Neo-Nazis, white supremacists and other alt-right factions rallied in Charlottesville, Virginia, on 12 August. Photograph: ddp USA/REX/Shutterstock A UN committee charged with tackling racism has issued an “early warning” over conditions in the US and urged the Trump administration to “unequivocally and unconditionally” reject discrimination. The warning specifically refers to events last week in Charlottesville, Virginia, where the civil rights activist Heather Heyer was killed when a car rammed into a group of people protesting against a white nationalist rally. Such statements are usually issued by the United Nations committee on the elimination of racial discrimination (Cerd) over fears of ethnic or religious conflict. In the past decade, the only other countries issued with early warnings have been Burundi, Iraq, Ivory Coast, Kyrgyzstan and Nigeria. The United States has been warned under the procedure in the past when Cerd raised the issue of land rights conflicts with the Western Shoshone indigenous peoples in 2006. “We are alarmed by the racist demonstrations, with overtly racist slogans, chants and salutes by white nationalists, neo-Nazis, and the Ku Klux Klan, promoting white supremacy and inciting racial discrimination and hatred,” said Anastasia Crickley, chair of the committee. Donald Trump faced widespread criticism after he blamed “both sides” for the violence in Charlottesville. Although the Cerd statement did not refer to him by name, it called on “the government of the United States of America, as well as high-level politicians and public officials, to unequivocally and unconditionally reject and condemn racist hate speech and crimes in Charlottesville and throughout the country”. Crickley also urged the US authorities “to address the root causes of the proliferation of such racist manifestations”. Lecia Brooks, director of outreach for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a civil rights group, said the UN’s early warning underlined the need for American leaders to “clearly and unconditionally condemn hatred and bigotry”. “It is a sad day when the president of the United States has so thoroughly failed to denounce white supremacism that UN experts must warn the US about the dangers of racism,” Brooks said. “Unfortunately, Trump’s racist and xenophobic campaign, and his lukewarm condemnation of white supremacists, has heightened racial tensions in America to the point that it’s raising alarms in the global community.” Sherine Tadros, Amnesty International’s UN representative, welcomed the UN’s move. “It is significant that the UN is speaking out publicly against the actions of the new US administration, which it so far has been reluctant to do,” Tadros said. Jasmine Tyler, US program advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, urged the White House to heed the UN warning. “As a black woman raising a black son, and a human rights advocate, I can hardly believe the times we’re living in,” Tyler said. “The Trump administration should take the Cerd’s early warning very seriously and rescind its decision to eviscerate the mandates and budgets of US civil rights institutions; end its attempt to exclude white nationalism from the federal government’s Countering Violent Extremism programs; and end immigration and refugee policies based on anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant sentiment.” The warning was issued on 18 August but came to light on Wednesday, the day after protests outside a rally by the president in Phoenix, Arizona. Trump used Tuesday’s event to portray himself as the victim of events in Charlottesville, branding journalists who “do not like our country” as the true source of division in America. He also accused the “crooked media” of “trying to take away our history and our heritage” and read out previous statements that he said condemned hatred, bigotry and violence. And he complained that the media had not given him enough credit for condemning hate groups. “I said everything,” the president said. “I hit them with neo-Nazi. I hit them with everything. I got the white supremacists, the neo-Nazi. I got them all in there, let’s say. KKK, we have KKK. I got them all.” Protesters outside the Trump rally in Phoenix raise their hands after police used teargas to disperse the crowd. Photograph: Matt York/AP The former director of national intelligence James Clapper later described Trump’s remarks as “downright scary and disturbing”. The former spy chief, who served under Democratic and Republican presidents, also called into question Trump’s fitness to serve. “How much longer does the country have to, to borrow a phrase, endure this nightmare?” Clapper said on CNN. Following Clapper’s remarks, the former British ambassador to the US, Peter Westmacott, compared Tuesday’s rally to Nazi Germany. “Shades of 1933 Germany,” Westmacott tweeted, claiming Trump’s speech was “an invitation to autocrats” in countries without the US’s system of checks and balances “to play the same game more dangerously”. Immediately after the rally, police said they used pepper spray to disperse protesters outside the rally – who numbered in their thousands, according to Arizona media – after being pelted with rocks and bottles. The Phoenix police chief, Jeri Williams, told reporters that four people had been arrested, including three on assault charges. In February, the SPLC said the number of hate groups in the US had risen for a second consecutive year and that “the radical right was energised by the candidacy of Donald Trump”. Until last week, his chief White House strategist was Steve Bannon, a rightwing ideologue and former editor of Breitbart, which Bannon called “a platform for the alt-right”. Bannon has returned to Breitbart News as executive chairman. In its statement, Cerd also called on the US to ensure that the freedoms of expression, association and peaceful assembly are not exercised with the aim of destroying or denying the rights and freedoms of others, ensuring “such rights are not misused to promote racist hate speech and racist crimes”. The committee monitors compliance with the international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, which the US ratified in 1994. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Guardian

