I guess that is what the author is saying in this opinion piece from Sri Lanka’s Daily Mirror—that Muslims become radicalized due to persecution and poverty.

We have an entire category on the Rohingya—we have posted on this Muslim Burmese (Myanmar) minority group ever since we first heard that they were agitating for resettlement to the United States.  Some have already been resettled to Canada and to Norway (that we know of).

Opinion writer, Kusal Perera, gives a summary of how this group evolved from Arab traders in the 17th century to an aggrieved  Muslim fundamentalist group now spreading out throughout the world.  He says:

The plight of the Rohingya Muslims over the years has led to armed groups within the Rohingya society inside and outside Myanmar. By late 1980’s there were two very conspicuous armed groups, the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO) and the Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front (ARIF). These two organisations came together in 1996 to form the Rohingya National Alliance (RNA), while maintaining each others identities separately.

Today, the Rohingya Muslim Diaspora, especially those living as refugees, is viewed with suspicion in most countries. Muslim fundamentalism along with Al Qaeda (meaning “the base”) terrorism is being linked to most Rohingya Muslim groups in Bangladesh, Pakistan and even in some Mid East countries. According to an article published in February, 2006 by the Hudson Institute – Centre on Islam, Democracy and the future of the Muslim World – Rohingya Muslim settlements provide recruits for Harakat ul-Jihad Islami, a radical Islami armed group. The article explains that,

“In addition to minority flight, there have been other factors augmenting the relative power of the Islamists. Since 1991, perhaps as many as 300,000 Rohingya Muslims have entered Bangladesh across its South-Eastern border with Myanmar (Burma), a Jamaat-e-Islami stronghold. Many reside between the port city of Cox’s Bazaar and the Myanmar border. Jamaat-e-Islami and its student wing, the Islami Chatra League, have worked to radicalize these refugees, who are probably more susceptible to religious indoctrination after their persecution in Myanmar. Indeed, according to reports by human rights groups on local minorities, many of Harakat ul-Jihad Islami’s newest members are recruited from the Rohingya settlements.”

The author goes on to describe the lucrative arrangements some Rohingya have had when they signed on to fight in Afghanistan.   And, finally suggests that someone needs to pressure the Burmese junta to not persecute the Rohingya any more so they will not become radicalized fighters—seems that barn door is already open.

Thus allowing Myanmar to continue with its ruthless persecution of Rohingya Muslims has provided Muslim fundamentalism with ready recruits willing to fight anywhere for their conviction. Rohingya Muslims as radicalised Islam fundamentalists have basically become internationalised and they are not necessarily fighting for their right to be part of Myanmar society. Getting in contact with the Al-Qaeda doctrine and becoming a Islamic fundamentalist makes them all fight for a “liberated Islamic World Order” defeating American imperialism and Zionism, thus giving them a licence to fight without borders. That is again a fundamental difference between this brand of Islamic “terrorism” and those that fight for political rights within their own boundaries.

This mobility of the Rohingya cadres therefore, is one factor that could tie any country in the South and the South-East Asian region having a fractured and marginalised Muslim community to radicalised Islamism and then perhaps to Islamic guerrilla war.

This concept that persecution leads to radicalization and terrorism ignores the basic tenets of Islam which asks its adherents to spread the Islamic doctrine across the world.  It strikes me that this persecution issue is just an excuse.  One need only notice that the Burmese Karen Christians that we are resettling now by the tens of thousands in the US have not turned into terrorists due to their persecution by that same Burmese Junta.

One lobbying group advocating for the Rohingya is Refugees International headed by Ken Bacon with Farooq Kathwari as its chairman of the Board.

There have been hints that some Rohingya are already here intermingled with the Burmese Karen refugees being resettled throughout America, but no one is saying so officially.