DISTINCT IDENTITY OF CHITTAGONG HILL TRACTS

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 DHAKA 000470

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

USAID FOR ANNE DIX

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/24/2018
TAGS: AID PGOV PHUM PREL BG
SUBJECT: DISTINCT IDENTITY OF CHITTAGONG HILL TRACTS
THREATENED BY BENGALI MIGRATION

REF: DHAKA 0292

Classified By: Ambassador James F. Moriarty. Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

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SUMMARY
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1. (C) A visit to the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) in
southeastern Bangladesh by EmbOffs in mid-April found the
tribal people who a half-century ago accounted for a vast
majority of the population are no longer masters of their
land. Bengali migrants dominate cities and commerce, and they
continue to push indigenous people off their land with the
backing of the military. Soldiers are omnipresent. Tribal
people are kept off the police force and are barely
represented in the top echelons of government. The king of
the largest tribal group, who currently is a high-level
official in the Caretaker Government, suggests at least some
comparisons with the more widely publicized Han Chinese
domination of the Tibet Autonomous Region of China are apt.
Ethnic tension in the Hill Tracts helps explain the continued
activity of small insurgent groups and what some see as the
inevitable radicalization of Muslim Bengali settlers. We will
be making regular visits to the Hill Tracts to monitor human
rights and security in what remains a highly volatile region.

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BACKGROUND: BEFORE LARGE-SCALE BENGALI MIGRATION
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2. (SBU) The Chittagong Hill Tracts are starkly different
from the rest of Bangladesh. The rest of the country --
except the Sundarban mangrove -- is intensely farmed plains
densely populated by ethnic Bengalis, the vast majority of
whom are Muslim. The CHT, however, is rugged terrain and
sparsely populated, home to more than a dozen tribes whose
beliefs range from Buddhist to Hindu to Christian to animist.
They cultivate the narrow, fertile valleys as well as the
steep hillsides, where they employ the "jhum" slash-and-burn
technique of farming. Much of the best land was flooded with
the construction of a huge, USAID-financed dam in 1963 near
Rangamati city, forcing tens of thousands of people to move
to inferior land. At the birth of Bangladesh in 1971, the
Hill Tracts population still was overwhelmingly tribal
interspersed with Bengalis who had migrated to the region in
earlier decades, often to start up small businesses.

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THE DELUGE
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3. (SBU) The demographics of the region profoundly changed
when impoverished Bengalis inundated the Hill Tracts in the
five years ending in 1984 under a government-sponsored
resettlement program; estimates of the number of newcomers
range from 400,000 on up. The CHT, much of which is not
arable, could not support nearly so many people, and the
government to this day provides settlers with about 85
kilograms of rice per family per month. Many settlers who
initially tried to claim fields to farm met with violent
opposition from tribesmen and retreated into "cluster
villages" for landless Bengalis, which still exist. The
interagency Embassy team visited one of those villages,
Rangchari, where 800 Bengali families live in homes built
behind bamboo-slat walls and protected by rifle-wielding
para-military guards.


4. (SBU) The influx of settlers in the 1970s-80s fueled an
indigenous insurgency that continues to this day, though much
reduced in scope since a 1997 peace accord between the
Government of Bangladesh and the Shanti Bahini, the main
insurgency group. In recent years, many Bengali settlers have
left their cluster-village homes to claim local land to farm;
about 150 families from Rangchari have moved out in the past
two years. Indigenous people argue that settlers are grabbing
land that is not theirs. A group of 18 headmen and other
local dignitaries traveled to Dhaka for a news conference in
December 2007 to protest what they described as recent land
grabs of nearly 400 acres in 12 villages in the northern Hill
Tracts. "I haven't lost land myself, but my neighbors and
relatives have," one of the participants, Nayana Devi Chakma,

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told the Embassy team during a visit to her home in Maischari
Union. She claimed that the military was harrassing her since
she returned from Dhaka and that she was moving from house to
house out of fear of being arrested.

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THE ROLE OF THE MILITARY, POLICE AND GOVERNMENT
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5. (C) The Bangladeshi military is complicit in the land
grabs "to quite an extent," said Devasish Roy (protect),king
of the Chakma people who comprise the largest tribe in the
Hill Tracts (See Reftel). Roy, who also is Special Assistant
to the Chief Adviser for the Ministries of Chittagong Hill
Tracts Affairs and of Environment and Forests, is a
relatively moderate voice but still views the Bengali
presence as an occupying force. Indeed, the CHT is by far the
most militarized area inside Bangladesh, with about 30,000
soldiers from the army and the Bangladesh Rifles, which is
the main border security force. The large force is justified
by the military as necessary to suppress the ongoing tribal
insurgency; by most accounts, however, the insurgency has
dwindled to several hundred people who are primarily engaged
in extortion and kidnapping to raise funds. Roy views the
continued military presence as a manifestation of a colonial
mindset among some Bengalis.


