On Feb. 11, Myanmar’s President Thein Sein rescinded a voting rights offer to the country’s Rohingya community amid intense
pressure from far-right Buddhist groups. Last week hundreds of Buddhists took to the streets to denounce the continuation of a 2010 law that extended the right to vote to the country’s more than 1 million ethnic Rohingya. Myanmar
does not regard the minority group as citizens.
The violence directed toward the Muslim Rohingya community has been characterized in the media as
Buddhism’s terrorism problem. However, the faith-based portrayal of the Rohingya crisis devalues the political and social nuances necessary to understanding the conflict.
The ‘Burmese bin Laden’
The Rohingya are one of the most persecuted groups in the world. Stripped of citizenship in the 1980s, the Rohingya have been a subject of frequent racist propaganda and blistering violence. For years numerous human rights organizations have documented
the persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state. The community continues to live under constant threats, with few legal rights.
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