A concentration camp in Poland. AkzuzkA/shutterstock.com Even though the Holocaust is one of the best documented genocides in a historical sense, there is surprisingly little quantitative data available, even on major critical events. What’s more, this history is often told in figures too large to comprehend on the human scale. Large numbers – like the infamous 6 million people murdered – obscure the significance of key operations that shaped this genocide, leaving instead just a vague characterization of a massively devastating event. In a digital age, mathematics, data science and visualization can help make sense of these events for new generations. By examining a rare and neglected dataset of human train deportations from the period, my study, published on Jan. 2, begins to uncover the true scale of slaughter. Operation Reinhard My work investigates a period in 1942, referred to as Operation Reinhard, when the Nazis efficiently shuttled about 1.7 million victims, often whole Jewish communities, across the European railway network in train carriages to Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor. Almost all of those who arrived at these death camps were murdered, usually within hours, in the gas chambers. Because the Nazis destroyed nearly all records of the massacre, it is important to try to uncover what actually happened at the time. My study looks at the “kill rate,” or murders per day. This reveals a sudden massive slaughter after Hitler “ordered all action speeded up,” as one SS officer put it, on July 23, 1942. Approximately 1.5 million Jews were murdered in only 100 days, including in shootings outside the death camps, with nearly 500,000 victims killed each month during August, September and October. That’s approximately 15,000 murders every day. The slaughter then soon terminated, as there were hardly any Jews remaining in the area to kill. The full scope of this genocidal slaughter appears to be undocumented in history. Available information before this study was mostly reconstructed indirectly, partially conjectured, and usually given on an annual timescale, rather than daily or monthly. That meant completely missing the three-month slaughter. My analysis was based on carefully compiled train records presented in a 1987 book by Holocaust historian Yitzhak Arad. Arad documents approximately 500 transportations from some 400 different Polish Jewish communities, recording for individual days the location, number of victims of each transportation and final death camp destination. My analysis required carefully sorting and working with the dataset, as well as including other surviving data. In addition, I generated a spatio-temporal map and film of the data. These visualizations plotted the 400 communities on a map of Poland and indicated the time sequence of all deportations to the death camps over the whole year 1942. While Operation Reinhard is considered the largest single murder campaign of the Holocaust, the extraordinary speed at which it operated to obliterate the Jewish people has been poorly estimated in the past and almost completely unknown to the general public. This massacre of unparalleled scale took place in just three short months, and was only captured through analysis of Arad’s dataset. This minimal time indicates the enormous coordination involved by a state machinery responsive to the Fuhrer’s murderous will to eradicate a people. The train records show how zones were emptied of Jewish communities one by one in an organized manner and how intense kill rates were achieved in targeted areas that only slowed as victims ran out. My plots of the data highlight the pace and frenzy of this mass murder. Measuring genocide Despite more than 70 years of research into the Holocaust, this appears to be the first attempt to graph aggregated data of the genocide, chronologically and spatially. My data-driven approach captures Operation Reinhard in a different perspective to the volumes of historical reports. https://youtu.be/WvqTgRWXaDY Genocide scholars often compare rates of recent genocides to the rate at which the Nazi Holocaust occurred, treating the latter as a kind of benchmark for genocide severity. As such, currently many social scientists maintain that the Rwandan genocide was the most “intense genocide” of the 20th century, with a sustained period of murders occurring at a rate three to five times more rapid than the Holocaust. However, my work shows that while the Rwanda massacre killings were 8,000 victims per day for a 100-day period, the Holocaust was nearly double this rate during a similar 100-day period in Operation Reinhard. That suggests that Holocaust kill rate has been underestimated on an order of six to 10 times. In my view, these sorts of comparisons have limited usefulness, and clearly diminish the Holocaust’s historical standing. The Holocaust stands out as a demonstration of how the efficient machinery of government was turned on people in an unparalleled way. It transcended in its ruthlessness and systemic efficiency. This is the key lesson of the Holocaust that I believe must not be forgotten. Copyright © 2010–2019, The Conversation US, Inc.

KHARTOUM, Sudan — The civil war in Darfur robbed Hager Shomo Ahmed of almost any hope. Raiders had stolen his family’s cattle, and a dozen years of bloodshed had left his parents destitute. Then, around the end of 2016, Saudi Arabia offered a lifeline: The kingdom would pay as much as $10,000 if Hager joined its forces fighting 1,200 miles away in Yemen. Hager, 14 at the time, could not find Yemen on a map, and his mother was appalled. He had survived one horrific civil war — how could his parents toss him into another? But the family overruled her. “Families know that the only way their lives will change is if their sons join the war and bring them back money,” Hager said in an interview last week in the capital, Khartoum, a few days after his 16th birthday. The United Nations has called the war in Yemen the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. An intermittent blockade by the Saudis and their partners in the United Arab Emirates has pushed as many as 12 million people to the brink of starvation, killing some 85,000 children, according to aid groups. Led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudis say they are battling to rescue Yemen from a hostile faction backed by Iran. But to do it, the Saudis have used their vast oil wealth to outsource the war, mainly by hiring what Sudanese soldiers say are tens of thousands of desperate survivors of the conflict in Darfur to fight, many of them children. At any time for nearly four years as many as 14,000 Sudanese militiamen have been fighting in Yemen in tandem with the local militia aligned with the Saudis, according to several Sudanese fighters who have returned and Sudanese lawmakers who are attempting to track it. Hundreds, at least, have died there. Almost all the Sudanese fighters appear to come from the battle-scarred and impoverished region of Darfur, where some 300,000 people were killed and 1.2 million displaced during a dozen years of conflict over diminishing arable land and other scarce resources. Most belong to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, a tribal militia previously known as the Janjaweed. They were blamed for the systematic rape of women and girls, indiscriminate killing and other war crimes during Darfur’s conflict, and veterans involved in those horrors are now leading their deployment to Yemen — albeit in a more formal and structured