RFA interactive web feature: The Rohingya: World’s Least-Wanted People
This web project explores the long persecution of the Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar through graphics, videos, key quotes, and current news. More than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims, including about 20,000 pregnant women, fled Myanmar’s Rakhine state last August in the wake of a military counter-offensive. The exodus put a huge strain on impoverished Bangladesh, which is struggling to provide housing and health care for Rohingya, many of whom escaped with little more than the clothes on their back.
The government of Myanmar does not recognize Rohingya Muslims as citizens and refers to them as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Myanmar security forces have been blamed for killings, rapes and arson against the Rohingya community, in what the U.N. has described as “textbook ethnic cleansing” of the persecuted Muslim minority.
In the spring of 2018, web designer for the project, Minh-Ha Le, received a Gracie award for best website in the category for interactive news media.