Latest chapter in the erasure of the Rohingya from Myanmar?
The evacuation of Maungdaw
The last remaining Rohingya enclave in Myanmar is vanishing before our eyes.
Read my full report for DVB English.
Where is the outrage? Where is the accountability?
In August 2024, the Arakan Army (AA) displaced thousands of Rohingya from Maungdaw, a town that once symbolised Rohingya survival in a state that has relentlessly tried to erase them. The AA claimed it was for their "protection," but the survivors tell a different story - one of blockades, starvation, forced recruitment, and unrelenting violence.
I spoke to three Rohingya in Bangladesh about that period of their lives. They told me they faced a deliberate war of attrition:
Food blockades sent rice prices soaring from 20,000 to 100,000 kyats per sack.
Electricity was cut off months before the exodus, plunging entire communities into darkness
Medical care collapsed, forcing people to die from treatable wounds.
One of the men told me how people were abducted and tortured. By August 25, thousands had no choice but to flee. They ran from the bombs, ran from the forced recruitment, and ran from the dacoits who preyed on them as they tried to cross the Naf River. Hundreds were intercepted by the Bangladesh Border Guard (BGB) and left stranded in limbo.
And what of the international community? Silence.
What of the Bangladeshi government? Indifference.
What of the so-called humanitarian agencies? Bureaucratic paralysis.
The Rohingya have lost nearly everything. Their villages. Their rights. Their homes. And now, Maungdaw - the last remnant of their homeland in Myanmar - is slipping away.