campaign. Some families are so eager for the money that they bribe militia officers to let their sons go fight. Many are ages 14 to 17. In interviews, five fighters who have returned from Yemen and another about to depart said that children made up at least 20 percent of their units. Two said children were more than 40 percent. To keep a safe distance from the battle lines, their Saudi or Emirati overseers commanded the Sudanese fighters almost exclusively by remote control, directing them to attack or retreat through radio headsets and GPS systems provided to the Sudanese officers in charge of each unit, the fighters all said. “The Saudis told us what to do through the telephones and devices,” said Mohamed Suleiman al-Fadil, a 28-year-old member of the Bani Hussein tribe who returned from Yemen at the end of last year. “They never fought with us.” “The Saudis would give us a phone call and then pull back,” agreed Ahmed, 25, a member of the Awlad Zeid tribe who fought near Hudaydah this year and who did not want his full name published for fear of government retaliation. “They treat the Sudanese like their firewood.” A few thousand Emiratis are based around the port of Aden. But the rest of the coalition the Saudis and Emiratis have assembled is united mainly by dependence on their financial aid. The Pakistani military, despite a parliamentary vote blocking its participation, has quietly dispatched 1,000 soldiers to bolster Saudi forces inside the kingdom. Jordan has deployed jets and military advisers. Both governments rely heavily on aid from the Gulf monarchies. (A report by a United Nations panel suggested Eritrea may have sent about 400 troops as well.) But in Sudan, which has played a far larger role, the Saudi money appears to flow directly to the fighters — or mercenaries, as critics call them. It benefits the economy only indirectly. “People are desperate. They are fighting in Yemen because they know that in Sudan they don’t have a future,” said Hafiz Ismail Mohamed, a former banker, economic consultant and critic of the government. “We are exporting soldiers to fight like they are a commodity we are exchanging for foreign currency.” A spokesman for the Saudi-led military coalition said in a statement that it was fighting to restore the internationally recognized government of Yemen and that coalition forces upheld all international humanitarian and human rights laws, including “abstaining from child recruitment.” “The allegations that there are children among the ranks of the Sudanese forces are fictitious and unfounded,” the spokesman, Turki al-Malki, said in the statement. Saudi officials said their soldiers have also died in Yemen, but declined to disclose how many. The Sudanese ground troops unquestionably have made it easier for the Saudis and Emiratis to extend the war. The Sudanese have insulated the Saudis and Emiratis from the casualties that might test the patience of families at home. The Sudanese are sometimes deployed to defend the flanks of the Yemeni militiamen who spearhead attacks. But the Sudanese fighters insist they are also the main barrier against the Saudis’ Yemeni foes, the Houthis. “Without us, the Houthis would take all of Saudi Arabia, including Mecca,” Mr. Fadil said. Ambassador Babikir Elsiddig Elamin, a spokesman for Sudan’s Foreign Ministry, declined to comment on troop levels, casualties or paychecks in Yemen. He said that Sudan was fighting “in the interest of regional peace and stability.” “Other than that,” he added, “we don’t have any national interest in Yemen.” Sudan’s defense minister threatened last May to withdraw from the conflict, pointedly announcing that Khartoum was “reassessing” participation in light of Sudan’s “stability and interests.” Diplomats called the statement a veiled demand that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates provide more financial assistance. They did not, and the Sudanese economy teetered. Khartoum backed down. The flow of fighters continued. But President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan has gained valuable allies, easing his international isolation after years as a virtual pariah. The United States has designated Mr. Bashir’s government a state sponsor of terrorism for more than two decades. The International Criminal Court has issued warrants for his arrest, charging him with directing the Darfur war crimes. Until recently, the Saudis and Emirates kept their distance, suspicious of Mr. Bashir’s roots in political Islam and relations with Iran and Qatar, both Saudi rivals. The war in Yemen, however, has enabled Mr. Bashir to win at least diplomatic support from its Gulf leaders, and he has thanked the Saudis and Emiratis for pressing Washington to upgrade relations. The Saudi payments to the soldiers have become increasingly significant to Sudan, where inflation has hit 70 percent and even in the capital residents line up for bread, fuel and bank withdrawals. At least nine people have been killed this month by security forces. Darfur has furnished mercenaries to other conflicts as well. Rebel groups who fought the Janjaweed have turned up fighting in Libya for the anti-Islamist Gen. Khalifa Hifter, according to the findings of a United Nations panel and other reports. But far more have fought in Yemen. The five fighters who had returned from Yemen and two brothers of fighters who died there all gave similar accounts. Sudanese jets departed Khartoum or Nyala, Darfur, carrying 2,000 to 3,000 soldiers at a time to Saudi Arabia. They were delivered to camps inside the kingdom, where some said they saw as many as 8,000 Sudanese gathered. The Saudis issued them uniforms and weapons, which the Sudanese fighters believed were American made. Then Saudi officers provided two to four weeks of training, mainly in assembling and cleaning their guns. Finally, they were divided into units of 500 to 750 fighters, they said. Then they traveled over land to Yemen, to battles in the Midi Desert, the Khalid ibn Walid camp in Taiz, or around Aden and Hudaydah. All said they fought only for money. They were paid in Saudi riyals, the equivalent of about $480 a month for a 14-year-old novice to about $530 a month for an experienced Janjaweed officer. They received an additional $185 to $285 for any month they saw combat — every month for some. Their payments were deposited directly into the Faisal Islamic Bank of Sudan, partly owned by Saudis. At the end of a six-month rotation, each fighter also received a one-time payment of at least 700,000 Sudanese pounds — roughly $10,000 at the current official exchange rate. By comparison, a Sudanese doctor working overtime at multiple jobs might earn the equivalent of $500 a month, said Mr. Mohamed, the economic consultant. Abdul Raheem, a 32-year-old member of the Rezeigat tribe whose full name was withheld to prevent reprisals, said that last year his family paid a local militia leader a bribe worth $1,360 so an older brother could go to Yemen as an officer. The brother, Abdul Rahman, died in combat in February 2018. “Life is like that,” Abdul Raheem said, stone-faced. Abdul Rahman’s wife and three children received the equivalent of $35,000 in Sudanese pounds, although banking restrictions have hindered access to it. Some Sudanese officers had told the soldiers explicitly, “Don’t fight harder than the money is worth, don’t fight more than you are paid for,” recalled Ahmed, of the Awlad Zeid tribe. All the fighters complained of Houthi rockets and mines, and they recounted casualty levels ranging from 135 in Mr. Fadil’s unit to about 200 in Ahmed’s. When they returned they bought livestock, a Korean-made pickup truck or a small grocery store. Hager, who went to Yemen at 14 and returned in November 2017, wore a matching khaki shirt and pants to an interview in Khartoum. His cheeks were clean. His mustache was just beginning. His unit lost 20 men during their overland journey to a camp near Aden, where they lost 22 more in a first battle and 35 in a second — 180 after six months. He had been terrified every day, he said, hunching forward in his seat when he talked about combat. But his Sudanese officers let him call his parents from time to time, and now they are happy. Besides a house, he bought the family 10 cattle. Declan Walsh and Saeed al-Batati contributed reporting from Yemen. © 2018 The New York Times Company

