Kutupalong: Blood stains still mark the spot where the killers killed Mohibo Allah, an activist who was a leading voice for the 850,000 Rohingyas living in fear in Bangladeshi refugee camps.
In the weeks following the murder, a senior member of the now-shail-shocked volunteer group, led by Ullah, received phone calls that he would be next. And he’s not alone.
“They may hunt you down the way they have shamelessly shot our leader and so many others.” Noor, too afraid to give his real name or to be filmed, told AFP.
They believe that “they” are members of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), a rebel group fighting the Myanmar military, but are also believed to be behind a wave of killings and criminal activity in the camps.
ARSA has denied that he killed Ulla.
Most of the Rohingya have been in camps since 2017, when they fled a brutal military attack in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where the predominantly Muslim minority is condemned and viewed as illegal immigrants.
Refusing to return until they are assured of security and equal rights, refugees remain trapped in bamboo and wire shanties without work, poor sanitation and little education for their children.
Overflowing toilets fill narrow mud alleys with faeces during the monsoon season, and fires can flare up in minutes during the hot summer.
by day Bangladesh The authorities provide some protection. But at night the camps become the domain of gangs – allegedly linked to the ARSA – who smuggle millions of dollars worth of methamphetamine out of Myanmar.
“The scenario is different as the sun goes down,” Israfil, a Rohingya refugee known by the name, told AFP.
“Dark times are long hours when they do what they want to do,” he said.
Working amidst the chaos and unrest in the camps, Ulla and his colleagues quietly document the crimes their men suffered at the hands of Myanmar’s military, while pushing for better conditions.
The former schoolteacher shot to prominence in 2019, when he staged a protest of nearly 100,000 people in the camps, two years after his exodus.
That year he met US President Donald Trump at the White House and addressed a United Nations meeting in Geneva.
But his fame with ARSA seems to have waned badly.
His aides and rights activists say he saw Ullah as a threat to his place as the sole voice representing the Rohingya.
“That turned out to be a thorn in ARSA’s side,” said Noor Khan Liton, a top rights activist in Bangladesh.
“ARSA was also stunned by his tremendous popularity.”
Three weeks after Ullah’s assassination in late September, gunmen and weapon-wielding attackers killed seven people at an Islamic seminary who allegedly refused security money to ARSA.
A top migrant Rohingya activist said, “The brutal massacre had all traces of ARSA. The group previously killed at least two top Islamic clerics because they did not support ARSA’s violent struggle.”
“ARSA has carried out the killings to establish their complete control over the camps. After the latest massacre, everyone has gone silent,” he said, asking to remain anonymous.
Following the attack on the seminary, the UN refugee agency urged Bangladeshi authorities to “take immediate measures to improve security in refugee camps”.
A series of turf war killings in 2019 prompted the Bangladesh Army to install barbed wire fencing around the camps. The elite Armed Police Battalion was assigned the task of patrolling the area.
Police have also launched several security operations in which dozens of alleged Rohingya drug traffickers have been killed.
But although they have arrested dozens of people in connection with Ullah’s murder, they are in denial about ARSA’s activity, instead blaming “rivalry” in the camps.
“ARSA has no presence in the camps,” Naimul HaqueThe commanding officer of the Kutupalong camp insisted to AFP.
Members of Ullah’s group are not convinced, saying that their security concerns fall on deaf ears.
Some even say that ARSA and Bangladesh’s security forces are colluding, but Dhaka vehemently denies this.
Kyaw Min, a top Rohingya leader, said police assist the ARSA to “rule out” at night, when they are not “easily” around when they work.
A month before he died, Ullah sent a letter, seen by AFP but could not be independently verified, to Bangladeshi authorities.
He named 70 people in the camps, said they were ARSA members, and said he and his colleagues feared for their lives.
Bangladesh refugee commissioner Shah Rezwan Hayati And camp in-charge Atikul Mamoon denied receiving any such letter.
Family members of senior Rohingya leaders told AFP that Bangladesh security forces have since relocated at least six families, including Ullah, fearing they will be targeted.
“We thought we would be safe in Bangladesh. But now we don’t know when the killers will knock on our door,” activist Sa Phyo Thida told AFP.
