Background 36 Although associate citizens would be allowed “rights to a certain extent,” including “the right to live” and “to carry on a livelihood,” General Ne Win emphasized that “[w]e will . . . not give them full citizenship and full rights.” 36 General Ne Win further described the 1982 law as a way to “clarify the position of guests and mixed-bloods.” He explained that “foreigners who had settled in Burma [Myanmar] at the time of independence have become a problem” and that those who could demonstrate long-term residency would be given “associate” citizenship under the law in order to prevent them from obtaining any role in government.37 A week after General Ne Win’s controversial speech, on October 15, Myanmar passed the proposed citizenship law, which remains in force at the time of writing.38 The 1982 Citizenship Law creates three categories of citizenship—full, associate, and naturalized citizens—each with varying rights and accompanying identification cards. Under the law, anyone belonging to one of the eight specified “national ethnic groups” identified in the law are considered full citizens by birth, as are persons belonging to ethnic groups that are considered to have settled in the country prior to 1823.39 Moreover, the 1982 Citizenship Law provides authority to the government to “decide whether any ethnic group is national or not.”40 Since at least 1989, Myanmar government officials have claimed that there are officially 135 ethnic groups in Myanmar—a dubious and highly disputed claim.41 The Rohingya are not recognized under the law or by the government as a “national ethnic group” of Myanmar.42 36 General Ne Win, “Speech by General Ne Win: Meeting Held in the Central Meeting Hall, President House, Ahlone Road,” The Working People’s Daily; South and Lall, eds., Citizenship in Myanmar 37 Ibid. 38 José María Arraiza and Olivier Vonk, European University Institute, Report on Citizenship Law: Myanmar, October 2017. See also, Michelle Foster, Hélène Lambert, International Refugee Law and the Protection of Stateless Persons (Oxford: Scholarship Online, May 2019), p. 150. 39 The 1982 Citizenship Law provides that citizens are: “Nationals such as the Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Chin, Burman, Mon, Rakhine or Shan and ethnic groups as have settled in any of the territories included within the State as their permanent home from a period anterior to 1185 B.E., 1823 A.D.” Burma Citizenship Law. 40 41 Burma Citizenship Law, Art. 4. See, Cheesman, “How in Myanmar ‘National Races’ Came to Surpass Citizenship and Exclude Rohingya,” Journal of Contemporary Asia, pp. 468-469. See also, Bertil Lintner, “A Question of Race in Myanmar,” Asia Times, June 3, 2017, https://www.asiatimes.com/2017/06/article/question-race-myanmar/ (accessed August 23, 2019). 42 Burma Citizenship Law, art. 3. See also, for example, Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK, “Myanmar’s 1982 Citizenship Law and Rohingya,” December 2014, https://burmacampaign.org.uk/media/Myanmar%E2%80%99s1982-Citizenship-Law-and-Rohingya.pdf (accessed August 23, 2019).