Press Release

The Muslims are Responsible before Allah in respect to the Continuation of the Acts of Oppression and their Re-occurrence against their Brothers in Burma

(Translated)

Recent events in Burma have witnessed a series of campaigns conducted by gangs of Buddhists and the Burmese authorities against the orphaned Rohingya Muslims. So whilst the voters were casting their ballots in Myanmar in the recent elections the Rohingya Muslims were deprived of the right to cast their vote... This is because the President of Burma, Thein Sein, withdrew the right of the Rohingya Muslims in the temporary vote which prevented them from participating in the referendum which came after protests against granting them this right.

Hundreds of Buddhists came out in protest demonstrations rejecting the passing of a law that would permit non-permanent residents “who hold white residency papers” to vote in the elections. The decision came only hours after the protest demonstrations took off in Yangon where the protesters rejected what they viewed to be a law that permitted the integration of non-citizens into the country. The military council that had ruled the country previously had provided the Rohingya and other minorities what was known as a white paper in 2012 to allow them to vote in the general elections. This was to rectify what the military government had done in 1982 in respect to withdrawing the right of citizenship from the Rohingya whilst considering them to be Bangladeshi foreigners.

The step to annul the voting rights suddenly represents a surrender to the Buddhists argument in the case where Shein Thumaana one of the Buddhist monks who participated in the protests stated: “Those carrying white papers are not citizens and non-citizens have no right to vote in the elections of any other country. It is only a ploy from the politicians to gain votes”.

Before the right was taken away, the National League for Democracy party led by Aung San Suu Kyi, the winner of the Nobel peace prize, withdrew the names of Muslims from its candidates lists under pressure from a collective of Buddhist monks.

In addition to withdrawing political rights from the Rohingya Muslims, the extreme Buddhist movement in Myanmar called its Buddhist supporters in the Arakan province to impose a self-rule for them within the province to prevent the Muslims from gaining control over it. Nan Da Ba Tha, the leader of the nationalist Ma Ba Tha movement blamed the government because it had failed to safeguard it and left the Muslims to take over control of the province and added that: “The Rakhine people required a special administration and not administration of the central government”.

O Muslims, these tragedies that are befalling our brothers in Burma will never come to an end except in two situations and you are responsible before Allah in respect to both of them:

Firstly: It will either be through what the criminal Buddhists are aiming for with the support of their authority and those who claim that they are workers for peace like Aung San Suu Kyi, whose complicity against the Muslims has been exposed, and this is their collective extermination and complete ethnic cleansing. This means that what has happened to our Rohingya brothers resembles the campaigns of barbaric extermination which happened against the Muslims of Andalus, the Balkans and the Mediterranean Islands which led to the extermination of some of them and the forced removal of the remainder whilst all traces of the existence of Islam and Muslims were wiped out in those lands.

With this aim the Buddhist gangs and the Burmese authorities have done every conceivable and inconceivable thing in terms of killing, burning, driving them from their homes, depriving the remainder from health care and education, preventing the men from working, the women from having children and removing political rights and so on... All of this has happened in plain sight of the United Nations, the western democratic states, the rulers of the Islamic lands, the international news and media, the Burmese democratic opposition and a number of human rights organisations who have chosen to ignore these acts of oppression and injustice. The United Nations urging the provision of voting rights to the Rohingya Muslims meant nothing in reality and Ban Ki-moon did no more than express his feelings of disappointment following the decision of the Burmese authorities to remove the voting right of the Rohingya Muslims: “I feel a great disappointment of this effective deprivation of the minorities in respect to their right to vote” and with that his dishonourable role ended.

Secondly: That Muslims come to their support in their capacity as one Ummah beginning with the support of the Muslim armies closest to their brothers in Burma. These are the armies of the Muslims in Bangladesh, Malaysia and Indonesia who are then followed by the next closest army and then the next... The issue in respect to those Buddhist criminals is dealt with by sending the armies and not by merely affirming the right of the Rohingya Muslims which the whole world already knows, in the case where the Rohingya Muslims are people of that land and have been so since 500 years and are not foreigners. This is what the Burmese authorities previously acknowledged and then later denied it. The United Nations also recognised that and then betrayed the Muslims as they did with the Muslims of Bosnia and Central Africa from before. The matter is also not just about rescuing our refugee and homeless brothers or providing them with assistance which the rulers of the Muslims have fallen short in, which is the least of roles. Rather what is required is to remove the oppression and persecution from our brothers in Burma and this will not be accomplished except by the support of the Muslim armies being provided to them.

O Muslim armies, in the lands neighbouring Myanmar, in Bangladesh, Indonesia and Malaysia, do not wait for those traitor rulers to move you and to send you to save your brothers. Rather move yourselves due to your desire to protect your Deen, your Aqeedah and due to your responsibility towards your brothers. This is because the Messenger (saw) said, «المسلم أخو المسلم، لا يظلمه، ولا يخذله»

“The Muslim is the brother of the Muslim. He does not wrong him and he does not let him down”.

We in Hizb ut Tahrir call all of the Muslims to work seriously and productively to support their brothers in Myanmar and the rest of the Muslim lands... We call you towards the radical solution from the roots to deal with these acts of oppression and slaughters... That will not happen except by the establishment of the Khilafah "Caliphate" upon the methodology of the Prophethood, in which the Khalifah of the Muslims leads it in the application of the Shar’a of Allah so that their affairs can be rectified; so that they attain by it the pleasure of their Lord and defeat their enemies, safeguard their blood and honour and spread justice to the world.

And O our brothers in Myanmar, patiently persevere just like those of great determination from amongst the prophets patiently persevered for verily the victory is coming by the permission of Allah... And do not despair because you are our brothers in the Deen and we promise you with the coming of the light of the rightly guided Khilafah "Caliphate" upon the methodology of the Prophethood which will regain your honour soon by Allah’s permission... And we say to you that which the Prophet Musa (as) said to his people:

﴿قَالَ مُوسَىٰ لِقَوْمِهِ اسْتَعِينُوا بِاللَّـهِ وَاصْبِرُوا إِنَّ الْأَرْضَ لِلَّـهِ يُورِثُهَا مَن يَشَاءُ مِنْ عِبَادِهِ وَالْعَاقِبَةُ لِلْمُتَّقِينَ﴾

“Musa said to his people: "Seek help through Allah and be patient. Indeed, the earth belongs to Allah. He causes to inherit it whom He wills of His servants. And the [best] outcome is for the righteous"” [Al-A’araaf: 128].

The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir