Rohingya
children have been beheaded and civilians burned alive, according to
witness testimony amid claims that Burma's military and paramilitary
forces are committing "genocide" or a "pogrom"
against the Muslim minority in the country’s western Rakhine state.
Around
60,000 refugees are believed to have fled over the country’s
western border into Bangladesh in a just a week following a clampdown
on Rohingya militants.
The
British Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson, called for the violence to
end, saying the treatment of the Rohingya was “besmirching the
reputation of Burma”, also known as Myanmar, and appealing to Aung
San Suu Kyi to act.
Turkey's
President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has gone much further, accusing
Burma's forces of genocide and saying those who turned a blind eye to
events were complicit.
Observers
believe the number of displaced people is likely to increase. The
Burmese military said 400 militants had been killed in clashes with
their forces.
Civilians
who escaped gave horrific accounts of violence and destruction by
Burmese soldiers and other armed groups.
A
man named as Abdul Rahman, 41, said he had survived a five-hour
attack on Chut Pyin village.
He
told Fortifiy Rights, a charity working in the area, that a group of
Rohingya men had been rounded up and detained in a bamboo hut, which
was then set on fire.
"My
brother was killed, [Burmese soldiers] burned him with the group,”
he said.
“We
found [my other family members] in the fields. They had marks on
their bodies from bullets and some had cuts.
"My
two nephews, their heads were off. One was six years old and the
other was nine years old. My sister-in-law was shot with a gun.”
Another
man from the same village, named as Sultan Ahmed, 27, told the
charity: “Some people were beheaded, and many were cut. We were in
the house hiding when [armed residents from a neighbouring village]
were beheading people.
"When
we saw that, we just ran out the back of the house.”
Survivors
from other villages in the region also described seeing people being
beheaded or having their throats cut.
“We
can’t stress enough the urgency of the situation,” said Matthew
Smith, head of Fortify Rights.
“This
new satellite imagery shows the total destruction of a Muslim
village, and prompts serious concerns that the level of devastation
in northern Rakhine State may be far worse than originally thought,”
said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director for HRW.
“Yet
this is only one of 17 sites that we’ve located where burnings have
taken place. Independent monitors are needed on the ground to
urgently uncover what’s going on.”
The
Burmese government has denied access to the affected areas to
journalists and observers.
On
Saturday, Mr Johnson, appealed to Aung San Suu Kyi, the former
dissident who won the Nobel Peace Prize and is now the country's
State Counsellor, to intervene.
“Aung
Sang Suu Kyi is rightly regarded as one of the most inspiring figures
of our age but the treatment of the Rohingya is alas besmirching the
reputation of Burma. She faces huge challenges in modernising her
country," he said.
“I
hope she can now use all her remarkable qualities to unite her
country, to stop the violence and to end the prejudice that afflicts
both Muslims and other communities in Rakhine.
“It
is vital that she receives the support of the Burmese military, and
that her attempts at peacemaking are not frustrated. She and all in
Burma will have our full support in this.”
Ms
Suu Kyi has been silent on the extreme violence reported within her
country and has faced mounting criticism from observers.
The
Tatmadaw, Burma's military, and paramilitary groups began the
operation when the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (Arsa) attacked
security outposts in Rakhine on 25 August.
Arsa
claim to fight for Rohingya people but have also been accused of
preventing civilians from leaving the conflict zones.
Francis
Wade, the author of a book about violence against the Rohingya, said
on Twitter: “What's happening in Myanmar can be dressed up as
counter-insurgency campaign, but in design and purpose, it's a pogrom
and has popular support.”
There
are around a million Muslim Rohingya people in Burma but they have
faced years of mistreatment at the hands of the government, which
does not recognise them at citizens. They also face widespread
discrimination from Buddhist majority population and are often
referred to as Bengalis, alluding to a common myth that they are
illegal immigrants.
Earlier,
Mr Erdogan said there was a “genocide” occurring in Rakhine.
"Those
who close their eyes to this genocide perpetuated under the cover of
democracy are its collaborators," Mr Erdogan said.