French judges have dropped a long-running investigation into the shooting down of a plane carrying the former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana. His death in 1994 was a trigger of the genocide. A French inquiry began four years later at the request of relatives of the French crew members who died. A judge accused Tutsi rebels, led by the current president, Paul Kagame, of the attack; arrest warrants were issued for a number of people close to him. The charges were dropped on 21 December, a judicial source said on Wednesday. French prosecutors had recommended in October the charges be dismissed because of insufficient evidence against the suspects. Lawyers for Habyarimana's widow, Agathe, have told the AFP news agency the plaintiffs in the case would appeal against the decision. "We have to interpret this decision by French judges as a form of resignation faced with a political context which prosecutors did not know how to fight," lawyer Philippe Meilhac said. "Rwandan authorities have never sought to help bring the truth to light." The plane carrying Habyarimana was shot down by a missile in April 1994, triggering the Rwandan genocide in which more than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus died. Habyarimana - a Hutu who had signed a peace deal with Tutsi rebels - was flying into the capital, Kigali, with his Burundian counterpart Cyprien Ntaryamira when a missile brought the plane down, killing all on board. The enquiry was launched in 1998, at the request of relatives of the pilot, who was French. The probe was a major source of tension between France and Rwanda. It was initially conducted by a prominent judge, Jean-Louis Bruguière, who concluded that Mr Kagame - who led the RPF rebels in 1994 - had ordered the attack. In 2006, Mr Bruguière issued arrest warrants against several aides of President Kagame. The Rwandan government described the enquiry as a politically motivated and accused France - which had supported the previous Hutu regime - of continuing to support those who had carried out the genocide. Relations between the two countries later improved. In 2012, a report by the French judge who succeeded Mr Bruguière cast doubt on the idea that the rebels had shot down the plane, and suggested that Hutu extremists were likely to have been responsible. An inquiry by Mr Kagame's government said the missile that brought down the jet had been fired from an army camp controlled by Hutus. Rocky relations • 1994: France sends troops to Rwanda; Rwanda later accuses France of protecting genocide suspects • 2006: French judge accuses Tutsis including President Paul Kagame of the 1994 Habyarimana killing; Rwanda breaks diplomatic ties • 2009: Rwanda joins Commonwealth; restores diplomatic ties with France • 2010: French President Nicolas Sarkozy visits Rwanda, admits France made mistakes in 1994 • 2011: Mr Kagame visits Paris, says it is time to leave history behind Copyright © 2018 BBC

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted on Thursday to end American military assistance for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen in the strongest show of bipartisan defiance against President Trump’s defense of the kingdom over the killing of a dissident journalist. The 56-to-41 vote was a rare move by the Senate to limit presidential war powers and sent a potent message of disapproval for a nearly four-year conflict that has killed thousands of civilians and brought famine to Yemen. Moments later, senators unanimously approved a separate resolution to hold Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia personally responsible for the death of the journalist, Jamal Khashoggi. Together, the votes were an extraordinary break with Mr. Trump, who has refused to condemn the prince and dismissed United States intelligence agencies’ conclusions that the heir to the Saudi throne directed the grisly killing. While the House will not take up the measure by the end of the year, the day’s votes signal that Congress will take on Mr. Trump’s support of Saudi Arabia when Democrats take control of the House next month. The action indicated a growing sense of urgency among lawmakers in both parties to punish Saudi Arabia for Mr. Khashoggi’s death, and to question a tradition of Washington averting its gaze from the kingdom’s human rights abuses in the interest of preserving a strategically important relationship. “What the Khashoggi event did, I think, was to focus on the fact that we have been led into this civil war in Yemen, half a world away, into a conflict in which few Americans that I know can articulate what American national security interest is at stake,” said Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah. “And we’ve done so, following the lead of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.” The resolution was written by Mr. Lee and Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont. It was an unusual invocation of the War Powers Act, a 1973 law by which Congress sought at the end of the Vietnam War to reassert its constitutional role in deciding when the United States would go to war. Mr. Sanders called it the first time Congress had used the law to make clear “that the constitutional responsibility for making war rests with the United States Congress, not the White House.” “Today, we tell the despotic regime in Saudi Arabia that we will not be part of their military adventurism,” he said. Seven Republican senators joined Democrats to pass the resolution: Mr. Lee, Susan Collins of Maine, Steve Daines of Montana, Jeff Flake of Arizona, Jerry Moran of Kansas, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Todd Young of Indiana. With both votes, senators diverged sharply from Mr. Trump, who has maintained steadfast support for Saudi Arabia and Prince Mohammed, even though the C.I.A. has concluded that he ordered the assassination of Mr. Khashoggi inside its consulate in Istanbul in October. “Maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!” Mr. Trump wrote of whether the crown prince had knowledge of the killing in an extraordinary statement that the president released last month, in which he argued that punishing Saudi Arabia for Mr. Khashoggi’s death would risk billions of dollars of American arms sales to the kingdom. Senator Bob Corker, the Tennessee Republican who heads the Foreign Relations Committee and sponsored the measure condemning the crown prince, said on Thursday that it was vital that the Senate “is speaking with one voice” to hold him accountable. “Unanimously, the United States Senate has said that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi,” Mr. Corker said. “That is a strong statement. I think it speaks to the values