelligence exchange with Bangladesh, we learned that the ARSA leader Ataullah and 60 of his followers are facing legal actions in Bangladesh.”

The Naypyidaw (capital of Myanmar) labelled ARSA as an “extremist Bengali [Bangalee] terrorists, also Rohingya Muslim terrorists,” warning that its goal is to establish an Islamic state in the region [South-East Asia].

In a rare interview with an international media, Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi, commonly known simply as Ataullah, the supremo of ARSA said that their objective would be “open war” and “continued [armed] resistance” until “citizenship rights were reinstated” of Rohingyas in Myanmar.

Despite the denial of Ataullah, who was born in Karachi and moved to Saudi Arabia, of having links to the Islamic State or ISIS in a video and said he turned his back on support from Pakistani-based jihadists, security agencies of Bangladesh and India are sceptic of his claim.

A security expert in Bangladesh explains that ARSA has ideological differences from other terror outfits and has reason to distance itself from the transnational jihadist network.

The global terror network’s footprint is absent in the region. The territory is too hot to handle, as some experts explained, especially when India remains a deterrent to the physical presence of jihadists and terror networks.

The exodus of more than one million Rohingyas from restive Rakhine State has also brought the ARSA operatives and sympathisers into Bangladesh.

The security agency in Bangladesh has trained their eyes and ears on their activities. The agency explains ARSA is also known as ‘Al Yakin’ in the refugee camps – the militants prey on the refugees.

ARSA operatives are responsible for widespread kidnaps, extortions, tortures and executions of suspects. The crimes are committed to collect funds for local operations in the world’s largest squalid Rohingya camps in Cox’s Bazar, in southern Bangladesh.

Cash-starved Al Yakin, the volunteer group of ARSA is mostly responsible for gang war in the refugee camps to establish dominance over other non-militant groups in the camps.

The recruiters from sleepers-cell disseminate a message that joining ARSA or ‘Al Yakin’ was a Farj (a religious obligation).

However, ARSA remains focused on recruitment and indoctrination, followed by establishing small units and engaging in rudimentary military training.

Often breaking news from Rohingya refugee camps of robbers, dacoits, and armed gangs killed in encounters by anti-crime forces – the slain victims are radicalised Rohingya militants.

Despite ARSA’s name still commands a mix of cautious respect and fear among some in the Rohingya camps. The members remain low profile to avoid confrontation with Bangladesh security forces.

For funding the militant’s network, the foot soldiers are also engaged in providing armed escorts to cross-border smugglers and drug traders.

The intels still believe ARSA have a low ordinance and the militants were unable to launch any large-scale armed clash with Myanmar troops after August 2017.

However, Myanmar security forces do not agree and said that last year in mid-September, “the Arakan Army launched attacks in cooperating with ARSA from a certain distance on the Taungpyo Latwal police outpost near BP-31 between Myanmar and Bangladesh using small and heavy arms and three shells fell into the Bangladesh side and three exploded.

“On the other hand, their hit-and-run tactics were significantly neutralised after Myanmar troop’s crackdown on Rohingya Muslims [ARSA],” said Myanmar’s official website Info Sheet.

Myanmar blames Pakistan’s dreaded spy agency ISI for its share in mentoring the jihadist outfit. Their theory that ARSA has been raised, funded, provides logistics and indoctrination was masterminded by ISI and is also believed by both Bangladesh and India.

Consequently, the encampment at No-Man’s-Land or Zero-Point was attacked once again on January 18, 2023, resulting in the camp’s destruction, and the forced displacement of all Rohingya refugees living there, writes Saifur Rahman, a Rohingya journalist who is living in exile in a third country.

ARSA’s militancy capability remains poor due to strict surveillance by security agencies of India and Bangladesh and sharing mechanism of intels – reducing ARSA into a toothless tiger.

First published in the India Narrative on 7April 2023

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh

Is ARSA a threat to Bangladesh?

Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi supremo
video conference at an unknown location

SALEEM SAMAD

Does the militant group’s presence spell trouble for Bangladesh?

Early this month, on information that members of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) were holding a secret meeting in a mosque in a Rohingya camp, the Armed Police Battalion raided the site. When the raid occurred at Chakmarkul Rohingya Block-3 camp, Amtala mosque, the members escaped the dragnet. The police seized 72 pairs of sandals as evidence of the botched meeting.

The ARSA members are mostly recruits from among the Rohingya refugees. They mostly raise funds from the Rohingya living in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

ARSA is the fledgling Rohingya militant group whose attacks on police posts across northern Rakhine State on August 25, 2017, provided an excuse for the Tatmadaw’s (Myanmar military) brutal ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya that prompted the region’s most severe refugee crisis. The exodus of more than one million Rohingya from the restive Rakhine State has also brought ARSA supporters into Bangladesh, and have taken shelter in squalid refugee camps.

Explaining in a rare interview to the international media, Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi, commonly known simply as Ataullah, the supremo of ARSA said that their objective would be “open war” and “continued [armed] resistance” until “citizenship rights were reinstated” of the Rohingya in Myanmar. Ataullah denied any links to the Islamic State or ISIS in his August 2017 video and claimed he turned his back on support from Pakistani-based militants.

A security expert in Bangladesh explains that ARSA has ideological differences with other terror outfits and has reason to distance itself from the transnational jihadist network, which would compel Bangladeshi security forces to move against them.

For obvious reasons, the global terror network’s footprint is absent in the region. The territory is too hot to handle, as some experts explained, especially when India remains a threat to their physical presence. With dried ordinance, the militants were unable to launch any large-scale skirmishes with Myanmar troops after August 2017.

On the other hand, their hit-and-run tactics were significantly neutralized after the Myanmar troops’ crackdown on Rohingya Muslims. The Myanmar government labelled ARSA as “extremist Bangali terrorists,” warning that its goal is to establish an Islamic state in the region.

Myanmar also blames Pakistan’s spy agency ISI, claiming it has provided funds and logistics to ARSA. The security agencies have trained their eyes and ears on their activities. The officials said ARSA is also known as “Al Yakin” in the refugee camps, and the militants prey on people. 

They are responsible for a series of kidnaps, extortions, tortures, and executions of suspects. The recruiters from sleeping-cells disseminate a message that joining ARSA or “Al Yakin” is a Farj (a religious obligation).

However, ARSA remains focused on recruitment and indoctrination, followed by establishing small units and engaging in rudimentary military training. One such session of recruits was in progress in the Amtala mosque earlier this month.

The International Crisis Group, a conflict resolution nonprofit organization, claims that the network of members and supporters in Bangladesh are fairly large. The cash-starved Al Yakin, the volunteer group of ARSA, is mostly responsible for gang war to establish dominance over other non-militant groups in the camps. 

Often, there is breaking news from Rohingya refugee camps -- of robbers, dacoits, and armed gangs killed in encounters with anti-crime forces. The slain victims are radicalized Rohingya militants.

Despite that, ARSA’s name still commands a mix of cautious respect and fear among some in the Rohingya camps. The members maintain a low profile to avoid confrontation with Bangladesh security forces. 

For survival, the foot soldiers are engaged in providing armed escorts to cross-border smugglers and drug traders. ARSA’s militancy capabilities remain poor due to strict surveillance by security agencies -- reducing ARSA into a toothless tiger.

First published in the Dhaka Tribune, 17 August 2021

Saleem Samad is an independent journalist, media rights defender. Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter: @saleemsamad

Discontent Against Myanmar For Rohingya Crisis

SALEEM SAMAD

Finally, Myanmar will begin to feel the pinch for its failure to provide meaningful accountability for its security forces' widespread and systematic violence and atrocities against the Rohingya Muslims in northern Rakhine state.

