India’s government asked the country’s Supreme Court Monday to allow the deportation of more than 16,000 Rohingya Muslim refugees to Burma, where human rights groups say the government is waging an ethnic cleansing campaign. The threatened deportation came as Human Rights Watch distributed before-and-after satellite photos it says show the near total destruction of 214 Rohingya villages in Burma, with tens of thousands of homes burned to the ground. The photos echo the stories of the more than 410,000 Rohingya who have fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh.
Chaman Bahar: “The military torched our houses. My husband, along with my daughter and her husband, were killed in the clashes. I somehow was able to flee, taking my grandson, along with all these villagers.”