that we hold dear.” Senators in both parties described the twin measures as a direct response to the refusal by Mr. Trump and his administration to hold Saudi Arabia to account for Mr. Khashoggi’s death — and a way to counter the president’s assertion that the money to be made from arms sales to the kingdom was enough to justify turning a blind eye to such a deed. “We cannot sweep under the rug the callous disregard for human life and flagrant violations of international norms the Saudis are showing,” said Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, the senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee. “A few more weapons purchases cannot buy our silence — it should not buy our silence,” Mr. Menendez said. “And if the president will not, Congress must act.” The votes came only hours after Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo implored members of the House of Representatives during a closed-door briefing to continue the military advising, logistics support and intelligence that have for years been shared with Saudi Arabia. Some lawmakers emerged from the House meeting frustrated that Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Mattis had defended the United States’ relationship with the kingdom, which the White House needs to counter growing Iranian influence in the Middle East. Representative David Cicilline, Democrat of Rhode Island, said the two top administration officials had warned against jeopardizing the Saudi partnership — given what they described as a continuing, open investigation into whether Prince Mohammed had, in fact, ordered the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist who had lived in the United States. “The briefing was a colossal waste of time,” Mr. Cicilline told reporters afterward. Some senior Republicans offered the administration officials more support. Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the No. 3 Republican in the House, said Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Mattis had explained details of the investigation into Mr. Khashoggi’s death, as well as complexities of the relationship with Saudi Arabia. “There needs to be action,” Mr. Scalise said, without elaborating. “We need to hold everyone accountable.” Mr. Mattis and Mr. Pompeo gave a similar briefing to the Senate late last month. But it broke down as Republican and Democratic senators grew irritated with the administration’s defense of Prince Mohammed. By contrast, after Gina Haspel, the C.I.A. director, briefed senators last week on the case, they emerged saying they were even more convinced of Prince Mohammed’s role. The measure limiting war powers in Yemen has been under consideration for months, but senators sharpened its language two weeks ago with a procedural vote that signaled their deep frustration over the Trump administration’s refusal to blame Prince Mohammed for Mr. Khashoggi’s killing. “The relationship with the crown prince is so toxic, so tainted, so flawed that I can’t ever see myself doing business with Saudi Arabia in the future unless there is change there,” Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, told reporters on Wednesday as debate on the measure began. But Mr. Graham and other senators sought to separate the importance of maintaining a close alliance and partnership with Saudi Arabia from punishing Prince Mohammed. Before the killing and dismemberment of Mr. Khashoggi, most Republicans had supported the military alliance between the United States and Saudi Arabia. But in the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen, to which the Pentagon has supplied bombs and intelligence, Saudi airstrikes targeting Houthi rebels have also killed thousands of people at weddings, at funerals and on school buses. In late October, Mr. Mattis and Mr. Pompeo had called for a cease-fire in Yemen, and on Thursday, talks that were brokered by the United Nations in Sweden appeared to reach an agreement to ease the hostilities. The agreement calls for an exchange of up to 15,000 prisoners, the creation of a humanitarian corridor into the city of Taiz and, importantly, the withdrawal of troops from Hudaydah. That city, on the Red Sea, is a key entry point to Yemen for essential products like food and medicine. Peace talks are expected to continue in January in an effort to resolve what has become a humanitarian crisis in one of the poorest nations on Earth. “The agreements today mean a lot, not only for the Yemeni people but for humanity if this can be a starting point for peace and for ending the humanitarian crisis in Yemen,” António Guterres, the United Nations secretary general, said at the close of the talks on Thursday. Mr. Menendez and Mr. Graham said on Wednesday that they and other senators would introduce legislation early next year to impose even broader penalties against Saudi Arabia, including suspending weapons sales and cementing a ban on American refueling of Saudi coalition aircraft in Yemen. While Thursday’s moves were largely a symbolic, if stinging, slap at the Trump administration, they previewed what could be a far more consequential debate after Democrats take over the House in 2019. “If Paul Ryan thinks on his way out the door his last public service gift to humanity is covering up for Saudi Arabia, great, he can make that his legacy,” said Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, referring to the procedural gambit by Mr. Ryan, the House speaker, this week to prevent the war powers measure from coming up for a swift a vote. “But we’re going to be around next year,” Mr. Kaine said, “and we’ll figure out ways that there can be consequences for this.” Correction: December 13, 2018 An earlier version of this article misspelled the surname of the United Nations secretary-general. He is António Guterres, not Guterrez. Eileen Sullivan, Gardiner Harris and Charlie Savage contributed reporting. © 2018 The New York Times Company

The United Nations Mission in South Sudan has condemned a series of brutal sexual attacks on women and girls travelling from their villages to the town of Bentiu in the Unity region of South Sudan. Approximately 125 women and girls have sought medical treatment after having been raped or sexually assaulted in a ten-day period as they walked along roads near Nhialdu and Guit on their way to Bentiu. They report the attacks as having been carried out by young men in civilian clothing or military uniforms. In addition to being sexually violated, they were brutally beaten and robbed. “These attacks on vulnerable civilians are absolutely abhorrent and must stop,” said the Head of UNMISS and Special Representative of the Secretary-General, David Shearer. “The violent assaults happened in a Government-controlled area and it has primary responsibility for the safety of civilians. The Mission has held urgent meetings with authorities and urged them to take immediate action to protect women and girls in the area and to hold the perpetrators of these terrible crimes to account.” “UNMISS peacekeepers have immediately sent patrols to the area to provide a protective presence and our human rights team has launched an investigation to identify the perpetrators. UNMISS engineers are also clearing foliage from the sides of the road so attackers find it harder to conceal their presence,” said David Shearer. The Mission is also urging armed forces in the area to guarantee command and control over their troops to ensure rogue elements within their ranks are not involved in these criminal acts,” said David Shearer.

