Part 17. The 2015 Election, Rohingya Political Exclusion and the Beginnings of Armed Mobilisation in Arakan
Chapter 5. Early Armed Mobilisation in Arakan towards the End of 2015
By the end of 2015, organising associated with Harakah al-Yaqin was developing in northern Arakan. Later reporting traced preliminary activity to earlier years, while some Rohingya participants recalled becoming aware of the movement and Ata Ullah during 2015. Its emergence was therefore a process of recruitment and expanding village connections, rather than a single publicly announced beginning.
For Rohingya villagers, the questions surrounding this movement extended beyond its promises of protection. Accounts supplied to Rohipedia describe armed members moving through settlements, intimidating residents and apparently encountering no intervention from security personnel. These accounts raise a central question: how could an underground armed movement operate with such apparent freedom in a region where ordinary Rohingya life was closely monitored?
The testimony and information described below were supplied by a Rohipedia contributor who reports receiving accounts from witnesses in northern Arakan and sources in Yangon and Naypyidaw. They are presented as allegations and reported experiences, with the witnesses’ observations distinguished from conclusions about military collaboration.
1. Armed Organising under Extensive Surveillance
Northern Arakan had a long-established system of security controls over Rohingya communities. Fortify Rights documented official policies governing household registration, movement and other aspects of daily life. Although NaSaKa was formally abolished in July 2013, its dissolution did not itself remove the administrative and security structures through which Rohingya were monitored.
Against this background, the contributor describes villagers who regarded the authorities’ knowledge of local life as pervasive. In their experience, residents, movements and household activities were subject to observation through officials and informants. They consequently found it difficult to believe that repeated recruitment and training could remain entirely unknown to the security apparatus.
That perception does not establish what every official knew. It does, however, identify a question that accounts of the movement’s emergence must address: whether authorities were unaware of its activities, unable to intervene, deliberately tolerating them or acting under instructions to leave particular organisers alone.
2. Village Recruitment and the Promise of Protection
Retrospective interviews provide evidence of recruitment developing unevenly. The Dhaka Tribune recorded a participant who recalled self-defence training in 2013 and learning about Harakah al-Yaqin and Ata Ullah in 2015. Other interviewees placed their awareness earlier. These differences make it inappropriate to assign one starting date to every village.
Reuters subsequently interviewed residents who described recruitment continuing into early 2016. A teacher recalled Ata Ullah visiting his village and promising to fight for villagers’ rights. Reuters noted that the accounts could not be independently verified.
Such promises must be considered alongside the experiences of people who did not join. A movement’s assertion that it protects a community cannot establish either the community’s consent or the actual safety of its residents.
3. Allegations of Harassment, Extortion and Killings
According to the contributor’s account of village testimony, members identified by residents as belonging to Harakah al-Yaqin moved around homes and settlements with little apparent fear of arrest. Residents reportedly described harassment, demands for money and, in some cases, killings attributed to members of the movement.
These are serious allegations concerning harm to Rohingya civilians by people claiming to defend them. The information supplied does not yet establish the dates, locations, victims or individual perpetrators of each incident. It therefore cannot support a verified count or a finding that every reported incident followed orders from the leadership.
Nevertheless, these accounts belong in the history of early mobilisation. Recording only the movement’s protective promises would exclude the experiences of villagers who reportedly feared its members. Rohingya civilians were entitled to security from both state personnel and armed organisers operating within their communities.
4. Complaints That Reportedly Brought No Intervention
The contributor reports that villagers complained to the relevant security authorities about harassment and other abuses, but received no effective response. In some cases, officials allegedly told complainants that higher authorities in Naypyidaw had prohibited action against the movement.
The alleged explanation is more significant than silence alone. If corroborated, an instruction from higher authorities would point towards deliberate tolerance rather than a purely local failure to enforce the law. Establishing that distinction requires identifying who received the complaint, what was reported, what the official said and whether another witness heard the response.
For the complainants, the immediate consequence was the same: approaching the authorities reportedly failed to secure protection. Their accounts describe a situation in which civilians could face pressure from armed members while having no dependable authority to whom they could turn.
5. A Reported Encounter with Security Personnel
One account relayed by the contributor describes Ata Ullah and accompanying members encountering Myanmar security personnel on a road. According to this account, the personnel behaved as though they had not seen the group and did not intervene. Ata Ullah reportedly explained their passage by saying that God had blinded the security forces so they could not see him. This is a reported witness account, not an independently established encounter. The wording attributed to Ata Ullah is also a recollection rather than a recording.
Its significance lies in the different interpretations of the alleged event. Ata Ullah reportedly presented noninterference as divine protection. Villagers suspicious of the relationship between the movement and the authorities interpreted it as a possible sign of official tolerance. The encounter alone cannot determine which explanation accounts for the personnel’s conduct.
Some witnesses use “NaSaKa” when describing security forces during this period. Because that organisation had formally ceased to exist in 2013, the historical record should preserve their terminology while identifying the actual unit wherever possible.
6. Alleged Contacts with Military Officials
The contributor also reports receiving information from sources in Yangon and Naypyidaw alleging that Ata Ullah visited Myanmar, met military officials and subsequently travelled to Saudi Arabia, where he met members of the Rohingya community.
The available public research establishes aspects of his background. The International Crisis Group identified him as born in Karachi to a Rohingya family and raised in Saudi Arabia, and described a leadership network involving Rohingya émigrés there. These biographical findings do not independently confirm the alleged meetings with Myanmar military officials.
The allegations of meetings must therefore be recorded separately from the verified background. The information supplied does not specify the dates, officials involved, purpose of the meetings or whether the sources directly witnessed them. Those details would be necessary to establish an agreement or instructions.
The contributor interprets the alleged contacts, reported noninterference and accounts of orders from Naypyidaw together as evidence of collaboration. That is an attributed assessment. It remains distinct from a finding independently established by Rohipedia.
7. Later Events and the Question of Timing
A later event intensified the suspicion described by the contributor. The Annan Commission’s final report was published on 24 August 2017. Attacks on security posts followed on 25 August. The chronology is documented, but belongs to 2017 rather than the movement’s initial development in 2015.
According to the contributor, some Rohingya interpreted these attacks as coordinated with Myanmar’s military and staged to provide a pretext for the campaign against their population. This is a specific allegation of collaboration, not simply a reference to simultaneous attacks on several posts.
The proximity to the report’s publication gives these witnesses a question about timing; it does not, by itself, prove an agreement. Their allegation requires examination of communications, orders, meetings and other evidence connecting the parties. A fuller reconstruction of the attacks and their consequences belongs in the later chronology.
8. Rohingya Civilians at the Centre of the Record
The early history of Harakah al-Yaqin must include both those attracted by its promises and those who report intimidation, abuse or suspicion of its leadership. Neither experience can stand for the entire Rohingya population.
The accounts supplied here challenge a history written solely through leaders’ declarations. They ask how organising proceeded under surveillance, why complaints allegedly brought no intervention, and whether particular officials protected the movement. Those questions deserve investigation through village testimony and records from the authorities concerned.
For Rohingya civilians, the essential issue was whether the people claiming to protect them actually preserved their lives, homes and future. Their testimony must remain central when examining both the movement’s emergence and allegations that its leadership served interests opposed to their own.