Turkey
has offered to assist Bangladesh financially if it accommodated more
refugees, but the south Asian country, which is already home to
400,000 displaced Rohingya, has been reluctant to allow more in
It
is a peculiar feature of the news cycle that stories disappear very
quickly. Often stories never even make the light of day if they are
in forgotten areas like Africa. In this case the devastating floods
in Bangladesh, India and Nepal did get reasonable international media
coverage.
Nothing
compared with saturation coverage of the floods in Houston. Quite
justifiably.
Yesterday,
I decided to check the main pages of two of India’s main
newspapers, the Hindustan Times and
Times of India and
could not find any reference in the main websites. That is usually an
indication that if this was a newspaper it would be hidden deep in
the paper.
Where
are the headlines on this most devastating, ongoing tragedy?
Here is the Hindustan Times
And the Times of India
Instead
, I found ONE article about floods in Karachi, Pakistan, India’s
sworn enemy.
The
heavy rains in Karachi continued through Friday and Prime Minister
Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has directed the army to help the civilian
administration in restoring connectivity and communications.
At
least 23 people, including seven children, have been killed by
flooding in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, large parts of which
were under water on Friday following a prolonged period of rainfall
that started on Wednesday night.
The heavy rain continued through Friday and the local media reported that many neighbourhoods were flooded, with scores of cars and motorcycles under the water, as bodies of animals floated through the streets. The same seems to be true in Bangladesh where one-third of the country is under water.
**** I did find this one item that was talking about the sorry state of Mumbai's dilapidated buidlings and not to the humanitarian tragedy, still less to what is causing this devastation.
Mumbai building collapse: 25,000 buildings dilapidated in the city
Is this a case of downplaying not only abrupt climate change but of the manifestations as well? the Indian media seems to be even outdoing most NZ media in this regard! This is a report from the Big Wobble, reflecting international media coverage.
At
least 1,200 dead across India, Nepal, and Bangladesh as troops
struggled to reach dozens of people trapped after a building
collapsed in Mumbai
Emergency
services struggled to reach dozens of people trapped after a
condemned building collapsed in Mumbai on Thursday morning, killing
at least 21 others.
In the days before the incident, torrential
rainfall had pounded India's financial capital during an unusually
strong monsoon season, which has left more than 1,200 dead across
India, Nepal, and Bangladesh.
Despite the city declaring the
building unsafe in 2011, 50 percent of residents - including several
families - still lived in the 117-year-old five-story building in
the Bhendi Bazar area of India's financial capital, local lawmaker
Amin Patel told the Indian Express.
While emergency services
responded quickly to a call at 8.30 a.m. local time, the narrow
streets and closely packed buildings - some of them also over a
century old - are hampering rescue efforts, the Hindustan Times
reports.
So far, firefighters have rescued 34 people from the
rubble, but a number of other residents still remain unaccounted
for.
Buildings often collapse during monsoon season in India, and
five inches of rain had fallen in Mumbai on Tuesday, leaving streets
in the area flooded and weakening the foundations of thousands of
century-old buildings in the city.
Meanwhile the torrential
monsoon rains paralyzed India's financial capital Mumbai for a third
day Thursday as the streets turned into rivers and people waded
through waist-deep waters.
By Thursday the city had received
almost 300mm of torrential rain in the last four days, reported the
Hindustan Times.
Public transport stopped and thousands of
commuters were stranded in their offices overnight.
India's
monsoon season runs from June through September.
Since its start
this year devastating floods have killed more than 1,000 people
across South Asia and affected close to 40 million in northern
India, southern Nepal and northern Bangladesh.
The rains have led
to wide-scale flooding in a broad arc stretching across the
Himalayan foothills in the three countries, causing landslides,
damaging roads and electric towers and washing away tens of
thousands of homes and vast swathes of farmland, Associated Press
reported.
The UK's Guardian reported that the storm reached
Pakistan on Thursday, lashing the port city of Karachi.
Local TV
footage showed streets were already submerged as the country's
meteorological department forecast that the rains would continue for
three days in various parts of Sindh province, where authorities
closed schools as a precaution. Windstorms and rain are also
expected in the south-western Baluchistan and eastern Punjab
provinces.