South Sudan has carried out more executions this year than it has done in any year since gaining independence in 2011, with a child among seven people known to have been executed so far in 2018, Amnesty International revealed today. Amnesty International fears for the lives of another 135 people on death row, who have this year been rounded up from other prisons across the country to two prisons notorious for executions. “It is extremely disturbing that the world’s youngest nation has embraced this outdated, inhuman practice and is executing people, even children, at a time when the rest of the world is abandoning this abhorrent punishment,” said Joan Nyanyuki, Amnesty International’s Director for East Africa, the Horn and the Great Lakes. “The President of South Sudan must stop signing execution orders and end this obvious violation of the right to life.” Amnesty International has established that at least 342 people are currently under the sentence of death in South Sudan, more than double the number recorded in 2011. Last year, South Sudanese authorities executed four people, two of whom were children at the time of the crimes for which they were convicted. The executions were a blatant violation of national and international laws, which strictly forbid the execution of anyone who was below the age of 18 at the time of their alleged crime. This year Amnesty International interviewed a 16-year-old boy, who is languishing on death row at Juba Central Prison, after being convicted of murder. Waiting for his appeal to be considered by the court, he described the crime as an accident. “Before the accident, I was in secondary school. I was a runner, a very good one and I was also a singer of gospel and earthly songs. […] My own aim was to study and do things that can help others. My hope is to be out and to continue with my school,” he said. He said he had told the judge that he was 15 during his trial. The use of the death penalty against people who were children at the time of the crime is strictly prohibited under international human rights law and South Sudan’s 2011 Transitional Constitution. Article 37(a) of the Convention on the Rights of a Child, to which South Sudan is a party, stipulates that ‘neither capital punishment nor life imprisonment without possibility of release shall be imposed for offences committed by persons below 18 years of age’. State-sanctioned killings Since independence in 2011, South Sudanese courts have sentenced at least 140 people to death, and the authorities have executed at least 32 people. This year’s spate of state-sanctioned killings seems to have been sparked by a directive by the Director-General of the National Prison Service of South Sudan on 26 April 2018. In it, he ordered all death row prisoners held at county and state prisons to be moved to two of the country’s most notorious death chambers - Wau Central Prison and Juba Central Prison. In May, 98 death row prisoners were transferred from Kuajok, Tonj, Rumbek and Aweil state prisons in Bahr el Ghazal region, in the north-western part of the country, to Wau Central Prison. Another 37 death row prisoners, including at least one child and a breastfeeding mother, were also transferred from prisons in the Equatoria region in the south of the country to Juba Central Prison. Thirty-four people were moved from Torit State Prison in September 2018 and three from Kapoeta State Prison in November 2018 to Juba. “The transfer of 135 death row prisoners to prisons in Juba and Wau where all executions have taken place so far is deeply alarming. The South Sudanese government must immediately establish an official moratorium on executions, commute all death sentences to prison terms and abolish the death penalty altogether,” said Joan Nyanyuki. Any attempt to execute a breastfeeding woman would also contravene South Sudanese law and international human rights law and standards. Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception regardless of the nature of the crime, the characteristics of the offender, or the method used by the state to execute the prisoner. The death penalty - the premeditated and cold-blooded killing of a human being by the state in the name of justice - is the most fundamental denial of human rights. It violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. Background In South Sudan, the Penal Code provides for the use of the death penalty for murder; bearing false witness resulting in an innocent person’s execution or for fabricating such evidence or using as true evidence known to be false; terrorism (or banditry, insurgency or sabotage) resulting in death; aggravated drug trafficking; and treason. Hanging is the method of execution provided for in the Code of Criminal Procedure. Before a person sentenced to death can be executed, the Supreme Court and the President must confirm the death sentence. © 2018 AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Getty Muslims living in China’s western region of Xinjiang are being forced to put up Communist Party officials in their homes, effectively extending state surveillance into the last place they had felt safe from intrusion. Since early 2017, the Uighur people have been subjected to an increasingly strict security regime, including armed checkpoints and streets lined with facial recognition-equipped CCTV. Experts and human rights groups believe around a million mostly male Uighurs are being held in secretive internment camps across the province. After initially denying the camps’ existence, the Chinese government has begun referring to them as voluntary “vocational training centres”. Now, in interviews with the Associated Press, Uighurs living in exile have described how a state “cultural exchange” programme has thrust government spies into the only private space most Muslims in Xinjiang had left.According to the ruling Communist Party’s official newspaper, 1.1 million local government officials have been deployed to spend about a week every two months living in the home of an Uighur host family. The government calls it the “Pair Up and Become Family” campaign, with social media posts by the Uighurs involved referring to the officials as their new “relatives”.“Look, I have a Han Chinese mother now!” reads the caption of one picture posted online by the 39-year-old sister of Halmurat Idris, an Uighur Muslim living in Istanbul. Han Chinese make up about 90 per cent of the country’s ethnic mix, with Uighurs numbering between 1 and 3 per cent.The government describes the programme as voluntary, but China’s Muslims are well aware that refusing any state initiative can lead to being branded a potential extremist. Social media images show the new “relatives” attending Uighur weddings, funerals and other occasions once considered intimate and private.Mr Idris said that seeing the picture of his sister alongside an elderly woman he did not know, her face fixed with a mirthless smile, made him feel sick.“I wanted to throw up,” the 49-year-old said. “The moment I saw the old woman, I thought, ‘Ugh, this person is our enemy.’ If your enemy became your mother, think about it – how would you feel?” AP said it had interviewed four other Uighurs living abroad who had been in contact with relatives back home in Xinjiang, and who described their loved ones as constantly on edge in their own homes, knowing that any misstep – a misplaced Quran, a careless word – could lead to detention or worse.In the presence of their faux relatives, the interviewees’ family members could not pray or wear religious clothing, and the government officials were privy to their every move. Meanwhile, a new analysis of satellite images by experts and Reuters has revealed the growing extent of 39 detention camps for Uighurs across Xinjiang province.Collectively, the facilities have almost tripled in size in the 17 months between April 2017 and August 2018, while the most recent imagery suggested construction work was still going on at many of them. Though covering an area roughly the size of 140 football pitches, the camps represent just a portion of the total number of detention facilities that are believed to exist in the state. Access for journalists to the province is tightly controlled, making it almost impossible to verify the precise number and nature of the camps. China refers to its broader crackdown on Xinjiang as the “people’s war on terror”, which started in 2014 after a series of violent attacks that authorities blamed on extremists. Beijing said in August that “those deceived by religious extremism... shall be assisted by resettlement and re-education”. That admission came after the UN’s Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said it was “alarmed” by reports from the province, criticising the “broad definition of terrorism and vague references to extremism and unclear definition of separatism in Chinese legislation”. Members of the committee said there were credible reports that the Chinese government had “turned the Uighur autonomous region into something that resembles a massive internment camp”.China has strongly refuted any suggestion that it is mistreating the Uighur minority. Journalists from state media outlets have been given tours of the internment camps and described surprisingly light security measures, as well as activities like basketball and arts projects. Last year a senior official in Xinjiang went as far as to refer to the Uighurs as “the happiest Muslims in the world”. The Independent, 2018

