Rohingya

Aziz Ansari, Salman Rushdie, Swet Shop Boys & more sign plea to save the Rohingya from genocide

Aziz Ansari, Swet Shop Boys members Riz Ahmed and Heems, Silicon Valley and The Big Sick‘s Kumail Nanjiani, The Office‘s Mindy Kaling, novelist Salman Rushdie, cookbook author Madhur Jaffrey, The Daily Show‘s Hasan Minhaj, soon-to-be Butterboy co-host Aparna Nancherla, jazz/experimental musician Vijay Iyer, internet personality Anil Dash, and comic Hari Kondabolu are among the many people to sign a plea published on The Guardian titled “The Rohingya are facing genocide. We cannot be bystanders.”

The Rohingya are a predominantly Muslim group and, as the article points out, “are often described as among the most persecuted people on earth.” They are refused citizenship in Myanmar, which has had a notable Rohingya population for centuries, and the UN calls it a “textbook case” of ethnic cleansing. The article begins by pointing out that “over the past two months, more than 600,000 Rohingya people have been driven from their homes, had their land destroyed, and endured torture and rape while searching for safety.” Later, they write:

This Friday, world leaders will gather at the Asean summit but the Rohingya crisis is nowhere on the agenda. We call on leaders to pressure the Myanmar government to stop these atrocities, grant the Rohingya citizenship, and allow them to return to a place they call home.

Countries must fully fund the UN appeal and close the funding gap that is leaving traumatized children without basic food, water, and shelter. Finally, member states of the United Nations must assess what diplomatic efforts can enable them to fulfill their responsibility to protect the Rohingya.

We must not be bystanders to this genocide. We cannot allow people to be slaughtered and burnt out of their homes, while the world watches.

After every atrocity, we say: “Never again.” We must mean it.

Read the full piece HERE. Full list of signatories below:

Waris Ahluwalia, Babi Ahluwalia, Sachin Ahluwalia, Riz Ahmed, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Aziz Ansari, Dev Benegal, Gotham Chopra, Nandita Das, Rana Dasgupta, Anil Dash, Kiran Desai, Noureen DeWulf, Geeta Gandbhir, Vikram Gandhi, Shruti Ganguly, Janina Gavankar, Neelam Gill, Maneesh Goyal, Arjun Gupta, Mohsin Hamed, Hitha Prabhakar-Herzog, Anadil Hossain, Vijay Iyer, Sakina Jaffrey, Madhur Jaffrey, Poorna Jagannathan, Riddhika Jesrani, Rega Jha, Mindy KalingRaghu Karnad, Siddhartha Khosla, Hari Kondabolu, Shruti Kumar, Anjali Kumar, Hari Kunzru, Ajay Madiwale, Karan Mahajan, Rekha Malhotra, Aasif Mandvi, Sunita Mani, Nimitt Mankad, Suketu Mehta, Hasan Minhaj, Smriti Mundhra, Ajay Naidu, Aparna Nancherla, Kumail Nanjiani, Karuna Nundy, Maulik Pancholy, Joseph Patel, Shomi Patwary, Freida Pinto, Shaifali Puri, Aniq Rahman, Saira Rao, Zuleikha Robinson, Salman Rushdie, Reema Sampat, Reshma Saujani, Nikil Saval, Sumana Setty, Shiza ShahidKamila Shamsie, Anoushka Shankar, Sheetal Sheth, Sonejuhi Sinha, Madhureeta Goel, Southworth Lakshmi, Sundaram Himanshu Suri, Sonali Thimmaya, Pej Vahdat