The meteorological department said rains were also
expected in the capital, Islamabad, and in Kashmir
This
video IS from the Hindustan Times ( a day ago)
Sri
Lanka floods: Residents afraid as more rain forecast
Sri
Lankan authorities are urging hundreds of thousands of people
displaced by flooding not to return to their homes -- warning of more
landslides. About 180 people have been killed since monsoon rains
struck on Friday
Bangladesh
raises highest danger warning as cyclone takes aim
Bangladesh
raised its storm danger signal to the highest level of 10 on Monday
as a severe and intensifying cyclone churned toward its low-lying
coast and was expected to make landfall in the early hours of
Tuesday.
Impoverished
Bangladesh, hit by cyclones every year, warned that some coastal
areas were "likely to be inundated by a storm surge of four to
five feet (1.2 to 1.5 meters)" above normal because of
approaching Cyclone Mora.
The
Disaster Ministry ordered authorities to evacuate people from the
coast, the ministry's additional secretary, Golam Mostafa, told
reporters in Dhaka. About 10 million of Bangladesh's population of
160 million live in coastal areas.
River
ferries had suspended operations and fishing boats called in to
safety.
"Maritime
ports of Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar have been advised to lower
danger signal number seven but instead hoist great danger signal
number ten (repeat) ten," a government weather bulletin said.
"The
coastal districts of Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Noakhali, Laxmipur,
Feni, Chandpur and their offshore islands ... will come under danger
signal number ten (repeat) ten."
Bangladesh
is hit by storms, many of them devastating, every year. Half a
million people had their lives disrupted in coastal areas such as
Barisal and Chittagong in May last year.
It
is still recovering from flash floods that hit the northeast,
affecting millions of people, in April. Rice prices have reached
record highs and state reserves are at 10-year lows in the wake of
flooding that wiped out around 700,000 tonnes of rice.
The
cyclone formed after monsoon rains triggered floods and landslides in
neighboring Sri Lanka, off India's southern tip, which have killed at
least 177 people in recent days, authorities said, with 24 killed in
storms in the eastern Indian state of Bihar, either by lightning
strikes or under collapsed village huts.
India
warned of heavy rain in the northeastern states of Tripura, Mizoram,
Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh as Mora moved further up the
Bay of Bengal.
RUBBER
AND TEA PLANTATIONS HIT
Floods
reached roof level and cut off access to many rural Sri Lankan
villages, disrupting life for 557,500 people, many of them workers on
rubber plantations, officials said. Nearly 75,000 people had been
forced out of their homes.
Villagers
in Agalawatte, in a key rubber-growing area 74 km (46 miles)
southeast of the capital, Colombo, said they were losing hope of
water levels falling soon after the heaviest rain since 2003.
Fifty-three villagers died and 58 were missing.
"All
access to our village is cut off. A landslide took place inside the
village and several houses are buried," Mohomed Abdulla, 46,
told Reuters.
Some
areas in the southern coastal district of Galle, popular with foreign
tourists, have not received relief due to lack of access.
"My
entire village is cut off and nobody can come to this village,"
C.M. Chandrapla, 54, told Reuters by phone from the tourist village
of Neluwa.
"There
have been no supplies for the past two days. Water has gone above
three-storey buildings and people survive by running to higher
ground."
Sri
Lanka's flood survivors threatened by dengue, disease: aid workers
The
Sri Lankan military has sent in helicopters and boats in rescue
efforts in the most widespread disaster since the 2004 Boxing Day
tsunami. About 100 people were missing in total.
The
meteorology department forecast torrential rains over the next 36
hours.
Residents
in seven densely populated districts in the south and center of Sri
Lanka were asked to move away from unstable slopes in case of further
landslides.
The
wettest time of the year in Sri Lanka's south is usually during the
southern monsoon, from May to September. The island also receives
heavy rains in the North West monsoonal season from November to
February.
Reuters
witnessed some people stranded on the upper floors of their homes.
Civilians and relief officials in boats distributed food, water and
other relief items.
