State of Statelessness in Bangladesh The Rohingya Background The Rohingya community, the largest stateless group in the world, has fled from their native country, Myanmar, in the face of systematic persecution and abuse. For more than five decades, they have migrated to neighbouring countries such as Bangladesh, India, Thailand and Malaysia to escape discrimination in every area of their lives. Bangladesh now houses around a million Rohingya,16 including more than 742,000 forcibly displaced from Myanmar’s Rakhine state since August 2017,17 when the military initiated a new wave of violence against the community. The UN has stated that these crimes amount to genocide and launched genocide proceedings against Myanmar. The Road to Statelessness The term ‘Rohingya’ was originally derived from ‘Rohang’, the ancient name of the territory that is now Rakhine state, with their presence dating back to the 8th century. Their numbers expanded further due to labour migration from Bengal before and during the British colonial era. The majority of the Rohingya are Muslim. The community in Rakhine state was subjected to targeted violence by Rakhine Buddhists in 1942, during World War Two, when Japanese troops invaded Myanmar. Following independence, the government enacted the Residents of Burma Registration Act in 1951, issuing a National Registration Card (NRC) to every resident as a proof of nationality. However, after the military junta came to power in 1962, they ruled that this certificate alone would not be conclusive proof of citizenship. From 1970, the military regime did not issue any further NRC cards to Rohingya, and in 1974 they seized the remaining NRCs from Rohingya without any legal justification.18 This was the 16 Committee Against Torture, Initial report submitted by Bangladesh under article 19 of the Convention, July 23, 2019, p. 16. 17 ‘Rohingya Emergency,’ UNHCR, accessed October 23, 2019, https://www. unhcr.org/rohingya-emergency.html. 18 Equal Rights Trust and The Institute of Human Rights and Peace Studies, Equal only in name- The Human Rights of Stateless Rohingya in Malaysia (London, Stroma Ltd., 2014), accessed October 24, 2019, https://www.equalrightstrust. 23