Despite global outcry, Myanmar refused to bring to account government and military officials implicated in the genocide, gang rapes, mutilations, and forced eviction by security forces on the Rohingya.

There is growing international frustration among several countries planning economic and legal measures against Myanmar.

The state-sponsored atrocities killed at least 10,000 Rohingya, left scores with physical disabilities, and caused the largest exodus of civilians since the Rwandan genocide. An estimated more than a million Rohingyas are living in refugee camps in Bangladesh for the last two and half years.

Myanmar has demonstrated its defiance against the international move toward meaningful accountability of the demands.

In the past weeks, there were signs of growing international support for the Gambia's International Court of Justice (ICJ) genocide complaint against Myanmar.

In response to Gambia's official complaint of Myanmar's violation of the United Nations' 1948 Genocide Convention initiated in November 2019, the Myanmar government statement to the ICJ asserted that the Gambia's allegations were based on "incomplete and misleading factual picture of the situation in Rakhine state."

The ICJ delivered a harsh rebuke of that narrative on January 23 by supporting the Gambia's request for urgent provisional measures to protect the Rohingya population while the court undertakes the longer-term judicial consideration of the Gambia's genocide allegations.

That statement peddled by the Myanmar military's long-discredited narrative that its activities in northern Rakhine state in August 2017 constituted legitimate "clearance operations" in response to attacks on police posts by the banned Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA).

Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi told ICJ justices last December that what transpired in northern Rakhine in late 2017 was mere "an internal armed conflict started by coordinated and comprehensive attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, to which Myanmar's Defence Services responded."

On February 25, Maldives announced that it would file a written "declaration of intervention" at the ICJ in support of the Gambia's genocide complaint.

Maldives' minister of foreign affairs, Abdulla Shahid, said that intervention - the details of which are yet to be made public - demonstrated his country's support for "the ongoing efforts to secure accountability for the perpetrators of genocide against the Rohingya people."

Last November 13, Rohingya and Latin American human-rights organisations filed a case with an Argentine court against Myanmar government and military officials under the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows that people implicated in the most serious international crimes may be arrested, prosecuted, and convicted in countries other than their own.

The Argentine court filing seeks "the criminal sanction of the perpetrators, accomplices, and cover-ups of the genocide" perpetrated by Myanmar security forces against the Rohingya.

Germany's development minister, Gerd Müller, announced that

Berlin was suspending development cooperation with Myanmar because of its "ethnic cleansing" of its Rohingya minority.

Although Müller didn't specify the financial cost of that suspension, he simultaneously announced an additional German government contribution of €15 million (US$16.5 million) to support Bangladesh's Rohingya refugee population.

Other states are likely to initiate similar ICJ interventions over the coming weeks, including Canada and The Netherlands, whose governments announced in December that they planned to "jointly assist the Gambia at the International Court of Justice."

The biggest challenge remains with the international effort to trigger an ICC investigation of the atrocities that have been complicated by the fact that Myanmar is not a signatory to the Rome Statute that established the court.

Unfortunately, an ICC probe through a resolution of the UN Security Council has been stymied by the opposition of Russia and China.

Meanwhile, the UN-created Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar officially began operations in September 2019 to gather evidence of crimes against humanity against Myanmar's ethnic minorities, including, but not limited to, the Rohingya, nationwide over the past eight years.

That message is that Myanmar should stop obstructing Rohingya accountability efforts, or pay the price of pariah-state status synonymous with murderous impunity.

First published in The New Nation on 19 March 2020

Saleem Samad, is an independent journalist, media rights defender, recipient of Ashoka Fellow (USA) and Hellman-Hammett Award. Twitter @saleemsamad, Email: saleemsamad@hotmail.com

ARSA: A Threat To Bangladesh or Myanmar?

SALEEM SAMAD

The terror outfit Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has roots in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and there is not much evidence to prove that ARSA has any ties to the transnational jihadist network.ARSA's leadership was born and brought up in Karachi, Pakistan and moved to Saudi Arabia. They raised funds mostly from Rohingya's living in Pakistan and Middle-East.

