I think its origin is in history, because during the British colonial rule, which started in 1823, there was a large migration from India. At the time, India was part of the British empire, including what is Bangladesh and Chittagong today. Muslims have been living in Rakhine state for much longer than that. These are the original people who call themselves Rohingya, but many others also migrated during this British colonial time. Of course, that was 200 years ago. I think they should be considered as citizens, as they are in many other countries where there was colonial rule in Asia and other parts of the world.
In Myanmar you have the Rakhine community, which is strongly Buddhist and extremely nationalistic. That region, before the British, used to be a separate kingdom. The Rakhine claim that this kingdom was theirs, and because of the British, there was this migration of Muslims or Rohingya, but they don't call them “Rohingya”. They call them “Bengali” because they are similar in religion, in culture, and in language to the people from Chittagong in Bangladesh. They are born in Myanmar. Their families, parents, and grandparents are born in Myanmar. Even today, for the Rakhine and most Burmese, the public—it's not just the government—wants to see these people as foreigners and outsiders. They came here to invade our country, and for the Rakhine it's an existential threat. That's why they push the term “Bengali”, because although Bengali is anthropologically an ethnicity and not a nationality, in Myanmar it is understood as being Bangladeshi. That means you are an outsider and a foreigner, and that you should go back to Bangladesh.
As you know, there has been tension with Bangladesh when the Myanmar government claimed that the Rohingya are Bangladeshi, and Bangladesh claimed the Rohingya are from Myanmar. I think the whole issue is that Myanmar, and the Rakhine in particular, do not want to accept Rohingya in Rakhine. I have to say that from my various trips in the region, I think the main issue, beyond the fact of ethnicity, which is by law, is religion. In the camps I mentioned, among the 120,000 internally displaced, there are also a small number—I didn't mention them because they are not very significant—10,000 or so, of Kamein. The Kamein are Muslim, and they are a recognized ethnic group in Myanmar, but they face exactly the same fate as the Rohingya. They are also pushed into IDP camps. They have citizenship, but they cannot move.
That's why I have always suggested that citizenship alone is not going to solve the problem. It has to be approached holistically, and tensions have to be reduced. I think the government has to take steps at the national level, and not just in Rakhine, to stop all this hate speech and the incitement to violence against Muslims. I'm happy that last Friday the government set up a committee at the national level to address hate speech and incitement to violence. Maybe that's the first step, which hopefully is positive.
I just wanted to mention that.