Those jailed as part of a crackdown call for the right to drive and an end to the kingdom's male guardianship system. Saudi Arabia continues to hold more than a dozen women rights activists in jail, months after a crackdown on dissent intensified in May. Most of them campaigned for the right to drive and an end to the kingdom's male guardianship system, which requires women to obtain the consent of a male relative for major decisions. In 1990, more than 40 women drove their cars in the capital Riyadh, the first public demonstration against the ban, which is now lifted. They also called for the abolishment of the male guardianship system. Since then, other similar protests have been held, and the government initiated a crackdown on rights activists this year. Those under arrest have been branded threats to national security and have been accused of being foreign agents. They face up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Human Rights Watch (HRW) said that the reason for the arrest is to silence the women and prevent others from participating in activism. Rights organisations and governments around the world have called on the Saudi authorities to release all political prisoners, but to no avail. Last week, Amnesty International said Saudi activists, including women, who have been arrested in this year's crackdown have faced sexual harassment and torture during interrogation. The activists, held in Dhahban prison on the western Red Sea coast, faced repeated electrocution and flogging, leaving some of them unable to stand or walk, the Amnesty International said in a report, citing three separate testimonies. At least one activist was made to hang from the ceiling and another woman was sexually harassed by interrogators wearing face masks, the United Kingdom-based rights group added. Yahya al-Assiri, the head of ALQST, a London-based Saudi rights group, said that authorities targeted male human rights activists in the past, but as the "regime became more aggressive" they also began targeting women. "To justify that, they're trying to say that [these women] are coordinating with embassies, or foreign countries … To say to the people that they are traitors," al-Assiri told Al Jazeera. Many activists have mostly been held incommunicado, without access to their families or lawyers. Below are some of the prominent women dissidents jailed for demanding basic rights. Loujain al-Hathloul [Illustration by Jawahir Al-Naimi/Al Jazeera] Loujain al-Hathloul is a women's rights activist from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. She obtained an undergraduate degree in French Literature from the University of British Columbia in Canada and then pursued a Master's degree in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). For years, she advocated for the women's right to drive in the kingdom, and in 2013 actively participated in a campaign where she posted videos of herself driving in an attempt to encourage women to do the same. With an active social media presence, the 29-year-old had been arrested several times for defying the now-lifted ban on women driving in Saudi Arabia. We are no longer an isolated country, anyone can gather information about what happens here. That's why we much strive to develop without ignoring the pain of our sisters, we must speak out about what harms them and their existence, especially at a time where we feel that our leadership is invested in creating change for women." Al-Hathloul was most recently imprisoned in May 2018, months after King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud signed a royal decree in September 2017 that said women would be allowed to drive "in accordance with Islamic laws". She, along with other female activists who had been calling for the lifting of the ban, was instructed not to comment on the decision prior to its announcement, HRW reported. Two years prior to her latest arrest, al-Hathloul spent 73 days in jail and faced charges of "terrorism" for attempting to drive into Saudi Arabia from the neighbouring UAE in November 2014. At the time, Samah Hadid, director of campaigns at Amnesty International in the Middle East, said, "The Saudi Arabian authorities' continuous harassment of Loujain al-Hathloul is absurd and unjustifiable … It appears she is being targeted once again because of her peaceful work as a human rights defender speaking out for women's rights, which are consistently trammelled in the kingdom." In 2016, al-Hathloul signed a petition with thousands of others calling for the abolishment of the male guardianship system. The following year, she was arrested without charge and was unable to contact her lawyer or family members until she was eventually released shortly after. In an interview with the Economist in January 2016, al-Hathloul highlighted the challenges women in the kingdom face when they are unable to drive. She said she had dedicated 30 percent of her salary to drivers, and said having to "beg" people to driver her around was "insulting". "They [government] told us that we are actually protected, that we have the right to express ourselves freely without being condemned or sent to jail … but in practice it's not there," al-Hathloul said. "They still send us to jail for very normal, rationalised opinions". When asked what kind of country she would like Saudi to become, al-Hathloul said "a Saudi Arabia that respects people's differences and human rights". Al-Hathloul has been married to Saudi stand-up comedian and actor Fahad al-Butairi since 2014. Al-Butairi, a prominent comedian who had a large social media following, was also arrested earlier this year. Samar Badawi [Illustration by Jawahir Al-Naimi/Al Jazeera] Samar Badawi, an award-winning activist, is known for her legal battle with her abusive father, who filed a lawsuit against her when she sought refuge in a women's shelter in 2008. As a result, she was arrested and spent six months in jail on the charge of "parental disobedience". She was then released after a Jeddah general court ruled in her favour and transferred her guardianship to her uncle. Since, Badawi has advocated for the abolishment of the male guardianship system, which among other things, grants male custodians the right to prevent their daughters from marrying, studying, or travelling without prior consent. In 2011, Badawi filed an unsuccessful Grievances Board lawsuit against the Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs for the rejection of her registration for the 2011 municipal elections. "I learned that we have laws to protect women's rights, but the woman needs to search for them and to how harness them for her own benefit," Badawi said in an interview. She also played an active role in the 2012 campaign to end the ban on women driving in the kingdom, and along with fellow activists, filed a lawsuit against the traffic department for refusing to issue her a driver's licence. In March 2012, the United States Department of State honoured Badawi with the International Women of Courage Award for her work and activism. In 2014, she was subjected to a travel ban and was arrested in 2016 for her human rights work, before being freed on bail. However, the mother of two was arrested again in July 2018 along with activist Nassima al-Sadah. "The arrests of Samar Badawi and Nassima al-Sadah signal that the Saudi authorities see any peaceful dissent, whether past or present, as a threat to their autocratic rule," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at HRW, in a statement. Her latest arrest prompted a diplomatic spat between Saudi Arabia and Canada after the Canadian ministry of foreign affairs said in a tweet it was "gravely concerned" about the detention of rights activists in the kingdom, including Badawi. Saudi Arabia accused Canada of "blatant interference in the Kingdom's domestic affairs, against basic international norms and all international protocols". Samar is the sister of Raif Badawi, a prominent human rights campaigner sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2014 on charges of insulting Islam. His wife and children are naturalised Canadian citizens. Eman al-Nafjan [Illustration by Jawahir Al-Naimi/Al Jazeera] Eman al-Nafjan is a 39-year-old Saudi blogger and activist who was arrested in May 2018, along with Loujain al-Hathloul and five other female advocates amid a government