One
of the worst-hit areas was the southern coastal district of Matara
which is home to black tea plantations. Rohan Pethiyagod, head of the
Tea Board in the world's largest exporter of top quality teas, said
supplies would be disrupted for the next auction due to a lack of
transportation.
Sri
Lanka has already appealed for international assistance from the
United Nations and neighboring countries.
Mercury
rising: India records its highest temperature ever
India
recorded its highest-ever temperature on Thursday when the heat in
the town of Phalodi, in the western state of Rajasthan, shot up to a
burning 51 degrees Celsius (123.8 degrees Fahrenheit).
It
was the second day in a row the town experienced temperatures in
excess of 50 degrees Celsius.
Other
towns in the state, such as Churu, also recorded highs of about 50
degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) the same day.
In
New Delhi, the capital, the temperature reached nearly 47 degrees
Celsius on Wednesday.
The
previous temperature record in India was held by Alwar, also in
Rajasthan, at 50.6 degrees Celsius (123.1 Fahrenheit) in 1956.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the highest
temperature ever was recorded at 56.7 degrees Celsius (134 degrees
Fahrenheit) in Death Valley, California, on July 10, 1913.
Rajasthan,
home to the Thar desert, typically records the highest temperatures
in India. Temperatures can soar as a result of incoming western winds
from hot areas.
Red
alert issued
The
IMD has issued a red-level alert for Rajasthan as well as for other
states like Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, where temperatures,
despite not having crossed the 50-degree mark, are higher than
average.
India
has recorded higher than normal temperatures throughout 2016.
Many
areas are experiencing severe heat waves and state
governments estimate more than 370 people killed so far.
India
recorded its highest ever temperature on Thursday, in Phalodi,
Rajasthan, where numbers shot up to a burning 51 degrees Celsius
(123.8 degrees Fahrenheit)
This
comes on the back of a searing 2015, when more than 2,500 died in the
summer. 2015's high casualty rate has led to India's National
Disaster Management Authority coordinating with states on heat wave
action plans to spread awareness and establish preventative measures.
Double
whammy of heat wave and drought
The
heat wave has also coincided with another major environmental
problem: drought.
After
two successive below-average monsoons in 2014 and 2015, ground water
levels have receded, impacting many rural Indians who rely on ground
wells for drinking water.
The
western Indian state of Maharashtra is one of the worst impacted,
with the state government organizing emergency 'water trains' to
bring daily supplies to villages.
The
double whammy of heat and drought has led to accidents and
fatalities.
On
Monday, five men died in the northern state of Haryana when they
attempted to restore a well that had fallen into disuse.
Authorities
say the men were killed when they inhaled poisonous gas trapped in
the well.
India's
meteorological department says the heat wave will continue into next
week. Many schools across the country have been operating on
shortened days.
The monsoons are expected
to hit India in June, bringing much-needed rain and relief. The 2016
monsoons are forecast to bring an above-average amount of rainfall.
Unrelated
to the annual monsoons, large parts of Sri Lanka and now southern
India have beenlashed
this week by
rains caused by a tropical depression in the Bay of Bengal.
Citizens
of Turbat sweltered through the hottest day recorded in Pakistan’s
history, as the mercury shot up to 53.5°C on Sunday.
The
temperature equalled the one measured on May 27, 2010 in Mohenjo Daro
which broke a 12-year record – 53°C in Larkana on May 31, 1998.
According
to a senior meteorologist at the Met Department, the previous highest
temperature recorded in Turbat was 52°C on May 30, 2009. He said the
temperature in Turbat kept fluctuating between 50°C and 52°C over
the past few days, but peaked on Sunday.
He
predicted that the current heat wave would persist across the country
for the next three to four days in interior Sindh, southern Punjab
and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
Weather
in these parts of the country is expected to remain very hot and dry,
he said.
“Pakistan
is under the influence of extreme climate change and over the past
few years, we have witnessed several extreme weather events,” he
said. Last month’s heat wave broke old temperature records for the
month of April in many cities, he added.
According
to data compiled by the Pakistan Meteorological Department, the
temperature in Sukkur on April 16 was recorded at 47°C. The previous
highest temperature recorded in April was 46.5°C on April 25, 2000.