Now it is come to surface, that the terror organisation with the poor fund was unable to launch any large scale skirmishes with Myanmar troops. Long ago they were able to make quite a number of hit-and-run operations, that activities have been significantly neutralised after Myanmar troop's crackdown on Rohingya Muslims.

Well, the Myanmar government officially labelled ARSA as "extremist Bengali [Bangalee] terrorists," warning that its goal is to establish an Islamic state in the region.

The exodus of one million Rohingyas from restive Rakhine State has also brought the ARSA members into Bangladesh territory living in squalid refugee camps.

In the camps, violent gangs who are members of ARSA, prey on people. There is an incentive to join militants because it accords them and their families a degree of security and additional resources.

In a rare interview given to international media, Ataullah abu Ammar Jununi, commonly known simply as Ataullah, said that ARSA would be "open war" and "continued [armed] resistance" until "citizenship rights were reinstated."

Ataullah denied any links to the ISIS in his 18 August 2017 video. He is reported to have turned his back on support from Pakistani-based militants.

Security experts in Bangladesh and abroad explains that ARSA has ideological differences and has reason to distance itself from transnational jihadist network, which would compel Bangladeshi security forces to move against them.

The plight of the Rohingya has been referenced by international jihadists in the past. Abdullah Azzam, the preacher who inspired Osama Bin Laden, raised the Rohingya issue in the 1980s. Al-Qaeda showed cursory interest in the 1990s.

In the July 2014 speech in which he declared the establishment of a caliphate, Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi referenced the Rohingya as among "oppressed" Muslim populations worldwide that ISIS was looking to defend.

In 2016, the alleged chief of Islamic State in Bangladesh, Sheikh Abu Ibrahim al-Hanif (killed by Bangladesh counter-terrorism unit), in Dabiq interview that IS sought to turn Bangladesh into a launching pad for attacks in India and Myanmar.

Harkatul Jihad al-Islam (HuJI) and Arakan leaders have been photographed on the stage with Lashkar e-Taiba (LeT) leaders, including Hafiz Saeed. The LET's charitable arms, Jamat-ud Dawa and Falah-i-Insaniat Foundation support the Rohingya refugees in Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Bangladesh and Indian security forces believe that the Aqa Mul Mujahidin (AMM) received funding and support from Pakistan's ISI via the LET.

Indian authorities are investigating whether a little-known Rohingya militant group with links to Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).

For obvious reasons, none of the global terror networks did set foot in the region. The territory is too hot to handle, as some experts explain.

The recruiters from sleeping-cells disseminated a message that joining ARSA was a Farj (a religious obligation).

However, ARSA remains focused on recruitment and indoctrination, followed by establishing small units and engaging in rudimentary military training.

Often news breaks-out from Rohingya refugee camps in Cox's Bazar and Bandarban of robbers, dacoits, and armed gangs were killed in an encounter by elite anti-crime forces. Most of the slain victims are radicalised Rohingya militants.

Finally, ARSA's military capabilities remain poor, their ragtag foot soldiers are more engaged in extortion, loot and plunder in the refugee camps. The smugglers, drug traders, and gunrunners employ the armed groups for escort services in the region.

There has been no militancy activity for quite some time, and it is unlikely there will be any in the immediate future.

Thus ARSA becomes a toothless tiger in the western frontier.

First published in The New Nation, on 24 February 2020

Saleem Samad, is an independent journalist, media rights defender, recipient of Ashoka Fellow (USA) and Hellman-Hammett Award. Twitter @saleemsamad, Email: saleemsamad@hotmail.com

Militants in Myanmar: Endangered Lives Of Ordinary Rohingyas

SALEEM SAMAD

Two years ago on August 24, Reuters news agency reported that Muslim militants in Myanmar staged a coordinated attack on 30 police posts and an army base in Rakhine State, and at least 59 of the insurgents and 12 members of the security forces were killed.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), a group previously known as Harakah al-Yaqin, which instigated the October attacks, claimed responsibility for the early morning offensive and warned of more.