campaign that accused them of undermining the kingdom's stability with financial assistance from abroad. Saudi authorities accused the activists of having "suspicious contact with foreign parties", providing financial support to "hostile elements abroad". According to HRW, the arrests are an attempt to silence dissent. "Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's 'reform campaign' has been a frenzy of fear for genuine Saudi reformers who dare to advocate publicly for human rights or women's empowerment," HRW Middle East Director Sarah Leah Whitson said in a statement in May. "The message is clear that anyone expressing scepticism about the crown prince's rights agenda faces time in jail." Rothna Begum, a researcher at HRW, said the government is trying to silence critics, particularly those who champion women's rights reforms. "While it's not clear why they were arrested, today we have seen Saudi press reports come to suggest that these women are traitors and have been arrested because they are undermining the national unity of the country," Begum told Al Jazeera at the time. "What we know is that the Saudi crown prince wants to make it clear to all of his citizens that they are his subjects who must be grateful for whatever liberties he gives them, but they must not demand any of their rights." The mother of three obtained her undergraduate degree from the University of Birmingham and worked as a schoolteacher and later as a university assistant. Al-Nafjan then earned her master's degree from the same university in teaching English as a foreign language. She began blogging in 2008, writing mainly about social and cultural issues with a focus on women in Saudi Arabia, referring to the system in place as "gender apartheid", according to the Washington Post. A few years later, she joined the women's driving campaign and published articles in western media outlets to shed light on the campaign to allow women to drive in the kingdom. When the ban on women driving was lifted, she wrote, "The manner in which the ban was lifted seemed too simple to be real. Initially, I was overwhelmed with my own powerlessness as a woman living in a patriarchal absolute monarchy. Were our efforts the reason the ban was lifted? Or was it a decision that had been made regardless of our struggles?" Prior to her arrest, al-Nafjan was working towards completing a PhD in linguistics. Hatoon al-Fassi [Illustration by Jawahir Al-Naimi/Al Jazeera] Hatoon al-Fassi is a women's rights activist and writer who was arrested by Saudi authorities on June 24. Prior to her arrest, she had been under a travel ban since June 19. Considered a leading figure in the women's rights movement in the region, al-Fassi has long been fighting for the rights of Saudi women, including their right to participate in municipal elections. Al-Fassi, originally from Mecca, is an associate professor of women's history at King Saud University (KSU) in Saudi Arabia and at the International Affairs Department at Qatar University. She secured an undergraduate degree in history from KSU, and in 2000, earned a PhD in women's history from the University of Manchester. As a scholar, her work focuses on women's history and politics. Her most notable work "Women In Pre-Islamic Arabia", argues women in the pre-Islamic period enjoyed considerable rights in the Nabataean state, an urban Arabian kingdom centred in modern Jordan, south Syria and northwest Saudi Arabia during the Roman empire. Women in Nabataea enjoyed more freedom than in Saudi Arabia today because Muslim leaders have misunderstood the origins of Islamic law, her research said. "One of the objectives of this book is to question the assumption of subordination of women in pre-Islamic Arabia," al-Fassi said. "And what are the characteristics of sheikhs? Does this question imply perfection in men? My article deals with the truth and clarifies how much we lose when religious authority is monopolised to the exclusion of women and their perspective on fiqh and the issues that affect humanity." In 2011, she joined a campaign called "Baladi", which called for women's participation in the municipal elections. To help women interested in running for election, the Baladi campaign had planned to organise training sessions to educate participants on campaigning techniques and help them create agendas. "The ministry has stopped us from holding these workshops as they wanted the election programme to be more unified and centralised," al-Fassi said at the time, according to Saudi Gazette. "As evidenced by the 250 female members of the Baladi campaign, women have expressed their commitment to elect the best person for the job … Whether it is a woman or a man," she said. The initiative's efforts were blocked again during the 2015 municipal elections. © 2018 Al Jazeera Media Network

Two weeks ago the governments of Bangladesh and Myanmar deemed it safe to start repatriating Rohingya refugees to their home country. More than 2,000 refugees were put on a list, without their knowledge, processed and then were told that the conditions were right to send them back. Having escaped brutal torture and persecution at the hands of the Myanmar authorities, which the United Nations described as a “textbook case of ethnic cleansing,” the vast majority are petrified to return. A recent UN report describes a campaign of systematic violence conducted by the Myanmar military with an estimated 10,000 people, including children, killed and brutalized in gang rapes and enslavement when the violence escalated in August 2017. The bulk of these refugees fled to Bangladesh during that time. When we heard our names were on the repatriation list, we were very scared,” Noor Alam told ABC News at the Unchiprang refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, a coastal town in the South East of Bangladesh where all Rohingya camps are spread out. Alam, 30, is from Rambibi Village in Maungdaw, Myanmar. Many of the refugees went into hiding after discovering they were on the list. “We all fled from this camp and hid in a place called Leda for five days. From Leda we moved to Kutapalong,” Alam said. He, his wife and five children went into hiding for eight days. “We fed our children by begging from people,” he said. “If we are forced to go we will commit suicide by drinking poison. We have already collected poison. Otherwise the government of Bangladesh has to shoot us dead.” The Bangladesh government has been looking for a solution to tackle the number of refugees that are now living in camps across Cox’s Bazar, which the government says exceeds 1 million. “The number of refugees outnumber the local population [in the camp areas] so this is another problem, you know so we have to think of alternates,” Bangladesh’s Minister for Affairs Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali told ABC News. “We don’t want them to move out of the camps in to other areas of the country.” “What we are trying to do now is to repatriate the first batch and once they go there then that will have a salutary effect on the others,” he added. Not a single Rohingya, however, has volunteered to go back. Bangladesh has asserted that it will not forcibly return any of the Rohingyas to Myanmar. Earlier this month, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet, called on Bangladesh to “halt” this process of repatriation, saying, “With an almost complete lack of accountability, indeed with ongoing violations, returning Rohingya refugees to Myanmar at this point effectively means throwing them back into the cycle of human rights violations that this community has been suffering for decades.” Nearly all Rohingyas fear for their safety and do not trust how they will be treated by authorities in Myanmar if they were to return. Omar Faruk, a refugee at the Chakmarkul camp, called his grandfather, who was not able to escape from Myanmar. “The situation is not safe, things are bad,” he said. His grandfather told him that the rest of the family could not really leave the compound they are living in; they would be fined and thrown into prison for not being able to pay the cost. In the last six months his grandfather's area has received only two food drops from agencies which they ration to one meal a day. Faruk said Rohingya Rights in Myanmar are still non-existent. Jamel Hosen saw both his parents and a younger brother get slaughtered by the Myanmar military and escaped to Bangladesh with his family of eight. His trauma amplified when he discovered his family was on the repatriation list. He said he would only go back if four conditions were met: "We get Rohingya status, we are allowed to observe our religion peacefully, we can exercise our religious freedoms and we are returned to our original homes.” It was Myanmar’s denial of their status and hatred of their ethnicity that has forced them to become refugees in Bangladesh. Salman Saeed contributed to this report.

