On 9 October 2016, attacks on guard posts along Myanmar’s border with Bangladesh set off an allegedly genocidal military crackdown that led more than 700,000 Rohingya to flee for their lives into Bangladesh over the next year. They joined some 300,000 victims of earlier campaigns packed into already crowded refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar. The exodus brought some belated international attention to Myanmar’s long-persecuted Muslim minority, but their troubles had been building relatively unnoticed for decades.
In the years since the exodus, the plight of the fewer than 500,000 Rohingya who remain in Myanmar has only become more dire, thanks largely to the February 2021 military coup and an escalating civil war involving several armed ethnic resistance groups. Today, the Rohingya, like millions of other civilians in Myanmar, are subjected to deadly air raids, forced conscription, and alleged aid interference by the military junta. But the ill treatment of the Muslim minority extends further. Since late 2023, the Arakan Army, an armed opposition group based in Rakhine State, has also been accused of arson attacks, forced disappearances, and the targeted killing of Rohingya civilians.
At the same time, Bangladesh, criticised for arbitrarily opening and closing its borders as Rohingya try to flee Myanmar – and for the increasing violence and generally poor conditions in its refugee camps – is dealing with its own political uncertainty after deadly protests forced out longtime Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in August 2024. The refugee crisis, meanwhile, has shifted from a short-term response to a protracted emergency. Conditions in the camps have worsened, and In 2021, Rohingya faced massive fires and severe monsoon floods.
When the Arakan Army took majority control of Rakhine in late 2023, it only added to the troubles for the Rohingya, who are now allegedly subject to forced conscription, disappearances and widespread displacement by the Arakan Army. The AA’s leadership have also made controversial statements alluding to the Muslim minority as Bengali migrants. The junta has been no better. Government restrictions on refugees and aid groups have grown, along with grievances among local communities on the margins of a massive aid operation.
But it’s important to note that the Rohingya have been victims of decades of restrictive policies and persecution in Myanmar. In 1982, the government passed a citizenship law that effectively stripped the Rohingya of all rights to legal citizenship. This only exacerbated the claim that Rohingya Muslims are not indigenous to the nation, and are instead migrants from neighbouring Bangladesh.
Since then, the situation for the Rohingya people hasn’t improved under either military rule or when a short-lived civilian government was in power.
The February 2021 military coup has made the prospects of a safe return even more uncertain. The coup triggered a nationwide civil disobedience movement, re-ignited conflicts in Myanmar’s border regions, and worsened existing humanitarian crises. Rights groups say the military committed new abuses against Myanmar’s population. Since 2023, however, a series of armed ethnic resistance groups have also come under criticism for their alleged rights abuses as they challenge the junta’s dominance. Most notably, the Arakan Army, the armed group based in Rakhine state, have allegedly targeted and abused the Rohingya.
Who are the Rohingya?
The Rohingya are a mostly Muslim minority in western Myanmar’s Rakhine State. The Rakhine, also known as Arakanese, say their community is marginalised within Myanmar’s political system, which is traditionally dominated by the majority Bamar population.
Rohingya say they are native to the area, but in Myanmar they were often viewed as illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh, a thought that pervades to this day.
Over decades, government policies stripped Rohingya of citizenship and enforced an apartheid-like system where they were isolated and marginalised. Even Myanmar’s pre-coup government did not consider the Rohingya to be one of the country’s 135 officially recognised ethnic groups. That government, led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, came under fire for excusing or ignoring what the International Court of Justice said was the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims by the military.
How did the crisis unfold?
In October 2016, a group of Rohingya fighters (later calling themselves the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, or ARSA) staged attacks on border posts in northern Rakhine State, killing nine border officers and four soldiers. Myanmar’s military launched a violent crackdown, and 87,000 Rohingya civilians fled to Bangladesh over the coming months.
A month before the initial ARSA attacks, Suu Kyi had set up an advisory commission chaired by former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan to recommend a path forward in Rakhine to ease tensions between the Rohingya and ethnic Rakhine communities. Suu Kyi was later criticised for comments that downplayed the military’s violence and abuses. On 24 August 2017, the commission issued its final report, which included recommendations to improve development in the region and tackle questions of citizenship for the Rohingya. Within hours, ARSA fighters again attacked border security posts.