Nonetheless, the attack caught the Myanmar government by surprise. Its military, known as the Tatmadaw, responded with full-blown pogroms, including attacks on Rohingya villages and acts of arson.

State violence conducted in Rakhine State, what the United Nations has described as "a textbook case of ethnic cleansing" against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar's Rakhine State.

The atrocities ignited fresh exodus of another 700,000 Rohingya civilians to flee to Bangladesh since August 25, killing an estimated 3,000 people and burning 288 Rohingya villages, according to rights groups and the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and Human Rights Watch.

However, Myanmar does not hesitate to argue that its actions were counter-terrorism operations, but its response to the threat posed by Rohingya militants is disproportionate and is likely to fuel militancy for years to come, predicts writes Prof Zachary Abuza at the National War College where he focuses on Southeast Asian security issues.

The Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) was active in the mid-1980s to 1990s. The RSO achieves very little militarily, but its ties to the Jamaat-e-Islami and Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (HuJI) in Bangladesh and Pakistan caused concern to regional security. By the mid-2000s, the RSO was defunct.

The Rohingyas literally hoped that the country's democratic transition would address their legal rights. While democratic freedoms also unleashed extreme Buddhist nationalism.

In 2015, Attullah Abu Amar Jununi, also known as Hafiz Tohar, founded Harakah al-Yaqin, the Faith Movement, to "defend, save, and protect [the] Rohingya community … in line with the principles of self-defense".

Attullah was born in Karachi, Pakistan to Rohingya parents, and raised in Saudi Arabia, where he was a cleric in a mosque. He moved to Bangladesh, crossing into Rakhine State in late 2015 or early 2016 via Pakistan.

Attullah led Harakah al-Yaqin was an offshoot of Aqa Mul Mujahideen (Faith Movement of Arakan), which itself emerged from another organization, Harakat ul-Jihad Islami-Arakan, headed by Abdus Qadoos Burmi, a Rohingya from Pakistan.

Disgruntled members of RSO, defected to Harakah al-Yaqin. By 2015, Attullah's group was actively recruiting youths from the refugee camps.

In early 2017 Harakah al-Yaqin rebranded to ARSA and was initially engaged in hit-and-run tactics in a bid to stockpile armory from Myanmar security forces.

The rebranding as the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army was apparently to soundless Islamist and more as a legitimate ethno-nationalist group fighting in self-defense.

But ARSA continued to recruit through its network of clerics and mosques, and there is a far more religious basis to the movement than they publicly admit.

On August 18, 2017, Attullah released a video statement justifying ARSA's actions, stating that his group was established only in response to government and paramilitary abuses against the Rohingya community. "Our primary objective under ARSA is to liberate our people from dehumanized oppression perpetrated by all successive Burmese regimes," he said.

Possibly ARSA leaders hastily decided the attacks on border police check posts only two days after UN Special Representative Kofi Annan submitted his report stating several pragmatic recommendations, and Myanmar tacitly agreed on some issues towards a conflict resolution but disputed with most recommendations on the status of Rohingya Muslims citizenship.

ARSA knew very well that the Myanmar military's response would be heavy-handed. Despite understanding their limitation, the ragtag foot soldiers are poorly funded and possess only limited light weapons and dare not confront the Myanmar military, currently the 11th largest in the world, with its long track record of repression against ethnic minorities.

The duffers in ARSA leadership had no understanding of the consequences of hit-and-run tactics that will endanger the lives of more than a million Rohingyas in Rakhine State.

The two-month long campaign of ethnic cleansing, with even senior officials in the government of de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi justifying the military's attacks on civilians, seems to have caught ARSA off guard, writes Prof Zachary Abuza at the National War College.