Like those genocide days in Myanmar in 2017 when we lived in fear of military death squads, we are now living in extreme fear.
In the weeks following the murder, a senior member of the now-shail-shocked volunteer group, led by Ullah, received phone calls that he would be next. And he’s not alone.
“They may hunt you down the way they have shamelessly shot our leader and so many others.” Noor, too afraid to give his real name or to be filmed, told AFP.
They believe that “they” are members of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), a rebel group fighting the Myanmar military, but are also believed to be behind a wave of killings and criminal activity in the camps.
ARSA has denied that he killed Ulla.
Most of the Rohingya have been in camps since 2017, when they fled a brutal military attack in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where the predominantly Muslim minority is condemned and viewed as illegal immigrants.
Refusing to return until they are assured of security and equal rights, refugees remain trapped in bamboo and wire shanties without work, poor sanitation and little education for their children.
Overflowing toilets fill narrow mud alleys with faeces during the monsoon season, and fires can flare up in minutes during the hot summer.
by day Bangladesh The authorities provide some protection. But at night the camps become the domain of gangs – allegedly linked to the ARSA – who smuggle millions of dollars worth of methamphetamine out of Myanmar.
“The scenario is different as the sun goes down,” Israfil, a Rohingya refugee known by the name, told AFP.
“Dark times are long hours when they do what they want to do,” he said.
Working amidst the chaos and unrest in the camps, Ulla and his colleagues quietly document the crimes their men suffered at the hands of Myanmar’s military, while pushing for better conditions.
The former schoolteacher shot to prominence in 2019, when he staged a protest of nearly 100,000 people in the camps, two years after his exodus.
That year he met US President Donald Trump at the White House and addressed a United Nations meeting in Geneva.
But his fame with ARSA seems to have waned badly.
His aides and rights activists say he saw Ullah as a threat to his place as the sole voice representing the Rohingya.
“That turned out to be a thorn in ARSA’s side,” said Noor Khan Liton, a top rights activist in Bangladesh.
“ARSA was also stunned by his tremendous popularity.”
Three weeks after Ullah’s assassination in late September, gunmen and weapon-wielding attackers killed seven people at an Islamic seminary who allegedly refused security money to ARSA.
A top migrant Rohingya activist said, “The brutal massacre had all traces of ARSA. The group previously killed at least two top Islamic clerics because they did not support ARSA’s violent struggle.”
“ARSA has carried out the killings to establish their complete control over the camps. After the latest massacre, everyone has gone silent,” he said, asking to remain anonymous.
Following the attack on the seminary, the UN refugee agency urged Bangladeshi authorities to “take immediate measures to improve security in refugee camps”.
A series of turf war killings in 2019 prompted the Bangladesh Army to install barbed wire fencing around the camps. The elite Armed Police Battalion was assigned the task of patrolling the area.
Police have also launched several security operations in which dozens of alleged Rohingya drug traffickers have been killed.
But although they have arrested dozens of people in connection with Ullah’s murder, they are in denial about ARSA’s activity, instead blaming “rivalry” in the camps.
“ARSA has no presence in the camps,” Naimul HaqueThe commanding officer of the Kutupalong camp insisted to AFP.
Members of Ullah’s group are not convinced, saying that their security concerns fall on deaf ears.
Some even say that ARSA and Bangladesh’s security forces are colluding, but Dhaka vehemently denies this.
Kyaw Min, a top Rohingya leader, said police assist the ARSA to “rule out” at night, when they are not “easily” around when they work.
A month before he died, Ullah sent a letter, seen by AFP but could not be independently verified, to Bangladeshi authorities.
He named 70 people in the camps, said they were ARSA members, and said he and his colleagues feared for their lives.
Bangladesh refugee commissioner Shah Rezwan Hayati And camp in-charge Atikul Mamoon denied receiving any such letter.
Family members of senior Rohingya leaders told AFP that Bangladesh security forces have since relocated at least six families, including Ullah, fearing they will be targeted.
“We thought we would be safe in Bangladesh. But now we don’t know when the killers will knock on our door,” activist Sa Phyo Thida told AFP.
Like those genocide days in Myanmar in 2017 when we lived in fear of military death squads, we are now living in extreme fear.
.