Myanmar’s military swept through the townships of northern Rakhine, razing villages and driving away civilians. Multiple UN officials, rights investigators, and aid groups working in the refugee camps say there is evidence of brutal levels of violence against the Rohingya and the scorched-earth clearance of their villages in northern Rakhine State.
When hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled to Bangladesh in 2017, they brought with them stories of burnt villages, rape, and killings at the hands of Myanmar’s military and militias. However, over the last two years, ARSA has come under attack by the AA for allegedly siding with the junta. Residents in Rakhine say the AA is now using this accusation as a justification for its own alleged attacks on the state’s remaining Rohingya population.
Here’s an overview of the Rohingya refugee crisis and a timeline of what led to it:
What has the international community said?
As the abuses and disenfranchisement of the Rohingya span decades, the list of alleged perpetrators are not just limited to the military junta and the Arakan Army.
A UN-mandated fact-finding mission on Myanmar says abuses and rights violations in Rakhine “undoubtedly amount to the gravest crimes under international law”; the rights probe called for Myanmar’s top generals to be investigated and prosecuted for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes committed in 2017.
The UN’s top rights official called the military purge a “textbook case of ethnic cleansing”. Médecins Sans Frontières estimated at least 6,700 Rohingya were killed in the days after military operations began in August 2017.
Rights groups say there’s evidence that Myanmar security forces were preparing to strike weeks and months before the August 2017 attacks. The evidence included disarming Rohingya civilians, arming non-Rohingya, and increasing troop levels in the area.
The UN’s claims about the 2017 attacks, and an ICJ case saying the military’s actions amounted to ethnic cleansing, remain unresolved. Since then, the military junta has consistently been accused by rights groups of carrying out airstrikes that have led to civilian deaths, including Rohingya. Over the last year, Rohingya activists inside and outside the country have also started to call out the Arakan Army for its own use of violence and displacement tactics against the Rohingya. They have also pointed to statements by the AA’s leadership that they say perpetuate the belief that the Rohingya are not indigenous to the country.
What has Myanmar said?
After the refugee exodus, Myanmar's government denied almost all allegations of violence against the Rohingya. It said the August 2017 military crackdown was a direct response to the attacks by ARSA militants. Myanmar’s security forces admitted to the September 2017 killings of 10 Rohingya men in Inn Din village – a massacre exposed by a media investigation. By 2018, seven soldiers had been convicted of murder, but those convictions came after the military had made earlier statements that those killed in Inn Din were “Bengali terrorists”, which activists saw as an inference to the belief that the Rohingya are not actually from Myanmar.
The government blocked international investigators from probing rights violations on Myanmar soil. This included barring entry to the UN-mandated fact-finding mission and the UN’s special rapporteurs for the country. In 2019, Suu Kyi defended Myanmar against accusations of genocide at the ICJ.
The February 2021 military coup may have shifted public perceptions of international justice, and of the Rohingya and other ethnic groups who have lived through years of discrimination and conflicts. Violent military crackdowns – once concentrated in remote border regions – are now directed at a broad section of Myanmar society opposed to the junta.
In August 2021, the National Unity Government (NUG), the shadow government that includes elected officials ousted in the coup, indicated it would accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. Earlier, officials said the NUG would “actively seek justice and accountability”, and pledged to repeal or amend citizenship laws that have excluded most Rohingya.
Suu Kyi’s government had previously rejected ICC jurisdiction and resisted calls to repeal the citizenship laws. The junta has done little to end, or reduce, the discrimination of the Rohingya. They are still denied their right to citizenship and their ability to travel to other communities has been severely restricted. As armed opposition groups have continued to take on the junta over the last year, the military rulers have also been accused of forced conscription of Rohingya civilians to aid the military’s fights against those groups, including the AA.
What’s the situation in the refugee camps?
The swollen refugee camps of southern Bangladesh now have the population of a large city but little basic infrastructure. The majority of Rohingya refugees live in camps with population densities of less than 15 square metres per person – far below the minimum international guidelines for refugee camps (30 to 45 square metres per person). The risk of disease outbreaks is high in such crowded conditions, aid groups say.