Meanwhile, temperatures in Larkana, Sibi, Dera Ismail Khan and
Faisalabad broke decades-old records for April, according to the Met
Department’s data.
Dehydration,
gastro cases surge as city grapples with heat
“However
pre-monsoon is expected to start in Pakistan in the second week of
June, which will help bring the temperature down,” said the
meteorologist.
The
Met Department earlier published a temperature reading of 54°C for
Turbat on Sunday – which, if true, would have been one of the
highest ever temperature readings recorded in the world.
The
current record is 56.7°C, recorded in Death Valley, US on June 10,
1913, though some scientists believe that this number is questionable
for various reasons. The next highest and most reliable is 53.9°C
which was also recorded in Death Valley on five occasions – July
20, 1960, July 18, 1998, July 20, 2005, July 7, 2007, and June 30,
2013.
A
figure of 54°C was also recorded at the Mitribah weather station in
Kuwait on July 21, 2016, while Basra, Iraq recorded 53.9°C the very
next day. The readings are currently being investigated by the World
Meteorological Organisation.
No
concrete proposals presented on climate change
At
one point, the record was believed to be 57.8°C, recorded on
September 13, 1922 in Azizya, Libya, but this was discredited by the
World Meteorological Organisation
CONFIRMED:
13 dead, 150 injured after rare hurricane hits central Moscow
(VIDEOS, PHOTOS)
At
least 13 people have died, and over 150 have been hospitalized,
including 22 children, when a severe thunderstorm hit the Russian
capital Monday, health officials say.
13
Muscovites have lost their lives,
with over 400 trees toppled, and more than 150 people
seeking medical help, including 22 children, after what Russians
are calling a ‘hurricane’ or in Russian ‘ураган’.
Reports say that electrical cables were damaged as Moscow was lashed
with high winds, hail and torrential rain.
The
winds of up to 110 km/h (70 mph) were described by meteorologists as
extremely rare for the city, and caused structural damage to
buildings.
Over
19 million people from 100 countries were forced to relocate in 2014
due to the effects of natural disasters including drought, soil
degradation, typhoons, cyclones, and other extreme weather events,
according to the Internal
Displacement Monitoring Centre 2015 Report.
The International Organization for Migration has estimated that by
2050, there will be as many as 200
million climate migrants globally.
Secret
documents reveal New Zealand’s electronic eavesdropping agency
shared intelligence with state security agents in Bangladesh, despite
authorities in the South Asian nation being implicated in torture,
extrajudicial killings and other human rights abuses.
Government
Communications Security Bureau, or GCSB, has conducted spying
operations in Bangladesh over the past decade, according to the
documents. The surveillance has been carried out in support of the
U.S. government’s global counterterrorism strategy, primarily from
a spy post in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, and apparently
facilitated by the National Security Agency and the Central
Intelligence Agency. The Bangladesh spying,
revealed
on Wednesday by TheNew
Zealand Herald
in collaboration with The
Intercept,
is outlined in secret memos and reports dated between 2003 and 2013.
The files were obtained by The
Intercept
from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. An NSA document
that outlines the agency’s relationship with New Zealand, dated
from April 2013, noted that “the GCSB has been the lead for the
intelligence community on the Bangladesh CT [counter-terrorism]
target since 2004.” The document added that the New Zealand agency
had “provided unique intelligence leads that have enabled
successful CT operations by Bangladesh State Intelligence Service,
CIA and India over the past year.” The specific
Bangladesh “State Intelligence Service” referred to is not named
in the document. Bangladesh has several agencies that focus on
gathering intelligence, principally the Directorate
General of Forces Intelligence, the National Security Intelligence
agency and the police Special Branch. The lead agency that executes
the country’s counterterrorism operations is the Rapid Action
Battalion (pictured above). Each of these agencies has been accused
of involvement in severe human rights abuses over a number of years. In
2008, for instance, Human Rights Watch alleged
that the Special Branch headquarters in Dhaka’s Maghbazar
neighborhood was used to torture detainees. In 2009, the rights group
accused
the Rapid Action Battalion of extrajudicially executing hundreds
of people and said acts of torture were routinely perpetrated by
officials from the intelligence directorate. In
2010, a prominent trade union organizer, Aminul Islam, alleged
thatthe
National Security Intelligence agency had tapped his phone calls,
beaten him unconscious and threatened to kill him. Two years later,
he was found dead in unexplained
circumstances, his body showing signs of torture: His toes were
broken, a sharp object had apparently been used to pierce a hole
below his knee, and his body and legs were battered and bruised. Bangladesh’s
intelligence agencies and main security forces cooperate closely.