© AFP/File | A young man stands next to a sign for a health center in Bisesero, western Rwanda, where survivors say French soldiers had promised to rescue terrified Tutsis hiding in the hills at the height of the killing in June 1994 PARIS (AFP) - French judges have rejected a bid by survivors of Rwanda's genocide to reopen an investigation into claims that French troops were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people they had promised to rescue. A source close to the case said Wednesday that three war crimes judges had on November 22 dismissed the bid to reopen an investigation that symbolises deep wounds between Rwanda and France over the 1994 slaughter. Six survivors, backed by human rights groups and other plaintiffs, had launched a legal case in 2005 accusing French soldiers of abandoning Tutsi civilians in Bisesero, western Rwanda, in June 1994. The probe was shut down in July as no one had been charged during 13 years of investigation. The survivors say French soldiers had promised to rescue terrified Tutsis hiding in the hills of Bisesero at the height of the killing on June 27, 1994. The troops arrived only three days later -- after hundreds of people had been massacred by genocidal allies of the Hutu government which had been backed by Paris for years. Their deaths came nearly three months into the 100-day killing spree that left an estimated 800,000 people dead, most of them members of the Tutsi ethnic minority. In October, the plaintiffs' lawyers filed a request urging investigators to take further action despite the case being closed, including seeking testimony from soldiers and journalists who were nearby on June 27, 1994. But the judges ruled that further enquiry would "not be useful to ascertain the truth, nor reasonable given how long proceedings have been underway". Patrick Baudouin, a lawyer for the Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights, said the plaintiffs intended to appeal the latest decision. France's support for the ethnic Hutu forces which carried out most of the slaughter has been a source of deep acrimony in its relations with Rwanda ever since the genocide. France has admitted mistakes but denied Rwandan accusations of complicity in the mass killings. © 2018 AFP

A displaced woman farmer was killed on Sunday when an aircraft of the Sudanese Air Force launched a bombardment on the areas east of Nierteti in Central Darfur. Farmers reported that the air force bombed the areas near Kutrum, three kilometres east of Nierteti, killing a displaced woman who had returned to the area for farming. They said the air force also bombed the villages of Kuweila, Berbera, Beringo, and Kody in Jebel Marra, however there are no reports of casualties. They said the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) arrested six people, including two women in those areas on Sunday. Surviving the Antonovs The converted Russian-made Antonov 25 cargo aircraft are infamous in Darfur because their arrival means the indiscriminate bombing of villages. In the article entitled "Surviving the Antonovs in Darfur," Radio Dabanga editor-in-chief Kamal El Sadig explains that the sound of the cargo aircraft’s engine is unlike that of a helicopter or a jet fighter, and sets in motion a desperate attempt by villagers to find a shelter with their family and animals as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the attempts are often not successful for all people. The Antonovs are only capable of rolling barrel bombs out of their cargo hatch. The barrels, filled with shrapnel and high explosives, are thus far from accurate. As the weapon is deemed indiscriminate it is illegal under international law. In addition to the modified Antonovs, Russian Mi-17 and Mi-32 helicopter gunships, Sukhoi and MiG-29 fighter jets, and Chinese-made A-5 ‘Fantan’ jets have all been sighted in Darfur according to the Small Arms Survey. Copyright 2018 Radio Dabanga

Police official in Rakhine state claims officers were surrounded with swords Injured Rohingya man among 106 people detained trying to flee Myanmar earlier this week ( EPA ) Myanmar police shot and injured four Rohingya Muslims at a refugee camp on Sunday, according to an eyewitness. Around 20 police officers entered Ah Nauk Ye camp in western Rakhine state in an operation to arrest two men accused of smuggling people out of the country. They apprehended the two suspects accused of owning a boat used in an attempt to smuggle more than 100 Rohingya out of Myanmar on Friday. Maung Maung Aye, a 27-year-old Rohingya Muslim who witnessed the shooting, said four people were injured in the police operation, with two victims in a serious condition. “People from the camp went out to look and police shot at people,” he told Reuters. Police said the Rohingya surrounded the officers with swords and threw stones. “I heard that Bengali from the camp tried to grab the arrested people back from the police and police had to fire warning shots. I heard some Bengali got injured. I don’t know the details,” said police inspector Than Htay from a nearby police station. Many people in Myanmar call the Rohingya “Bengali,” implying they are from Bangladesh. Maung Maung Aye disputed the police inspector’s version of events. He said the Rohingya did not attack the police or try to grab the arrested men. He said police fired at residents and not into the sky. The rickety vessel at the centre of the arrests had been bound for Malaysia on Friday when authorities stopped it at KyaukTan, south of Yangon, detaining all 106 people on board. The incident, and similar recent boat departures, have raised fears of a fresh wave of dangerous voyages after a crackdown on people smugglers across the region. Rohingya woman was one of 106 people detained on Friday trying to flee to Malaysia (EPA) For several years Rohingya Muslims have boarded boats organised by smugglers in the dry months between November and March, when the sea is calm. The perilous journey to Thailand or Malaysia is often undertaken in overcrowded vessels. Tens of thousands of Rohingya have been confined to camps outside Sittwe in western Rakhine state since violence swept the region in 2012. They are denied free movement, access to decent healthcare and education. In August last year, Solidarites International, an international aid group, warned the conditions at the Ah Nauk Ye camp - home to more than 4,000 Rohingya - were severe. The organisation said the camp was “unsuitable to human settlement” and warned of water shortages, poor access to livelihood opportunities and communal violence. More than 700,000 Rohingya fled a brutal army crackdown in the northern part of Rakhine last year, according to UN agencies. UN investigators have accused the Myanmar army of “genocidal intent” and ethnic cleansing. Myanmar denies the allegations genocide, saying it was battling “terrorists”. Attacks by Rohingya insurgents preceded the army’s crackdown that began in late August 2017. Additional reporting by agencies Copyright 2018 The Independent