The National Islamic Front/National Congress Party in Khartoum is on the verge of securing a permanent lifting of U.S. economic and financial sanctions. This is so despite the failure of the regime to meet one of two key conditions laid down by the Obama administration in its perverse, last-minute decision to lift sanctions provisionally in January 2017: substantial improvement in humanitarian access. At the time, Obama administration UN Ambassador Samantha Power declared that there had been a “sea change of improvement” in humanitarian access: a preposterous and deeply destructively statement that was never corrected by Power herself or anyone else in the Obama administration in a position to do so. The State Department has confirmed to me directly that it has no idea what served as the basis for this claim, and that it did not represent realities in Sudan—either in Darfur or South Kordofan/Blue Nile. There has been none of the claimed “improvement” over the past seven months, nor signs that it will occur before the October 13, 2017 deadline for a final U.S. decision by the woefully under-staffed and ill-informed Trump administration. This is extraordinarily consequential in light of the cholera epidemic that began in Blue Nile State in August 2016 and has relatively recently reached the Darfur region. Vibrio cholerae is a bacterium that could be easily identified from fecal samples sent to UN WHO headquarters in Geneva A Radio Dabanga dispatch below, which makes clear that Khartoum still does not permit Sudanese journalists or medical officials to use the word “cholera,” is ominous in the extreme, especially since the UN World Health Organization, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, and the U.S. Agency for International Development have all been intimidated by Khartoum into using the euphemistic phrase “acute watery diarrhea” instead of “cholera.” This is only one of the reasons there has not been a more urgent response, but it is central: “Nierteti’s hospital faces gaps in medicines, including oral and intravenous re-hydration solutions [..],” OCHA stated. “In Zalingei hospital, there are several sanitation issues, including lack of latrines and evidence of improper solid waste management [..].” Suffering cholera patient; the disease can kill in under 24 hours if untreated; with treatment (primarily simple re-hydration) recovery is almost certain This is horrific news in the midst of a cholera epidemic, one that has now spread to a region with some 2.7 million Internally Displaced Persons, the majority living in camps that have no adequate sanitation or provision of clean water. That it comes at the very height of the rainy season means that the cholera epidemic in Darfur—and elsewhere in Sudan—will remain explosive for the foreseeable future. The most urgent need is for massive quantities of re-hydration equipment—followed closely by rapid improvements in sanitation and the supplies of clean water. And yet Radio Dabanga reports: As coordinator of the camp in Nyala state, Yagoub Abdallah Furi, informed Radio Dabanga yesterday, “There are three medical isolation centres belonging to two organisations from the United States that have been established in the camp since the cholera broke out here in June.” Currently there are 37 hospitalised cases at the camp’s isolation wards. “There is a large shortage of intravenous solutions.” And yet speaking of Central Darfur—and the same is true in all the Darfur states—OCHA declares in its most recent humanitarian bulletin on Sudan: “humanitarian access and insecurity remain major challenges for the implementation of key health and protection interventions” in Central Darfur.” Again, the same is true of all five Darfur states: access is denied to many locations and security issues that Khartoum refuses to address seriously prevent critical deliveries of humanitarian assistance. It is a despicable act of cowardice for the UN World Health Organization to continue its refusal to use the world “cholera” for the exploding epidemic in Sudan, and Darfur in particular. Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of WHO, deserves particular condemnation for his failure of leadership at the critical time (see my “open letter” to Dr. Ghebreyesus | July 24, 2017 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-25t/). ******************************* 42 cholera dead in South Darfur camp Radio Dabanga | 22, 2017 NYALA | https://www.dabangasudan.org/en/all-news/article/42-cholera-dead-in-south-darfur-campugust In two months, 42 people have died of cholera in Kalma camp for displaced people in South Darfur; 539 others have been infected. [This is one camp in Darfur, if the largest; the late arrival of the cholera epidemic in Darfur makes these figures terrifying, especially at the height of the rainy season, when sanitation maintenance and provision of clean water is most difficult—ER] The deaths occurred between 26 June and 20 August, the coordinator of the camp in Nyala state, Yagoub Abdallah Furi, informed Radio Dabanga yesterday. “There are three medical isolation centres belonging to two organisations from the United States that have been established in the camp since the cholera broke out here in June.” Currently there are 37 hospitalised cases at the camp’s isolation wards. “There is a large shortage of intravenous solutions. We hope organisations working in the medical field and the Ministry of Health to provide us with medicines.” The epidemic reached Manawashi, north of Nyala city, in the beginning of August. Central Darfur At least 36 people have been infected with cholera in Central Darfur’s Nierteti in the past 11 days. Four of them died, sources reported to Radio Dabanga. