Soldier’s body returned to Bangladesh, but questions remain about border clash

Soldier's body returned to Bangladesh, but questions remain about border clash

By Bill O'Toole   |   Tuesday, 03 June 2014

Tensions on Myanmar's western border appear to have lessened after it returned the body of a Bangladeshi colonel on May 31, three days after he went missing when his unit was attacked by Myanmar border police.

The incident prompted concerns over growing instability in the border area, and follows several outbreaks of violence on the border in recent weeks.

While a spokesperson for the Bangladesh embassy in Yangon, who asked not to be named, said the return of the body meant the incident had been "settled", the two governments have given differing accounts of why the skirmish occurred.

Through articles in state media, Nay Pyi Taw has insisted its soldiers were acting on information that insurgents from the Rohingya Solidarity Organization were active in the area, and the Bangladeshi troops were attacked because they were not wearing Border Guard Bangladesh uniforms or identification.

Police Colonel Min Aung, a deputy director of the Defense and Security Department, told Democratic Voice of Burma that the BGB troops were responsible for the conflict because they were not wearing the BGB insignia. Instead, they were wearing "yellow camouflage uniforms without armbands".

"They were shot at because they encroached on our territory without any identifiable insignia, leading our troops to assume they were insurgents."

The Bangladesh embassy could not confirm what the soldier was wearing when the incident occurred but the spokesperson said the corporal was conducting a routine patrol and it was unlikely that he or any of his fellow soldiers would have been wearing anything other than their standard uniforms.

Additionally, the spokesperson said the Bangladesh government has no information of RSO forces operating in the area. Bangladesh's Ministry of Foreign Affairs has asked Nay Pyi Taw to provide evidence of RSO activities in the area and has so far received no response, the spokesperson said.

Neither the Ministry of Foreign Affairs nor the President's office could be reached for comment.

Like the Bangladeshi embassy, some experts on the region say the RSO has had little to no operational capacity since the 1990s, when its training camps in Bangladesh were wiped out by local security forces.

However, both the central government and other civil soceity groups within Myanmar insist the group is still active, and that the site of the firefight – the 52-mile border post in Maungdaw township – is an area known for RSO activity.

It was in the same area on May 17 that several Myanmar border guard police were attacked by an armed group that had illegally entered Myanmar from Bangladesh. Four police were killed and another was injured in the incident, and the officers' weapons were taken.

U Min Zaw Oo, director of ceasefire negotiation and implementation at the Myanmar Peace Center, told The Myanmar Times that the MPC has collected reports from a variety of credible sources in Rakhine, including members of the Arakan Liberation Army, who say the RSO still has a presence in the border area.

The MPC considers the RSO a terrorist rather than armed ethnic group and as such does not engage with its members in any capacity.

Regardless of who is responsible for the recent violence, observers say it is indicative of a border region that is becoming more lawless by the day.

Saiful Huq Omi, a Bangladeshi journalist who has reported extensively from the border areas, said the mass exodus of Muslim refugees fleeing oppression in northern Rakhine State has led to a significant increase in armed criminal activity along the border, including human trafficking, smuggling, and robbery.

Jason Eligh, the country manager for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, said crime on the border is a "serious and growing concern".

"[T]he trafficking of drugs, arms and people across the Myanmar-Bangladesh border is a serious and growing concern, as is the movement of illicit armed groups," he said.

However, the Bangladesh embassy spokesperson dismissed the idea that the recent skirmishes represent any larger trend. "This is an isolated incident," they said. "I don't see any connections."

Source: http://www.news.myanmaronlinecentre.com/2014/06/04/soldiers-body-returned-to-bangladesh-but-questions-remain-about-border-clash/