^^ Trying to take the moral high ground on feelz? Check!
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/eb049231
The government of a dubiously democratic, newly independent state, in a relentless and openly avowed land‐grab, is waging genocidal warfare against the non‐Muslim tribal minorities who occupy lands along one of its borders with India. A Bangladeshi army commander operating in the Tracts once avowed the government's aim: “We Want the
Soil but not the
People of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.” A genocidal intention could not easily be more explicitly expressed.
Such great treatment of "citizens" indeed:
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/groups/w...violence-and-brutality-chittagong-hill-tracts
This is hardly surprising:
since March 2015, access to outsiders is tightly controlled and the indigenous people are forbidden to speak to foreigners without supervision.
The Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh have been affected by what has been described as “genocide” or “ethnic cleansing” for many years. In the 1960s and 1970s, thousands were forced off their lands to make way for reservoirs and hydroelectric schemes, a displacement made worse by massacres against the Jumma people (the collective name for all indigenous peoples in the region), and nearly twenty years of conflict against a military dictatorship and also with the democratic government of Bangladesh. This only ended in 1997 when a peace accord recognised the rights of the Jumma people over their lands. This accord remains largely unimplemented and the Jumma people are not even acknowledged in the Bangladesh constitution.
The Bangladesh government has settled hundreds of thousands of Bengali people in the Chittagong Hills, and they now make up the majority of the population in the region. Settlement has not been peaceful. In a number of violent clashes, tobacco, rubber and tea planters have seized Jumma lands at will, usually with military support. By 2012 the situation had become so bad that one indigenous woman told Amnesty International;
“We are now left with no land to farm and grow crops, or forest to go to for collecting fuel, wood, and fruit. Life has become very hard as we have [the] army at very close proximity and I feel very insecure even walking short distances.”
Violence, particularly sexual violence, is routinely carried out by settlers and the military alike. The figures make for sickening reading: in 2014 alone 117 indigenous women faced physical and sexual abuse, 57% of these being children. Twenty one of these women were raped or gang-raped and seven were killed afterwards. During the first few weeks of 2015, at least three confirmed rapes were reported within sight of military checkpoints supposed to bring security to the area. These are only the reported incidents; the true figure is likely to be much higher. It is common practice for the police not to report rape and medical staff are pressured against doing so. No wonder indigenous lawyer, Samari Chakma, calls the Chittagong Hill Tracts a “rapist's heaven”.
Concerns over human rights violations have been stifled, often brutally, as in the case of Kalpana Chakma, indigenous human rights activist, abducted in 1996 and not seen since. Generally allegations are met with indifference by corrupt officials, or by official reprisal. Following damning reports by Amnesty International and other human rights concerns, the Bangladesh government has placed restrictions upon the Jumma peoples speaking with outsiders (restrictions which do not apply to the Bengali population in the region). As Jerry Allen, writing for Amnesty International, comments;
“...no evidence or even plausible accusation has ever been brought forward of outsiders collaborating with indigenous people to detriment of the sovereignty of Bangladesh. The authorities just want to silence the indigenous people.”
What a surprise.