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported in its latest biweekly bulletin that “humanitarian access and insecurity remain major challenges for the implementation of key health and protection interventions” in Central Darfur. [Substantial improvement in humanitarian access to Darfur is one of two primary conditions to be met by the Khartoum regime to secure a permanent lifting of U.S. economic sanctions. Access continues to be denied to as many as 1 million people in Darfur, and total humanitarian embargoes remain in place in virtually all areas in South Kordofan and Blue Nile controlled by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army-North—ER] “Nierteti’s hospital faces gaps in medicines, including oral and intravenous re-hydration solutions [..],” OCHA stated. “In Zalingei hospital, there are several sanitation issues, including lack of latrines and evidence of improper solid waste management [..].” National epidemic The National Epidemiological Corporation reported in early July that nearly 24,000 Sudanese have been infected and 940 cholera patients have died since the outbreak of the infectious disease in Blue Nile state in August last year. The Sudanese authorities however, refuse to call the disease by its name, and instead refer to it as “Acute Watery Diarrhoea.” _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 SUDAN Research, Analysis, and Advocacy

Two of our team members just returned from Iraq, where they traveled to Mosul and Mount Sinjar in Iraq to document what is needed for Christians, Yezidis and other religious minorities to return to their homes. Wherever we go we are asked, “Why doesn’t the Church in America help us?” It is time the Church and all people of goodwill in the West awaken to the cries of those who are suffering and stand up for them. We must learn their stories, pray for them faithfully, share our many resources with them and fight for them both nationally and internationally. One way we at the 21st Century Wilberforce Initiative are working to move people to action is through an event called Speak Freedom Texas. On Sunday, November 5, the Texas Baptists are joining forces with 21CWI to encourage their 5,500 churches to stand with the persecuted. 21CWI has created a web site – www.SpeakFreedomTexas.org -- with a myriad of resources for churches or any faith group and individuals to use. On the site, you can find sermon starters, Sunday School lessons, fact sheets, videos, prayer guides and personal stories from the persecuted that have come from our own interviews. We also have specific ways churches and individuals can be involved, including templates for writing letters to members of Congress and even simple instructions for building an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) shelter just like the ones where so many families are forced to live in crowded and dangerous conditions. This web site and event are open to all churches, college campus chapters or other faith groups or individuals regardless of geography or faith. It is named for Texas because of the partnership with Texas Baptists. Our 21CWI team has traveled to more than a dozen countries of concern during the past three years and has witnessed the devastating results of religious intolerance. We have interviewed hundreds of individuals who have suffered imprisonment, displacement, bodily harm and loss of family members. We have seen villages that were burned to the ground, churches that were vandalized or destroyed and seen families living on the edge of extinction in places once known by the vitality of their faith. Challenge your church leaders to stand with the persecuted on Sunday, November 5 for Speak Freedom Texas. Use the resources we have provided to become engaged in the fight for the voiceless. Randel Everett President and Founder ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Wilberforce Initiative

On Tuesday, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported that children have been increasingly used as “human bombs” in northern Nigeria by Boko Haram, with the number for 2017 already being four-times are many used during all of 2016. A UNICEF representative said that 83 children have been forced to go on suicide missions by the militant group this year alone, with 55 of the children being girls under the age of 15 and 27 being young boys. Alarmingly, there was even an instance of an infant being strapped to a young girl and used as a bomb. Young children such as these are meant to catch bystanders unaware, as young children are typically seen as harmless. Unfortunately, it seems that Boko Haram’s tactics have worked: the frequency of successful suicide attacks has increased dramatically in recent weeks, and with it, the number of casualties. 170 civilians have become the victims of suicide attacks in northern Nigeria since only 1 June of this year. As a result, communities have come to fear the children who have escaped from Boko Haram, going as far as ostracizing them and leaving them in the hands of authorities. In an effort to effectively rid the country of the group, the Nigerian government has announced it is seeking to build an alliance with Russia to help combat Boko Haram. The Nigerian Defence Foreign Minister, Dan-Ali, met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Shoigu on 22 August and discussed counterterrorism cooperation. The Nigerian government has sought to eliminate Boko Haram from its borders in the past, even claiming it had done so last year, but the militant group remains dishearteningly resilient. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 RtoP Weekly