Rohingya refugees live in fragile shelters in the middle of floodplains and on landslide-prone hillsides. Aid groups say seasonal monsoon floods threaten large parts of the camps, which are also poorly prepared for powerful cyclones that typically peak along coastal Bangladesh in May and October. The government has constructed barbed-wire fences around parts of the camps. Rohingya say these fences made it difficult for people to escape a March 2021 fire that destroyed thousands of tent homes.
The dimensions of the response have changed as the months and years pass: medical operations focused on saving lives in 2017 must now also think of everyday illnesses and healthcare needs; a generation of young Rohingya have spent years without formal schooling or ways to earn a living; women (and men) reported sexual violence at the hands of Myanmar's military, but today the violence happens within the cramped confines of the camps.
Crimes largely go unpunished because there is no formal justice system in the camps. With inadequate security and little accountability, Rohingya say a climate of fear has spread. They report being harassed, kidnapped, attacked, or extorted by people they believe are affiliated with militant groups or gangs. Refugees and aid groups say the violence and threats have reached a crisis point. It’s not just violence though, the camps have also been subject to several arson attacks that residents say were orchestrated by gangs and criminal networks within the camps.
The former government’s response to the protest movement against Hasina, the former prime minister, also impacted the ability of aid workers to assist Rohingya refugees. Charities said they had difficulty reaching people in the camps and that the cutting of telecoms systems and violent crackdowns forced them to reduce their working hours in the camps. With an interim government now in charge, activists and aid workers are left to wonder if arbitrary border closures and alleged military abuses at the border will continue.
What’s happening in Rakhine State?
The 2021 military coup in Myanmar has worsened the humanitarian situation for people from all communities. In Rakhine State, local humanitarian groups report food shortages and aid access restrictions.
The UN estimates that 470,000 non-displaced Rohingya live in Rakhine State. Aid groups say they continue to have extremely limited access to northern Rakhine State – the flashpoint of 2017’s military purge.
Rohingya still in northern Rakhine face heavy restrictions on working, going to school, and accessing healthcare.
Additionally, some 125,000 Rohingya live in barricaded camps in central Rakhine State. The government created these camps following clashes between Rohingya and Rakhine communities in 2012. Rohingya there face severe restrictions and depend on aid groups for basic services.
Global funding for the Rohingya response appears to be waning. A UN-backed humanitarian appeal asked for nearly $1 billion in 2024. By October 2024, it was only 28% funded.
Over the last two years, the Arakan Army, which commands around 30,000 fighters, has gained control over large swathes of Rakhine. The AA has a largely-Rakhine focused view, saying their people have been disenfranchised for much of the country’s history. This puts them at odds with the Rohingya.
The junta has consistently been accused of abuses against the Rohingya, but as the AA’s control over Rakhine has grown, it too has been accused of forced conscription of Rohingya, forced disappearances, arson attacks on Rohingya communities and even a drone strike that killed at least 200 Rohingya.
What’s next?
Rights groups draw a direct line between the February 2021 military coup and impunity for atrocity crimes committed against the Rohingya, as well as against other ethnic groups through decades of conflicts in Myanmar.
Many have called on the UN Security Council to refer Myanmar to the International Criminal Court to investigate allegations of committing atrocity crimes. The UN body has not done so.
There are at least three parallel attempts, in three separate courts, to pursue accountability. The ICC judges have authorised an investigation hinged on one aspect: the alleged deportation of the Rohingya, which is a crime against humanity under international law.
Separately, the West African nation of The Gambia filed a lawsuit at the ICJ asking the UN's highest court to hold Myanmar accountable for "state-sponsored genocide". In an emergency injunction granted in January 2020, the court ordered Myanmar to “take all measures within its power” to protect the Rohingya. Members of the current junta’s leadership have been implicated in those actions. However, the former democratically-elected government has also been accused of not doing enough to protect the Rohingya and even providing cover for the military’s abuses.
And in a third legal challenge, a Rohingya rights group launched a case calling on courts in Argentina to prosecute military and civilian officials under the concept of universal jurisdiction, which pushes for domestic courts to investigate international crimes. In August 2021, Rohingya women spoke remotely at a hearing held to determine whether an Argentinian court would pursue the case.
To sum it up, international efforts to seek justice and accountability have stalled since the February 2021 coup, even as allegations of fresh abuses and new atrocities are brought to light and risk sparking a new exodus.
