KUALA LUMPUR, May 22 — Emotions ran high yesterday at the Myanmar embassy where about 200 people staged a peaceful protest to hand over a memorandum to the ambassador.

Organisers Komuniti Bertindak Untuk Rohingya — comprising 11 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) — along with PAS members and the Rohingya community, were present at the protest.

The memorandum contained demands such as staff serving with the embassy be sent back, repatriation of Myanmar nationals here, boycotting Myanmar imports, call to stop violence against Rohingyas in Myanmar, accepting the Rohingya community as Myanmar nationals and returning their stolen assets.

Two attempts — at 10am and 11.30am — to hand over the memorandum failed as the embassy denied the protesters access.

Malay Mail spoke to some of the Rohingya and obtained vivid accounts of the situation in Myanmar.

Raids on schools, no access to hospitals and merciless executions, were among the many forms of ill-treatment allegedly experienced by the Rohingya in Myanmar.

“They forced us out of their schools because we are not Buddhist,” said Ismail Hakim, 20, a Rohingya refugee in Malaysia.

He said the Rohingya community was denied basic needs and education in Myanmar, citing himself as one of those who could not attend school because he was a Muslim.

Mohd Yusof, 25, started tearing up when asked about his experience.

“The army came to my village and burnt it down. They shot my father in front of me and threw his body into the sea.”

“They would also gather all the educated Rohingya and bury them alive in mass graves,” he said.

He said there were few job opportunities for his community in Myanmar, with most of the families living on a handful of rice a day, adding that the community survived by growing their own crops, which the army also questioned.

Even after producing a birth certificate, Mofiszu Rahman, 51, still found it hard to live in Myanmar in peace.

“I was born in Myanmar with a Myanmar birth certificate. But I was forced out although my grandparents and their grandparents were Myanmar nationals. How can they say we are not from there?” he said.

Mofiszu, Rahman and Ismail gave similar replies when asked about opportunities outside Myanmar, saying that since Malaysia was a Muslim country, it was easier to find a halal source of income and food.

Most of the Rohingya came to Malaysia without their families, and had no choice but to go wherever the wind blew as they boarded overcrowded boats.

“An agent called me, saying that my wife was in Langkawi, and we spoke briefly by phone,” said 18-year-old Saleh Ahmad.

Saleh, who has been in Malaysia for almost three years, came here alone in search of greener pastures.

An agent told him of his wife’s arrival in Langkawi on Monday.

Ethnic Rohingya Committee of Arakan chairman Mohd Rafique Khairul Bashar, 35, pleaded with Asian leaders and NGOs to save the community.

“What crime did we commit? We have been residing there for thousands of years. The government sent the customs, police and navy to empty Arakan. Why?”

He added that the Rohingya community had nowhere else to go if they were denied refuge in Malaysia.