Even before the pope’s expected visit to Myanmar has been officially announced, it has become the subject of boisterous contention in a country riven by religious and ethnic tension. While Myanmar’s main political and religious leaders described the visit of Pope Francis as a potential salve for the country’s troubles, hard-line Buddhist nationalists warned the pope against using it to champion the Rohingya — a persecuted Muslim minority that many Buddhists in Myanmar insist are from neighboring Bangladesh, even though Rohingya families have lived in the country for generations. “There is no Rohingya ethnic group in our country, but the pope believes they are originally from here. That’s false,” said Ashin Wirathu, an ultranationalist monk in the former royal capital, Mandalay, and a leader of a hard-line Buddhist movement, Ma Ba Tha, that Myanmar’s top Buddhist authority has tried to suppress. He said he viewed the expected visit as “political instigation.” The expected visit, from Nov. 27 to 29, would be the first to Myanmar, also known as Burma, by any pope and may be formally announced as early as Wednesday, officials from the government and the Roman Catholic Church said in interviews. Vatican officials were said to have arrived on Monday in Yangon, Myanmar’s cultural and business capital, to coordinate logistics. Less obvious, observers said, is why the government in Myanmar, which is led by the democracy icon and Nobel Peace laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, chose to invite Pope Francis, who had previously expressed concern for the plight of the Rohingya. Another question, they said, is whether he would be viewed by Myanmar’s hard-line Buddhist fringe as a neutral peacemaker or a pro-Muslim antagonist. “The pope, as a world religious and spiritual leader, has the potential to speak well in this situation” and win the trust of both Buddhist nationalists and members of the Rohingya community, said Benedict Rogers, a human rights advocate based in London with the group Christian Solidarity Worldwide who has written several books about Myanmar. “But there is a potential for a negative action from groups like Ma Ba Tha,” Mr. Rogers added. “And what scale that will be really remains to be seen.” When Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s political party, the National League for Democracy, came to power in 2016 after winning Myanmar’s first free general election in decades the year before, she became the leader of a country with a long history of military rule, simmering religious and ethnic tensions, borderlands that were haunted by slow-burning civil wars and a military-drafted Constitution that left generals — who had once kept her under house arrest — with firm control of the domestic security apparatus. She said that her top priority was making peace with armed ethnic groups that had been fighting the Myanmar Army for decades. But the goal has proved elusive, and fighting has flared along Myanmar’s border with China, in the east. Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi has also been widely criticized by human rights experts who say that she has done little to stop a brutal counterinsurgency campaign by Myanmar soldiers and policemen against the Rohingya — violence that United Nations experts sayprobably amounts to crimes against humanity. Analysts say that Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s state counselor, may see the pope as an impartial figure whose visit could help defuse some of the international outcry over her handling of the violence in Rakhine State. CreditAgence France-Presse — Getty Images The violence, along the Bangladesh border in the western state of Rakhine, began after nine border officials were killed there by Rohingya militants last October. It was followed this January by the brazen assassination in Yangon of one of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s top advisers, who was Muslim, and later by vigilante attacks and brawls between Buddhists and Muslims that shook the city. In February, Pope Francis rebuked Myanmar for its treatment of the Rohingya. “They have been suffering, they are being tortured and killed, simply because they uphold their Muslim faith,’’ he said during a weekly audience at the Vatican. Myanmar said in June that it would refuse to grant visas to three United Nations-backed experts who planned to conduct a human rights fact-finding mission to determine the circumstances of violence against civilians in Rakhine State and other restive areas. But in May, Myanmar established diplomatic ties with the Vatican after a parliamentary vote that won support from the military’s political representatives. Analysts said that Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi may see Pope Francis as an impartial figure whose visit could help defuse some of the international outcry over her handling of the violence in Rakhine State — and perhaps also hold the military to account for it to a greater extent than she realistically could herself. She has been reluctant to alienate the military, in part because its political representatives control crucial ministries and have the power to veto proposed constitutional amendments. The visit would “improve the peace process and national reconciliation and create a communication bridge between Myanmar and the international community,” said U Yan Myo Thein, a political analyst in Yangon. Mainstream Buddhist, Muslim and Catholic leaders in Myanmar echoed that sentiment in interviews. “I think the pope’s visit will lead to an improvement in interfaith relations, and I hope we can get good advice on the Rakhine conflict,” said U Tin Maung Than, the general secretary of Myanmar’s Islamic Religious Affairs Council, a nongovernmental organization. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The New York Times