6. (C) Army checkpoints, typically manned by soldiers with
vintage rifles and the occasional submachine gun, are set up
every few miles along the region's main north-south road
between Rangamati and Khagrachhari, along which EmbOffs also
saw a foot patrol during their five-day visit. Although the
peace accord called for the closure of most army bases in the
Hill Tracts, Roy said only a few camps have been shut down as
a token gesture. Sprawling cantonments remain near the
largest cities with Bengali settlements strategically placed
nearby. He said relations between the military and tribal
Buddhist monastaries are particularly tense; both are highly
regimented and both want to occupy the literal high ground --
the army for tactical reasons and the Buddhists for spiritual
ones.


7. (C) Signs of discrimination against indigenous people are
legion. There are few, if any, tribal people in the
3,000-strong police force of Rangamati District even though
Roy said the peace accord explicitly allows for their
inclusion. The Superintendent of Police for Rangamati told
EmbOffs that recruiting officers from local tribesmen would
be helpful for a force that remains largely ignorant of
indigenous cultures and language. The top echelons of CHT
government also are bereft of tribal people. A meeting
between the Embassy team and the Rangamati District Deputy
Commissioner and his aides to discuss emergency food relief
was essentially an affair free of indigenous people. The
Embassy team also heard many tribal people complain that
there was not enough work for them on infrastructure
projects, particuarly road-building by the military where
Bengali laborers were said to be favored.

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A TICKING TIME BOMB?
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8. (C) The land grabs, the continued massive military
presence, and the systematic discrimination ensure that
tribal people remain marginalized. So too does the
dramatically changing demographics from the resettlements.
While the total population of the Hill Tracts is something of
a mystery (the Government has not released any statistics
recently),the consensus estimate is about 1.5 million
people. Bengalis account for the majority in at least one of
the three CHT districts, Khagrachhari. They account for
nearly half of the population of Rangamati district,
according to the Superintendent of Police there, and for a
strong majority in the district capital, where they dominate
commerce. Roy believes the indigenous peoples will dwindle to
about 30 percent of the total in the Hill Tracts over the
next two decades, making it ever more difficult to maintain
their distinct identities.


9. (C) Relations between Bengalis and the indigenous
population "could deteriorate at any time," said Dipankar

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Talukder, a former Awami League parliamentarian from
Rangamati who belongs to a local tribe. (Note: Scores of
homes were torched in Sajek Union of northern Rangamati
district on April 20. A foreign aid worker who saw the ruins
the following day heard a number of differing accounts,
including one from a local colleague who said that growing
tension over recent land grabs led to Bengali settlers
setting fire to homes of indigenous people. End Note.)
Talukder believes the northern district of Khagrachhari, home
to most of the recent land grabs, is particularly volatile,
an assessment borne out by the sharp anti-Bengali comments
made by Nayana Devi Chakma's neighbors. One man, as he sat in
her house sipping ginger tea and snacking on rice-and-coconut
biscuits, recounted how three acres of fertile land of fruit
and teak trees was brazenly taken from his father by several
Bengali families one night in 2004. It would be best, the
neighbors said, if all Bengalis left the Hill Tracts and
returned to the plains. While the Embassy team found no
evidence that recent land grabs or the food shortages
affecting some villages had increased the ranks of local
insurgents, their stubborn presence indicates continued
frustration among the hill tribes over their second-class
status in their own land.


10. (C) The Bengali settlers, too, have grievances,
particularly those still living in the teeming cluster
villages. Roy expects this population will become
increasingly radicalized over the following decade. Although
the Rangchari cluster village did not appear outwardly
extremist -- women did not wear burkhas as is common in many
plains villages, for example -- a small, locally funded
madrassa appeared to be thriving across the road. The course
of study for its 60-some students, about evenly divided
between boys and girls, was primarily Koran memorization.

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COMMENT: THE NEED TO REMAIN ENGAGED
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11. (C) Roy acknowledged some important similarities between
the Bengali presence in the CHT and the Han Chinese presence
in Tibet. In each case, a distinct people living in a remote
area is being overrun by an ethnic group that accounts for
the vast majority of the population in the rest of the
country. This is happening through civilian migration, a
large military presence, and control of the local economy and
politics by the dominant group.


12. (C) We fear that growing ethnic tension could radicalize
ethnic Bengalis and indigenous peoples in the CHT and will
only further complication Bangladesh's difficult transition
to democracy. We may be able, however, to influence
developments in a positive direction. After an interagency
visit to the Hill Tracts in January 2008 (the first in three
years),the Embassy urged Dhaka to lift a military
restriction on mobile telephony to boost development. Within
months, the GOB announced that cell phone coverage would
begin in the main CHT towns. The Embassy plans to continue
regular visits to the Hill Tracts to stay abreast of current
events and better advocate for human rights and development.
The Embassy Information Support Team plans a survey of the
region to better understand livelihood issues, while USAID
may expand its national environment, health and education
programs into the Hill Tracts. Only through such multipronged
engagement can the U.S. help improve the security and human
rights situation in what remains one of the most volatile yet
strategically important regions of Bangladesh.
Moriarty