A report published today by the International Crisis Group identifies the attackers who killed nine police officers in northern Rakhine State on October 9 as members of a group called Harakah al-Yakin – ‘Faith Movement’ in Arabic.
The report, titled Myanmar: A New Muslim Insurgency in Rakhine State, is led by a committee of 20 Rohingya expatriates in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Field operations are carried out by about 20 other Rohingya members on the ground in Rakhine State. The group formed after the communal violence in 2012 in Rakhine State that left around 200 people dead.
The public face of the group in Rakhine State is Karachi-born Ata Ullah, whose father is from Rakhine State. He is also known as Ameer Abu Amar and is identified as Abu Amar Jununi in videos released by Harakah al-Yakin. The Myanmar government identifies him as Hafiz Tohar.
Harakah al-Yakin’s military tactics and testimony by members indicate that the group receives support from other militant groups in Bangladesh and Pakistan, where the Mecca-based leadership are known to have connections. However, according to the International Crisis Group report, “analysis of [the group’s] methods indicate that its approach and objective are not transnational jihadist terrorism”.
“It has only attacked security forces (and perceived threats in its own community), not religious targets, Buddhist villagers or civilians and family members at the BGP bases it hit on 9 October. It has called for jihad in some videos, but there are no indications this means terrorism…. Its stated aim is not to impose Sharia (Islamic law), but rather to stop persecution of Rohingya and secure their rights and greater autonomy as Myanmar citizens,” the report says.
The violence committed by the Rohingya insurgency is almost certainly counterproductive; it may lead to radicalization that the Rohingya community has fortunately avoided up to now, and it will create a cycle of violence that will devastate Rohingya lives. However, these actions should not at the moment be labelled terrorism.
The violence perpetrated by the Myanmar military, on the other hand, can be.
According to the International Crisis Group report, the “area clearance operations” conducted in northern Rakhine State since October 9 resemble the “standard counter-insurgency ‘four cuts’ strategy developed in the 1960s to cut off rebel forces from their four main support sources (food, funds, intelligence, recruits)”.
The report refers to the strategy as a “‘calculated policy of terror’ to force populations to move” and to destroy resources that could support insurgents.
According to the Karen Human Rights Group, “the four cuts policy operated by terrorising the civilian populations in zones where ethnic nationality armies operate”.
Though some definitions of terrorism exclude actions committed by governments, state terrorism is still a widely recognized – if not legal – concept.
The Encyclopædia Britannica Online defines terrorism as “the systematic use of violence to create a general climate of fear in a population and thereby to bring about a particular political objective” and adds that “establishment terrorism, often called state or state-sponsored terrorism, is employed by governments – or more often by factions within governments – against that government’s citizens, against factions within the government, or against foreign governments or groups.”
While the Myanmar government claims its clearance operations target combatants, the 1,500 Rohingya homes the Tatmadaw has burned and the alleged summary executions and rapes at the hands of Burmese soldiers, if true, certainly cause disproportionate harm to civilians.
Kofi Annan, the chairman of the Rakhine State Advisory Commission, which is compiling a report on humanitarian and development issues in Rakhine State for the Myanmar government, weighed in on the state-terrorism debate when he was UN secretary-general.
In 2009, Kofi Annan said to Iran’s then-foreign minister: “Regardless of the differences between governments on the question of definition of terrorism, what is clear and what we can all agree on is any deliberate attack on innocent civilians, regardless of one’s cause, is unacceptable and fits into the definition of terrorism.”
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