Should the U.S. have closer military ties with Burma? Some members of Congress think so, and are trying to make it happen. But such a move would be inadvisable. In a proposed amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which Congress is slated to take up when it returns from recess in September, the Senate signaled support to expand the scale and scope of U.S.-Burma military-to-military ties. Such an expansion is a bad idea on many grounds, not the least of which is Burma’s current ties to North Korea – a regime who’s nuclear and missile programs the Trump administration has made a cornerstone of its foreign policy to counter. The amendment would further expand the U.S. military’s ties with the Burmese military by providing training in regional and global security issues and anti-trafficking best practices. It would also enable consultation on maritime and peace-keeping operations, among other issues. Joseph Yun, the U.S. Department of State’s Special Envoy for North Korea, visited Burma late last month to press the Burmese government and military to suspend its ties to North Korea. Burma was one of a handful of priority countries that the Trump administration physically dispatched officials to visit for the express purpose of discussing curtailing ties to Pyongyang. During his visit to Burma, Yun specifically stated that the U.S. could not fully normalize ties to the Burmese military if it does not discontinue its support for North Korea. While Burmese military officials deny having any ties beyond “normal relations” with North Korea, publically available evidence suggests otherwise. In fact, Burma has aided North Korea’s missile program developmentand may even house North Korean defense facilities. They also have a shared history of drug trafficking, counterfeiting, and money laundering. Profits from these illicit activities often fill the private coffers of the Kim regime or help fund the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s nuclear and missile weapons programs. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Forbes

Rohingya villagers watch as international media visit Maung Hna Ma village, Buthidaung township, northern Rakhine state, Myanmar, July 2017. Hundreds of Rohingya Muslims have been blockaded inside their area by their Buddhist neighbors in a western Myanmar village, residents say, as religious tensions in troubled Rakhine state spread to a more ethnically mixed part of the region. Monitors and aid workers worry that violence that has until now been largely confined to the Rohingya-majority northern part of Rakhine, bordering Bangladesh, could erupt in an area where the two communities live side-by-side in much larger numbers. Residents, aid workers and monitors told Reuters that Muslims in the village of Zay Di Pyin had been blocked from going to work or fetching food and water for the last three weeks, although a small number had been allowed through the blockade to buy provisions on Tuesday. Police said Rakhine Buddhist villagers were restricting the amount of food the Rohingya could buy, but denied their movement around the village and access to work had been blocked. "I think they are just afraid and aren't going out," said Myanmar police headquarters spokesman Colonel Myo Thu Soe. The government said it was working to improve security in the area. The stand-off has raised fears of a repeat of the communal violence that broke out in the Rakhine state capital Sittwe in 2012, leading to the killing of nearly 200 people and displacement of some 140,000 - most of them Rohingya. "The concern in Zay Di Pyin is that this could escalate into violence between the two communities," said Chris Lewa of Arakan Project, a Rohingya monitoring group. Rakhine has long been riven between ethnic Rahkine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims. Around 1.1 million Rohingya live in the state, but are denied citizenship and face severe travel restrictions, with many Buddhists across Myanmar regarding them as illegal immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh. More than 87,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since Rohingya insurgents killed nine police in northwest Rakhine in October. That prompted a military crackdown beset by allegations of rape, killings and arson by the security forces. PENNED IN In Zay Di Pyin, a large, mixed village of some 5,000 people with a mosque and a Buddhist monastery, Rakhine residents have penned about 700 Rohingya inside their neighborhood by blocking entry points with a fence since late July, preventing access to a market and a pond used as a source of drinking water, according to two Muslim residents and monitors. Local people said tensions had spiked in late July, when a Rakhine Buddhist man from a nearby village went missing. Three Rohingya residents were found killed in the area in the same period. "They accused us of killing the missing Rakhine person and blocked us from going out because of that," a Rohingya man told Reuters by telephone, speaking on condition of anonymity. An abandoned Rohingya house is seen at U Shey Kya village outside Maungdaw, in Rakhine state, Myanmar, October 2016 A second Rohingya man inside the blockaded area told Reuters the residents were being stopped from going to work at the local river jetty, where many carry loads for a living. They were also prevented from praying at the village mosque, which is outside the blocked area, he said. Rakhine villagers, some armed with swords and sticks, had set up makeshift checkpoints at six points around the Rohingya quarter, the men told Reuters. Both of them said there has been no major violent incidents so far. Police spokesman Colonel Myo Thu Soe said authorities had received a complaint about the blockade last week and had brokered a meeting on Friday, at which it was agreed 15 Rohingya residents would be allowed to leave their neighborhood to fetch food twice a week. Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi's spokesman Zaw Htay said the issue was resolved on Friday and that the "villagers can go out", adding that the government was planning to provide security for them. He did not give more details. One of the Rohingya men confirmed that 15 people had been allowed to go out to buy food for the community on Tuesday, but said they were still not permitted to move around freely. "They said that 15 people will be able to leave twice a week - but we can't work so I don't know how we'll be able to afford food," said the man. WILL THE FOOD LAST? Zay Di Pyin is located in the ethnically mixed Rathedaung district, some 65 km (40 miles) north of Sittwe. In another incident that has added to tensions in the area, residents in the neighboring village of Auk Nan Yar, where the Rohingya are the majority, said they were being prevented from leaving their village by security forces. It follows a confrontation in early August between hundreds of Muslims and security forces who were trying to arrest six Rohingya men accused of raising money for militants. In a separate incident on that day seven Buddhists were killed in a different part of northern Rakhine. In the week following the incidents, Suu Kyi convened a high-level security meeting in the capital Naypyitaw and declared a curfew in the area, while the army sent some 500 soldiers to reinforce around Aug. 10. Police said the military was conducting a "clearance operation" in the nearby Mayu mountain range, where the government suspects Rohingya insurgents have been training. "The nearby villagers were warned to be careful when they go out to he mountains in order to avoid getting arrested by mistake," said spokesman Myo Thu Soe. Two villagers from Auk Nan Yar told Reuters that they too were now unable to get to a market to buy food or to work. "Now we're sharing the food we have left with each other in the village," said one of the villagers. "We don't know how long the food will last." _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Reuters

Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the chair of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, arrived in Yangon on Tuesday afternoon, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Mr. Annan is scheduled to meet Myanmar President U Htin Kyaw in Naypyitaw tomorrow morning. According to the advisory commission’s official Facebook page, Mr. Annan will address questions from the media in the Sule Shangri-la Hotel on Thursday morning. The commission’s final report will be published on the same day. The report will include recommendations for the government on conflict prevention, humanitarian assistance, reconciliation between the region’s Buddhist and Muslim communities, institution building, and development in conflict-torn Rakhine State. According to commission member Al-Haj U Aye Lwin, Mr. Annan will not travel to Rakhine State during this trip—his third visit to Myanmar. The commission was established by State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in August 2016 and is comprised of two Yangon-based Muslim representatives, and two Buddhist Arakanese representatives, two government officials and three international experts, including Mr. Annan. A memorandum of understanding between the State Counselor’s Office and the Kofi Annan Foundation was signed last year but specific information pertaining to the agreement was not released to the public. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Irrawaddy

Ethnic Lisu people wait for the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group to deliver bags of rice to their internally displaced persons camp in Sadone, northern Myanmar’s Kachin state, Aug. 20, 2017. Photo courtesy of the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group The Myanmar military has stopped a prominent domestic activist and aid group from delivering rice to war refugees in a camp in Kachin state, even though there are no hostilities between the government army and ethnic militias in the area. Soldiers on Sunday stopped cars driven by members of the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group, formerly known as the pro-democracy 88 Generation Student Group, from transporting bags of rice to ethnic Lisu people living in an internally displaced persons camp in the northern state’s Sadone area They left their villages during a recent flare-up of hostilities between the Myanmar army and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), one of Myanmar's ethnic armed militias. The two armies have been engaged in fighting in the state, which is home to many of the country’s estimated 700,000 members of the Lisu ethnic minority. Mie Mie, an activist and a prominent member of the 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group — known for its activism against a previous military junta that ruled the country — told RFA’s Myanmar Service that troops prevented members from entering the area to deliver the rice, though the group had received permission from the Kachin state government. More than 500 internally displaced persons, including 100 children, are staying at the camp. “We were stopped by the Regional Military Command at Washaung gate,” Mie Mie said. “They [soldiers] said we could go to the camps, but not deliver the rice at the moment because they would have to ask higher authorities.” The group was accompanied by the ethnic Burman and Lisu affairs ministers from the Kachin state government and representatives from some of the state’s civil society organizations, she said. “We hope we can deliver the rice to Sadone in a couple of days,” Mie Mie said. The group has already delivered bags of rice to internally displaced persons in camps in the areas of Namti and Washaung and is planning to send some to a refugee camp in the Tanaing area, she said. In June, fighting between government soldiers and the KIA forced thousands of people to flee the seven wards that comprise the Tanaing gold and amber mining region in Kachin state’s Tanaing township. A month later, government troops clashed again with KIA soldiers in the state’s Indawgyi region, though no casualties were reported at the time. The Myanmar government is trying to end decades of ethnic separatist civil wars and forge peace in the country through a series of peace negotiations launched last August by de facto national leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The KIA was invited as an observer rather than a participant to the second and most recent peace conference in May, because the group, along with seven other militias, has not signed the government’s nationwide cease-fire agreement (NCA). The KIA was one of four ethnic armed groups belonging to an umbrella organization for militias which have not signed the NCA that recently split from the body over a disagreement about the pact. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 RFA’s Myanmar Service

