Could Rohingya be given British protected status?
Re: “No one can reasonable dispute that Rohingya are Myanmar citizens”, Have Your Say, October 10.
Mr Watson’s letter appears to show he has very little knowledge of citizenship law. It may well be the case that those born in the United States can become citizens of that country (“right of soil”), but in many other countries it is different. In most of Asia and Africa, citizenship depends on kinship – “right of blood”.
For example, being born in Britain of foreign parents does not automatically confer citizenship.
After Ne Win’s takeover in 1962 many Indians living in Burma, as it was then known, were expelled, as were the Chinese. These two groups were not recognised as Burmese in spite of the fact that some of them had families who had lived in that country for generations.
Note that in recent years there has been illegal migration from China across Myanmar’s northern border. Overpopulated countries tend to spill their people across borders.
The unfortunate Rohingya have of course been stripped of all citizenship rights and rendered stateless. I wonder, since Rakhine was formally part of a British colonial territory, whether these people can be given British protected status and British protected passports?
Ian Martin
Bangkok
