There are at least 10 camps like the one on the paddy fields at Hnget Thay, built after the insurgent Arakan Army (AA) took control of most of northern Rakhine state in 2024. These are where many Rohingya people in the state now have to live. Others hide in the mountains, or flee abroad to the refugee camps of Bangladesh or make deadly boat journeys to Malaysia.
The arrival of more than 155,000 Rohingya in Bangladesh since 2024, which amounts to 25% of the 600,000 estimated to still be in Myanmar, has raised concerns about the very survival of a people who now mostly live abroad as refugees.
The Rohingya are a mostly Muslim minority group from western Myanmar who have faced decades of persecution and clashes with Buddhist nationalists. The word translates as from Rohang – the district that is now Rakhine State. Speaking a language similar to the Bengali dialect of Chattogram (formerly Chittagong) in Bangladesh, they are reviled by many in Myanmar as a foreign people and are denied citizenship by the regime.