There has been an alarming spread of human rights crises across the globe. But there are some persecuted populations that seem to be more on the receiving end than others. It has been increasingly clear that the Burmese Rohingya are one population that no one wants. Facing ethnic cleansing and lack of official recognition in their own country, they have been turned out from every other country they have tried to flee to. Bangladesh began to set up armed patrols to keep out Rohingya migrants fleeing from the Rakhine province. Now, India has announced that it will attempt to deport an estimated 40,000 Rohingya Muslims back to Myanmar. It is clear that this step would put in grave danger these refugees’ lives. The ongoing military operation in the Rakhine territory has increased the outward migration of Rohingya into other countries through dangerous routes. The Indian state’s argument is that, while 14,000 of the Rohingya are registered with the UNHCR, many more living in India are ‘illegal’ and unregistered. The decision by the Indian deputy interior minister to use the term ‘illegal immigrants’ instead of refugees for the Rohingyas is an unfortunate – and seemingly purposeful – glossing over of the fact that these people are running away from persecution in their own land and would rather live in their own country. The Rohingya in Myanmar live in conditions that have been called 21st century concentration camps. The human rights abuses against them have been documented enough to be able to establish that there is a serious problem which needs international intervention. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have been forced to leave Myanmar – and the entire population could soon become state-less. The Indian decision to send them back to ‘their country’ is part of the international hypocrisy on the issue. The simple fact is that the country that they were born in does not accept them – and is, in fact, happy to use violence against them. India’s rejection of the refugee clauses of the UN can only be called a shameful precedent. While the National Human Rights Commission of India has issued a notice to the Indian central government over the plan to deport the refugees, it is unlikely that will have much of an effect. It is also quite possible the Muslim identity of the Rohingya has been the inspiration behind this step by the Indian government. That said, we must remember that Muslim-majority Bangladesh has not demonstrated itself to be much better regarding the Rohingya either. The UN general secretary has expressed his concern over the Indian plan – but the UN must do more than just express concerns. The Rohingya have faced the most terrible kind of world apathy. If that doesn’t change, they will be the victims of not just the Myanmar government but also of the entire international community. __________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The International News

Myanmar joint forces of military and Border Guard Police raided YenotNgaTha village tract under sector-2, Maungdaw North and arrested four innocent Rohingya men from the village on 21 August 2017. According to our correspondent report, on 21 August at around 1; 00 pm, approximately 100 joint forces of army and BGP from camp-5 under sector-2 besieged the YenotNgaTha village and arrested 4 innocent Rohingya residents from the village. The victims were taken to BGP camp and tortured them in their custody claiming their having link with the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA). The detainees have been identified as Isak Ahamed (27), son of Nur Muhamed, Mv Hamid Hussain (40), son of Muhamed, Rashid Ahamed (45), son of Muhamed Nasim and Kamal Hussain (50), son of Muhamed of the village. The Village Administrator (U Maung Mya) and Acting Administrator (U Hamid Hussain recommended and certified to the BGP Officer that the four arrested Rohingya are regular inhabitants of YenotNgaTha and they never involved in any subversive activities who are leading a simple life in the village. The four detained persons are day laborers who somehow support their families and starve most of the times. Now the family members of the arrestees are in sorrow about their fathers and in deep though how they can survive without support of their fathers. It is learnt that two out of four vicims are about to die following severe and indiscriminate toture of soldiers in the custody (detention center) now. During raid, the forces also plundered Kyat 200, 000 from victim Rashid Ahamed’s house. The villagers are also in panic situation following the frequent raid of joint forces who arbitrarily arrest people and torture severely, said a resident. On 20 August 2017, the forces surrounded the South Para, Dia Para and Middle Para of Tulatuli under sector-4 and carried out an intensified raid and gathered all the villagers including women and children at village school and claimed that the villagers had link with insurgent group. The forces plundered the valuables including cash money from the houses and destroyed the house hold articles during the raid. They also destroyed the houses of Mohamed Alam (28), son of Abu Alam, Sultan Ahamed (62), son of Abdur Rahim and Mohamed Nur (30) son of Halu of the village, source added. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Arakan Times

