Rohingya people
A stateless Indo-Aryan Muslim minority from Myanmar.
The Rohingya are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group, mostly Muslim, from Myanmar’s Rakhine State. Prior to the 2017 genocide, about 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar; over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh during that crisis. Widely considered one of the world’s most persecuted minorities, they are denied citizenship under Myanmar’s 1982 nationality law. Their freedom of movement is restricted, and they lack access to state education and civil service jobs. Some academics, analysts, and political figures have likened these legal conditions to apartheid.
- population_before_2017
- 1.4 million (estimated)
- religion
- Islam
- region
- Rakhine State, Myanmar
- language
- Rohingya (Ruáingga)
- status
- Stateless
- known_for
- Persecution and mass displacement; subject of genocide investigations
Lore & Background
The Rohingya maintain they are indigenous to western Myanmar with a heritage of over a millennium and influence from the Arabs, Mughals, and Portuguese. The community claims descent from Indic and Muslim populations in both precolonial Arakan and colonial Arakan; historically, the region was an independent kingdom situated between Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya as British colonial and postcolonial migrants from Chittagong in Bangladesh, arguing that a distinct precolonial Muslim population is recognized as Kaman, and that the Rohingya conflate their history with the history of Arakan Muslims in general to advance a separatist agenda.
Reader's Guide
The Rohingya people have faced military crackdowns in 1978, 1991–1992, 2012, 2015, and particularly in 2016–2018, when most of the Rohingya population of Myanmar was driven out of the country into neighboring Bangladesh. By December 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine had crossed the border since August 2017. UN officials and Human Rights Watch have described Myanmar's persecution as ethnic cleansing, and the UN human rights envoy reported that the long history of discrimination and persecution could amount to crimes against humanity. The International Criminal Court has investigated crimes against humanity, and the International Court of Justice has heard a case alleging genocide. The term 'Rohingya' itself is polarizing: the Myanmar government refuses to use it, preferring 'Bengali', while Rohingya campaign groups demand the right to self-determination within Myanmar. The United States embassy in Yangon continues to use the name 'Rohingya'.
Did You Know?
- The Rohingya refer to themselves as Ruáingga, pronounced [rʊˈɜi̯ɲ.ɟə].
- The term 'Rohingya' may come from Rakhanga or Roshanga, the early Muslim name for Arakan.
- In 1799, Francis Buchanan wrote about the 'Rooinga' as Mohammedans long settled in Arakan.
- The Myanmar government forced the Rohingya to identify as 'Bengali' in the 2014 census.
More in Ethnic Groups 1-22
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