Most notably, they work together as part of a notorious center called
the Taskforce for Interrogation Cell, located inside a compound in
northern Dhaka that is controlled by the Rapid Action Battalion unit. In 2011, the Guardianreported
that the interrogation cell was used as a place to extract
information and confessions from “enemies of the state.” It was
described as a “torture center” used for “deliberate and
systematic” mistreatment of detainees. One British man detained
there in 2009 on terrorism-related charges was allegedly hooded and
strapped to a chair while a drill was driven into his right shoulder
and hip. Other torture methods
used by Bangladeshi authorities, according
to Human Rights Watch, have included “burning with acid,
hammering of nails into toes … electric shocks, beatings on legs
with iron rods, beating with batons on backs after sprinkling sand on
them, ice torture, finger piercing, and mock executions.” In February 2014, the
U.S. government suspended
its own support for the Rapid Action Battalion, citing “gross
violation of human rights” committed by the force’s members. The
same month, a case against the Bangladesh government was lodged
in the International Criminal Court, accusing the country’s
officials of waging a brutal campaign of “widespread or systematic”
torture, killings, and other human rights abuses that amounted to
crimes against humanity. Bangladesh’s
government did not respond to requests for comment on this story. The
country’s officials have previously denied the abuse allegations;
State Minister Asaduzzaman Khan stated
last year that the government “doesn’t believe in the politics of
killing and forced disappearance.” It is unclear from any
of the NSA documents whether New Zealand sought or received any
assurances from Bangladesh over how intelligence it shared could be
used for detentions and interrogations, or whether there was any
effective oversight of how the country’s agencies ultimately used
the information. But the documents do
reveal that the GCSB adopted a dual-edged approach: It shared
intelligence with Bangladesh’s security agencies, and also secretly
monitored the internal communications of the Rapid Action Battalion
force. A classified
2009 GCSB report contained an intercepted image of a battalion
officer speaking on an internal video conference system. It said that
the force “has been an active target for the GCSB in the past and
this information could well be of high interest for future operations
if the domestic security situation in Bangladesh were to
deteriorate.” Bangladesh has low
levels of terrorist activity compared to many countries in that
region. In 2014 it was 24th on the Global Terrorism Index (the United
States was 30th). Concerns, as expressed in U.S. government
diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks, have mainly been that the
country can be used as a transport route or temporary haven for
militants active in other countries, particularly groups involved in
the long-running India-Pakistan conflict in Kashmir. New Zealand does not
have a high commission or any other official building in Bangladesh
in which to hide a covert listening post. The Snowden documents
suggest the Dhaka unit may be located inside a U.S. diplomatic
building with operations overseen by the NSA and the CIA. The 2009 GCSB report
said that the Bangladeshi surveillance was made possible through “the
Dhaka F6 environment survey.” F6 is a designator used to refer to a
joint CIA/NSA unit known as the Special Collection Service, which
eavesdrops on communications from U.S. embassies and consulates. The report noted that
the listening post was mostly being used by the GCSB to intercept
local mobile phone calls. “Site collection resources,” it said,
“are in the main being used for the collection of productive GSM
emitters.” The CIA, the GCSB and
the New Zealand prime minister’s office each declined to comment on
the details in this story. GCSB’s acting
director, Una Jagose, said in an emailed statement that the agency
“exists to protect New Zealand and New Zealanders.” She added:
“We have a foreign intelligence mandate. We don’t comment on
speculation about matters that may or may not be operational.
Everything we do is explicitly authorised and subject to independent
oversight.” The NSA had not
responded to a request for comment at time of publication. Photo:
Pavel Rahman/AP
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