Forced Muslim Recruitment and Divide-to-Conquer Tactics in War for Control of Arakan

By Admin 05 Oct 2024

Written by Nay Win San

During the renewed hostilities between Myanmar's military regime and the Arakkha Army (AA) in Arakan State, which began in November 2023, much evidence has emerged that the regime has been arming Muslims and forcing them to fight on the front lines.

AA statements have indicated that the bodies of dead Muslims were found during the seizure of multiple military camps.

The regime has reportedly recruited Muslims from villages and camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Sittwe, Buthidaung, Maungdaw and Kyaukphyu townships through threats, coercion and incentives. There were some who escaped because they did not want to serve in the army, but most of the Muslims targeted were forced to join the military.

A Legal Basis

In February, the regime introduced mandatory two-year military service for men aged 18-35 and women aged 18-27, citing existing legislation to do so.

The national conscription law and reserve force law that were used to justify involuntary military service are intended to restore peace and stability in Myanmar, junta boss Min Aung Hlaing told a military parade on March 27 to mark the 79th anniversary of Armed Forces Day.

The regime began compiling lists of potential draftees in urban and rural parts of Arakan State under its control in February, including Muslims in Sittwe, Kyaukphyu, Buthidaung and Maungdaw townships.

The regime trained 1,000 Muslims from displacement camps in Sittwe Township in February and March, and the conscripts were given two weeks of military training at the Regional Operations Command in Sittwe before they were sent to the front line to fight the AA.

In April, 500 young men were taken from Muslim villages such as Bumay, Thaechaung, Barsar, Darpaing and Thakkapyin in Sittwe Township for military training. Family members have lost contact with many of them.

The Muslims did not want to join the army, but due to pressure from the regime, they were forced to attend the military training, said Maung Kyaw Naing, a young Muslim in Sittwe Township who asked that he be identified by a pseudonym.

"In a given family, if a son runs away without serving in the military, the regime arrests a member of his family and forces him to serve in the military. If a draftee does not attend military training, the regime arrests and tortures his parents," he said.

Arakan State Security and Border Affairs Minister Colonel Kyaw Thura personally went to villages and displacement camps and ordered Muslim village administrators and camp officials to recruit Muslims as conscripts.

The Muslim community said that most of the Muslims who had completed military training were sent to the front lines of the expanding theatre of war in Arakan State, while others were forced to guard villages in Sittwe Township.

"Some have died in clashes with the AA in Rathedaung Township. The regime gave more than 200 Muslims military training at one time. Some Muslim conscripts were assigned to guard Palinpyin Village," Maung Kyaw Naing said.

Via a lottery system, the regime has been conscripting IDPs from Muslim displacement camps in Sittwe Township including Bumay, Thaechaung, Barsar, Darpaing, Thakkaypyin, and Ohntaw since May 25.

"No one wants to go to military training anymore. That's why draftees are chosen through the lottery system. Fifteen Muslim IDPs have been taken to the military regiment," said a Muslim man from the Thakkaypyin displacement camp. "We were forced to attend the military training."

Non-Muslims Conscripted Too

The regime has also enlisted non-Muslims in Arakan State's Sittwe, Ann, Taungup, Thandwe, Kyaukphyu, Manaung and Gwa townships for military service.

The junta has pressured more than 100 ethnic Chin people from about 10 villages in Ann Township to join the military. Regime soldiers came to Chin villages along the Minbu-Ann road, telling residents to enlist under the conscription law activated in February.

"I have seen reports about the regime forcibly conscripting people in areas it controls. Locals can't defy the guns. And they have nowhere to run," said a young Chin man in Ann Township.

Around the end of February, village administrators in Manaung Township received instructions from the regime to conscript two people from each village. More recently, the regime has told them to conscript 50 people in villages with more than 150 households, and 100 people in villages of more than 200 households.

The regime recruited nearly 5,000 young people for its military training batch No. 1 and about 4,000 for batch No. 2, according to figures compiled by the Burma Affairs and Conflict Study (BACS) organisation.

Graduation formalities for the military training batch No. 1 were held on June 28, 2024, at regional military headquarters across the country.

Against a Backdrop of AA Advances

The AA seized control of Rathedaung on March 17 after launching attacks on the military's Light Infantry Battalion Nos. 536, 537 and 538 that lasted for about two weeks.

The AA said that it found the bodies of Muslim combatants in Rathedaung upon seizing the town in March.

U Rawfi (a pseudonym) from Bumay Village in Sittwe Township said: "I want to say that the regime is killing Muslims by using them as hostages."

U Pe Than, a military and political analyst, and former lawmaker for Arakan State, said that the regime is recruiting and empowering Muslims in the townships under its control.