Amid calls for their deportation from India, Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar say they have settled in Jammu and Kashmir because of compulsions, and not out of choice, and that they will return to their country once the situation becomes favourable. More than 13,700 foreigners, including Rohingya Muslims and Bangladesh nationals, are settled in Jammu and Samba districts, where their population has increased by over 6,000 between 2008 and 2016, according to data available with the state government. "We are in India because of some compulsions, and not out of choice. We know this is not our land. We will leave on our own once those compulsions are addressed by the global community and we get justice," 35-year-old Mohammad Yusuf, the head of a camp for Rohingya refugees, told PTI. The Rohingyas are a Bengali-dialect speaking Muslim minority in Myanmar. Following persecution in their country, many of them entered India illegally through Bangladesh and took shelter here. "We were boarded into a train and asked to embark at the last station when the whole train gets empty. We were not aware that it is Jammu. We came to know at the railway station that some Rohingyas were living here and met them. This is how we reached here," he said, explaining why they landed in Jammu and Kashmir, several thousand miles from their homes. The Rohingya refugees are aware of reports about New Delhi's plan to deport them and the 'Quit Jammu' campaign by certain social and political organisations that see their presence as a "conspiracy to alter the demographic character and a threat to the peace in the region". Fear of deportation writ large on the faces of the refugees at their temporary cluster in Narwal on the Jammu- Pathankot highway. Yusuf, originally a resident of the worst-hit Arakan in Myanmar, has been living in one of the 75 shanties, along with his wife and four minor children. The settlement is considered the largest on the outskirts of the city. Such camps have also been set up at a number of other places including Bhagwati Nagar, Ban Talab, Channi and Bari Brahmana in Samba district. "We are not involved in any criminal activity and are doing odd jobs to make our living. Most of us work as wage labourers, rag-pickers, scrap-dealers and a few are working at railway stations as sweepers," he said. Rohingyas are facing a battle for survival, he says. "We are paying Rs 800 per month as rent to the land owner for each shanty and electricity connection," said Yusuf, surrounded by a group of men and children who nodded in agreement. On August 18, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) issued a notice to the Centre over the plan to deport Rohingya refugees. The NHRC notice came just days after UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres expressed concern over India's plan, and said the refugees should not be returned to the countries where they fear persecution. The Human Rights Watch's South Asia also asked India to abide by its international legal obligations and not forcibly return Rohingya refugees to Myanmar. According to the Human Rights Watch, about 16,500 Rohingya Muslims living in India are registered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), while the government contends that around 40,000 illegal immigrants from Myanmar are unregistered. Yusuf, who had arrived in Jammu in 2012 and got registration card from the UNHCR the next year, said there are around 8,000 Rohingyas in Jammu and none of them had ever been arrested for terror links. The state government had said only 17 FIRs were lodged against 38 Rohingyas for various offences, including illegal border-crossing. Yusuf, who is also the prayer leader and runs a madrasa within the settlement for the children of their community, said their religious belief is the same as of 'Deobandi' thought and "we believe in non-violence". "Back home, we cooperated with local government and implemented its orders fully, whether of seeking permission for marriage and depositing Rs five lakh for various services. Despite that, we faced the wrath and forced to migrate to save our faith and lives," he said. "We have people here who have seen worst and their stories can send shivers down the spine. They are targeting us because of our religion otherwise we had done nothing wrong," he said. Yusuf was all praise for the people of Jammu. "After a fire left us on the roads with all our belongings consumed by flames, the people came forward and helped generously to make us to restart our shattered lives," he said, referring to the fire in their camp earlier. He, however, said they did not get any institutional help, except from an NGO, Save the Children. The Jammu and Kashmir head of the NGO, Mohammad Shafi Bhat, said, "We are running a health and hygiene camp across the state and as part of our efforts to reach the last child, we concentrate on the health issues of the children of Rohingyas as well." "We do not extend any monetary help to them but our effort is concentrated on improving the conditions for their children to check spread of any disease and improve their survival rate," he added. Yasmeen Akhtar, a resident of Bousdang area of Myanmar and a select few who could speak in Urdu, said they have been facing lot of hardships in running their households. Initially reluctant to talk like many other women in the camp, Yasmeen said they have to buy even water. "We don't need anything but please allow us to stay back and spend a few peaceful years of our lives," she pleaded. Akhtar has been living with her husband and a girl child in the camp for the past five years. In May, the state government had announced the setting up of a high-level Group Of Ministers (GoM) on the issue of illegal settlement of foreign immigrants in Jammu and Samba. The panel is yet to submit its report, drawing criticism even from the BJP which is a part of the coalition government. Comprising two ministers each from BJP and PDP, the GoM headed by Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh has been given the mandate to go into the settlement of illegal migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh and examine all relevant aspects related to them. Earlier this year, BJP legal cell member Hunar Gupta had moved the high court seeking identification and deportation of Rohingyas and Bangladeshis from Jammu. The matter is sub- judice. "We want to go back to our homeland but the oppression is keeping us away. We know we will be killed if we go back," said Mohammad Zakariya in one of the camps for Rohingyas. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The New Indian Express