Possibly the ARSA did not benefit from Rohingyas languishing in sprawling refugee camps - as UNHCR claimed to the largest refugee camps in the world.

First published The New Nation, 1 October 2019

Saleem Samad is an independent journalist, media rights defender, recipient of Ashoka Fellow (USA) and Hellman-Hammett Award. Twitter @ saleemsamad; Email: saleemsamad @ hotmail.com

ARSA Episode: Jeopardizing Safety, Security Of Rohingya Refugees

ARSA leader Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi flanked by militants (Source: Al-Jazeera)

SALEEM SAMAD

International rights groups have dubbed Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) as a rogue Islamic militant group, and responsible for series of crime against humanity in restive Rakhine State, Myanmar.

The ragtag radicalized militant's recruits from among Rohingyas under the leadership who were born and raised in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia is creating law and order situation in the refugee camps in Bangladesh.

For decades, the Rohingya have experienced ethnic and religious persecution in Myanmar. The majority have escaped to Bangladesh. Tens of thousands have fled to other countries in Southeast Asia, including Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines.

ARSA remains a poorly equipped and trained force, able to do little in the way of waging a sustained campaign against Myanmar's security forces. Presently their primary goal is to consolidate power within the camps in Bangladesh, also in Malaysia and Indonesia.

The International Crisis Group (ICG) reported on 14 December 2016 that in interviews, the leaders of ARSA claimed to have links to private individuals in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The ICG also claimed in an unconfirmed report that Rohingya villagers had been "secretly trained" by Afghan and Pakistani fighters.

In 2017, ARSA leader Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi stated in a video posted online that "our primary objective under ARSA is to liberate our people from dehumanizing oppression perpetrated by all successive Burmese (also known as Myanmar) regimes".

The group claims to be an ethnic-nationalist insurgent group and has denied allegations that they are Islamists, claiming they are secular and "have no links to terrorist groups or foreign Islamists".

However, ARSA follows many traditional Islamic practices such as having recruits swear an oath on the Quran, referring to their leader as an emir (head of state) and asking for fatwas (Islamic religious decrees or edicts) from foreign Muslim clerics.

London based Amnesty International after conducting interviews with refugees in Bangladesh and in Rakhine State confirmed that mass killings carried out by ARSA took place in a cluster of villages in northern Maungdaw Township at the time of its attacks on police posts in late August 2017. The findings also show ARSA was responsible for low-intensity violence against civilians.

Security experts believe that the plight of the Rohingyas in Rakhine State will further deteriorate with the continued activities of ARSA in the region. This will surely endanger the good intention of the Rohingya refugees repatriation to Myanmar.

There are real dangers associated with allowing the alleged oppression against the Rohingya to continue. Several experts have already predicted that if elements of threats are left unattended the region will come face to face with a very serious security crisis.

In the void have stepped Islamist civil society organizations that are now providing education, medical assistance, and food for the refugees. Bangladeshi Islamist groups, including hardline militant groups like Hefazat-e-Islam that have engaged in violence, has established over 1000 madrasas in the camps in Cox's Bazar and Bandarban.

ARSA is striving to consolidate its authority in the world's largest refugee camps in Bangladesh. Similarly, efforts are visible in Malaysia and Indonesia. The militant outfit controls over the refugee camps not only gives them power and control over resources there but also gives them additional pressure when they "fundraise" amongst diaspora communities.

The militant outfit should be contained based on intelligence gatherings by security agencies. Their active involvement in madrasas teaching and reciting Quran is responsible for jeopardizing the safety and security of the Rohingyas in the camps. The threat perception of the refugees comes from non-combatant members of ARSA outfit.

The article was first published in The New Nation, 24 September 2019

Saleem Samad, is an independent journalist, recipient of Ashoka Fellow (USA) and Hellman-Hammett Award. Twitter @saleemsamad; Email: saleemsamad@hotmail.com