"The regime recruited Muslim conscripts to prepare a defence. As young people are being unfairly recruited to serve in the military, they are suffering more and want to revolutionise against the regime. The people of the Muslim community also know these things. I understand that Muslims are caught between the two sides, but they are in trouble because they can't overcome it," he said.

Fleeing 'Service'

Junta troops went to one IDP camp on February 22, registering eligible persons at the camp before ordering them to serve in the military and doing medical checkups.

Some 30 men and women fled the following day to avoid conscription, but scores of Muslim men at the displacement camp were reportedly detained on February 23, according to those who evaded conscription.

"We fled on the night of February 22. Soldiers surrounded the camp the next morning. I heard that more than 100 people, including some of my relatives, were detained," a Muslim woman who fled the Kyauktalone camp told DMG.

The escapees are currently taking shelter in an area controlled by the AA, she added.

The conscription law stipulates that men between the ages of 18 and 35 must serve in the military, but Muslims said that recruitment from the Kyauktalone displacement camp included men between the ages of 18 and 55.

Even as the regime undertook recruitment, Muslims noted that they are deprived of basic rights such as citizenship, freedom of movement, and access to medical care.

There has been a different dynamic to the regime's recruitment of Muslims from Buthidaung and Maungdaw compared with other Arakan State townships, in that Muslim armed groups active in Buthidaung and Maungdaw have reportedly allied with the military.

The AA says that the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), Arakan Rohingya Army (ARA) and Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) are among those who are fighting the AA in cooperation with the Myanmar military in Maungdaw Township. Local residents in Maungdaw have corroborated the claim.

"The Myanmar military ordered that every household must serve in the military. When the Myanmar military joined forces with ARSA, it gained considerable strength. ARSA threatened Muslims not to leave Maungdaw," said Haki Mumosta, a 32-year-old Muslim man from Ward 2 in Buthidaung.

Junta soldiers were recruiting Muslims, as were the Muslim armed groups. A 16-year-old boy, the son of U Arbutayoke from Ward 5 in Buthidaung, was abducted by ARSA members and junta soldiers for military service.

"My son was forcibly abducted by ARSA members at a betel quid shop. He was taken away in a car," U Arbutayoke recounted.

U Arbutayoke said his son escaped the day after his arrest when a fight broke out near the military camp where his captors were stationed.

"ARSA, together with the Myanmar military, has instigated the conflict between the Rakhine and Muslims," he added.

Sade Kular, 50, said his son was also forcibly drafted by the regime. The junta reportedly abducted around 30 men from Kyaukphyu Taung Village in Buthidaung Township.

"Both my wife and I were at home [when regime soldiers came for their son]. My wife pulled one arm of my son, and a junta soldier pulled the other arm. A soldier pressed a lit cigarette to the left arm of my wife. She still has a scar," he said.

The 25-year-old husband of Marajan was another victim of the Kyaukphyu Taung Village "recruitment" drive.

"We were sleeping when they came into our house. They forcibly took my husband. When I begged them, they hit me, and dragged away my husband," said Marajan.

The AA released a video clip on May 4 after it seized the Buthidaung-based No. 15 Military Operations Command. Among the junta soldiers who surrendered to the AA were the Deputy Commander of the No. 15 Military Operations Command, family members of the junta soldiers and Muslims who were forcibly recruited.

Marajan assumed that her husband had been held captive by the AA during the battle, having been forcibly taken by the regime and pushed onto the battlefield. Marajan is struggling to raise her three children on her own, and is hoping for her husband's release.

In an interview with The Diplomat on June 24, Major Hlaing Win Tun of the Myanmar military recalled the reasons that prompted the military to join hands with ARSA, which eventually led to the forced conscription and training of hundreds of Muslim youths in the region, including from refugee camps in Bangladesh.

Hlaing Win Tun was assigned to Light Infantry Battalion No. 353 when he was apprehended by the AA along with other soldiers on May 17. The State Administration Council (SAC) established by the Myanmar military after the February 2021 coup approached ARSA to forge a united front to defend Buthidaung against the AA, he said.

It all speaks of a calculated effort to sow divisions between the two largest ethno-religious communities in Arakan State, many agree.

"The regime is trying to prevent harmony between Arakanese and Muslims. The regime is making a profit by pitting Arakanese and Muslims [against one another]," said Ko Hakimu Mustah, a Muslim man from Ward 2 in Buthidaung Town.

Conscription Beyond the Border

Among those recruited for Myanmar military service have been not only local Muslims, but also Muslims sheltering in refugee camps in Bangladesh. Muslim armed groups abduct Muslim refugees from refugee camps in Bangladesh and sell them as conscripts to Myanmar's military regime, Fortify Rights said in a July 26 report.

