Religious violence strikes central Burma

A bloody religious clash last month in the central-Burma town of Meikhtila left some 40 people dead and displaced roughly 9,000, leaving Muslim communities in the Buddhist-dominated country living in fear.

The violent eruption was the second largest between the Muslim and Buddhist communities, next to the bloody communal unrest that erupted in Arakan State, western Burma in June of last year, that killed 180 people and displaced 110,000.

Some commentators and academics expressed concern over the violence, describing it as “Burma's never-ending pogrom.” A leading Burmese academic Dr. Maung Zarni described the unrest as “Neo-Nazi movement in Burma.” A Brussels-based advocacy organization, Euro-Burma Office, also warned of a “Rwandan-like genocide” of Muslims in Burma.

Other analysts said that the religious dispute between Buddhists and Muslims, especially “Rohingya Muslim,” likely has no end of sight, since it is based on hatred and prejudice against Muslims by Burmese Buddhists.

Ever since the Burmese government identified the Muslim Rohingya as “illegal immigrants,” these Muslim communities faced nonstop oppression and discrimination, until the country's recent opening in 2011 when the new government led by President Thein Sein took office.

Muslims from these communities are banned from traveling freely across the country and also face restrictions on marriage. In order to get married, they must seek permission from authorities and wait for months or years for approval.

But now that the country is opening, the longtime silent dispute between the two parties has become visible, and Buddhists are growing more violent in attacking the Muslim communities. Minority Muslim communities have also become more confident and dare to resist the Buddhists openly in the more permissive governmental environment.

The religious violence in Meikhtila erupted last week following Buddhist and a Muslim's failed gold sales deal in a local jewelry shop on 20 March.

Dr. Habib Siddiqui, a Muslim writer and activist wrote in Eurasia Review, a Spanish news and analysis website, that the whole episode smells of the Hitler-era Nazism in which Jewish homes and businesses were targeted by the dreaded SS.

“In Myanmar’s context, the Buddhist monks and their inspired zealots within the Buddhist population are increasingly behaving like those criminal SS thugs of the Nazi era.....these kinds of targeted violence against Muslims and other religious minorities do enjoy wider popular support within this Buddhist-majority apartheid state and are endorsed from the top echelon in politics,” wrote Siddiqui.

In a roundtable forum in Thailand's capital Bangkok on Tuesday, the outspoken Burmese academic Dr. Zarni described the violence as “genocide” against the Muslims in Burma.

Zarni said, “(the) Burmese military is a neo-Fascist institution when it comes to 'race' and religion....Its mobilization of religious and ethnic prejudices is an extremely dangerous strategy. Burma has had refugee issues since the 18th century. Racism in Burma is state-mobilized and state-orchestrated.”

“Clearly the conflict between Buddhists and Muslims has become extremely visible and violent in the past week, and it is deeply troubling,” said Benedict Rogers, the East Asia team leader at Christian Solidarity Worldwide who closely follow religious affairs in Burma.

He also said that he has met Muslims who said they have lived for 200 years in peace with their Buddhist neighbors, enjoying good relations and no problems, until now.

However, Rogers said that Muslim communities now live in fear. Though it is not impossible to restore good community relations and to promote and protect religious freedom, it will require leadership from political and religious leaders and investment in a long-term process of reconciliation.

Burma is a multi-ethnic country with about 135 minorities of different religious backgrounds, including Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Animists, while Buddhists are the majority group. Buddhism became the state religion in the 1960s.

The fresh outbreak of religious violence in Meikhtila left dozens of homes and buildings in ashes and burnt bodies in the streets. Even Buddhist monks joined in the angry attacks on Muslim mosques. They also intimidated journalists and photographers covering the violence, asking journalists to delete photographs and video footage of monks demolishing the mosques.

Rogers said, “The attacks are reminiscent of the pogroms against the Jews in Nazi Germany. They appear well-orchestrated, with an agenda behind the campaign. That is why the government must be transparent, and thorough efforts must be made to expose, with evidence, those who are orchestrating this. There may also be an element of copy-cat behaviour, fueled by the climate of impunity, and that must be addressed urgently.”

A group of Buddhist and Muslim leaders known as Interfaith Friendship Organization called on the government “to lay effective security plans and provide security to people of the two communities”. They also asked followers of different religions to obey the law and “maintain the community harmony with love and kindness.”

They also raised concerns, saying that clashes pose a threat to political reforms in Burma. International rights groups and nations including UN, US, and Britain have also called for calm and dialogue between communities amid fears that the violence could spread.

The UN Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, Adama Dieng said on Monday in a statement, “The recent episode of violence in Meiktila in central Myanmar raises concerns that sectarian violence is spreading to other parts of the country.

“In the context of last year’s violence between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine [Arakan] state, there is a considerable risk of further violence if measures are not put in place to prevent this escalation,” said Dieng.

“It appears to be driven by a deeply unpleasant extremist form of Buddhism, which in fact completely perverts and distorts what Buddhism should be about, and there is a real danger that it could spread if strong action is not taken to protect people and communities, restore law and order, prevent further violence, bring the perpetrators to justice and invest in addressing prejudice at grassroots levels through education, dialogue and reconciliation,” said Rogers.