The abduction and forced conscription of Muslims amounts to human trafficking, according to Fortify Rights. Refugees have confirmed that Muslim armed groups such as ARSA and RSO abduct young people from the refugee camps in Bangladesh and turn them over to the junta in Myanmar.

"Rohingya [Muslim] survivors of the ongoing genocide committed by the Myanmar military are now being forced to join the ranks of the very actors responsible for committing atrocities against them," said Ejaz Min Khant, human rights associate at Fortify Rights. "The abduction and forced conscription of Rohingya may amount to human trafficking and should be urgently addressed."

Muslim refugees abducted from Bangladesh refugee camps were forced to join junta battalions in Maungdaw Township, where they underwent military training before being sent to the front line.

A 17-year-old Muslim teenager who was abducted on March 1 said: "Seven people came and pointed a gun at me, blindfolded and tied my arms and legs with a rope, then abducted me from there. Later, I was taken to Myanmar."

According to Fortify Rights, "approximately more than 1,700 Rohingya refugees" were abducted by Muslim armed groups from March to May, and sold as conscripts to the regime.

The RSO has denied abducting Muslim refugees and sending them to Myanmar or cooperating with the regime, Fortify Rights noted in its July 26 report. "The Bangladesh authorities need to protect Rohingya refugees from forced conscription in the camps where they are supposed to be safe," said Fortify Rights.

Hundreds of young Muslim men from the refugee camps in Bangladesh have thus gone into hiding.

"They abduct young men on the streets and hand them over to the regime. The regime gives them military training and forces them to fight. So, young refugees have fled the camps. I heard that some abductees have been killed in fighting," said a refugee from the Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh.

Myanmar military counterinsurgency operations following attacks by ARSA militants in northern Arakan State in 2017 led to the mass exodus of more than 700,000 Muslims to Bangladesh. They have since been living in refugee camps in Bangladesh.

The Gambia has brought a case against Myanmar's military at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for the alleged burning of entire villages, killings, brutality, sexual violence against women, and racial discrimination during the military's so-called clearance operations.

A Desperate Regime Resorts to Familiar Playbook

Successive military regimes in Myanmar have used various methods to assert control and advance their interests, and exploiting ethnic and religious differences in society is one such strategy, according to a report published in September 2023 by Nyan Lin Thit Analytica, a local research group.

Political analysts say the regime's forced conscription of Muslims is another dirty trick to fulfil its recruitment needs in the face of a revolution that it appears increasingly unable to quell, while also creating ethnic conflict between Arakanese and Muslims.

"In 2012 and 2017, there were ethnic and religious conflicts between Muslims and Arakanese, and there was tension between the two communities," said U Khin Maung Win, a Muslim cleric. "For 10 years, no one has been able to reconcile these tensions, but the AA has. At a time when relations between the two are improving, we do not want issues that will cause ethnic conflict."

The 2012 conflict left profound strains on relations between Arakan State's Muslims and Arakanese people. After the AA gained a foothold in Arakan State, concerted efforts were made to restore good relations between the two communities.

When the fighting stopped, albeit temporarily, in Arakan State following the 2020 general elections, the AA took the lead in organising events, discussions and events to promote harmony among the Muslim and Arakanese populations.

"We also have rural administration, [institutions of] religion and a judiciary built with the cooperation of local Muslims. We cannot manage such a large population without Muslims," said Maj-Gen Twan Mrat Naing, commander-in-chief of the AA, during an interview with The Irrawaddy, a local news outlet.

Arakanese and Muslim students have also cooperated to promote harmony between the two communities in Arakan State.

A Fraught War Continues

The regime has lost 10 towns in Arakan State and Paletwa in neighbouring Chin State to the AA since renewed fighting began in November, and is defending against the ethnic armed group's attacks to prevent Maungdaw, Thandwe, Ann and Taungup from being seized.

The AA has announced that it will continue its onslaught in an effort to create a junta-free zone in Arakan State, but has been criticised for attacking junta positions in Buthidaung and Maungdaw townships where many Muslims live.

Dozens of people were killed on August 5 in an attack along the Naf River, which forms the border between Myanmar and Bangladesh in Maungdaw Township. The AA has been accused of perpetrating that attack, reportedly involving both aerial drones and artillery strikes.

The AA released a statement on August 7 denying responsibility for the killings. "Those deaths did not happen in territory controlled by us, and we have nothing to do with it," read the statement.

Fortify Rights has called for an investigation into the incident, and the fog of war remains thick across much of Arakan State. Regardless of the battlefield triumphs and losses of the warring parties, it seems clear that the junta is intent on sowing the seeds of division for many years to come.

"Even if Arakan State comes under the control of the AA, the regime will definitely destabilise Myanmar's westernmost state," said a Muslim man in Kyauktaw Township. "We need to be aware of the tricks of the regime."