Tun Khin

Tun Khin grew up in the Arakan state, where he faced persecution due to his Rohingya ethnicity. The Rohingya are considered a stateless people due to centuries of policies that have denied the Rohingya people citizenship in Burma. These laws have also complicated their ability to apply for asylum abroad.

During his childhood, Tun Khin witnessed his family suffer several instances of discrimination. His uncle was murdered by the authorities of Myanmar because he was educated and had influence over the Rohingya community, his father had to flee to Bangladesh, and his friends were sentenced to prison for marrying secretly without government permission (official permission can take 2-3 years and requires bribing), among countless other tragic injustices committed against those closest to him. 

Although his grandfather had been a Parliamentary Secretary during the democratic period after Burma gained independence, Tun Khin’s right to citizenship was still refused by the government due to his Rohingya ethnicity. In 2007, Tun Khin was finally able to travel to Bangkok to receive an education, after which he then moved to the United Kingdom and studied to obtain his PhD. His family still remains in Burma, in the state of Rangoon, which he believes is not as heavily persecuted as Arakan.

Since his arrival in the U.K., Tun Khin has wasted no time educating the public on the Rohingya people in Burma and the dangers they face, rallying support for activism and change, and collaborating with public figures and numerous councils to help his people. He is currently President of the Burmese Rohingya Organization UK (BROUK), an organization that works to globally spread information about the Rohingya to international media and policy-makers. As president, he has spoken with the United States Congress, the British Parliament, European Parliament, European Human Rights Council, and the European Human Rights Commission, among many figures of importance. His advocacy on the issues that face the Rohingya people has gained him much recognition all over the world, and in April 2015, he even received a leadership award from Refugees International in Washington D.C. for his ongoing work. He has also written countless articles for British newspapers, as well as Burma’s largest independent media network, Democratic Voice of Burma, and Mizzima Burmese Medias, which was established by a group of exiled Burmese journalists in the 90s.

In March 2018, Tun Khin visited the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh, discovering an overwhelming depletion of resources and support, given the growing numbers of refugees and the limited space. In an interview that year, he referred to it as a “humanitarian crisis.” During that same interview, he also explained his disappointment in Aung San Suu Kyi, a Burmese politician who served as State Counselor of Myanmar and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2016 to 2021. He went on to describe her unwillingness to help the Rohingya population and denied that their human rights were being violated, remaining otherwise silent on the issue.

In June 2022, Tun Khin spoke at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva where he attributed the aggravation of the ongoing genocide against the Rohingya to the recent military coup, while also asserting that it would be dangerous to force a return to Burma while the military is in power. He closed his speech with a plea for the international community’s participation in the protection and salvation of the Rohingya, asking that they financially support the Bangladesh refugee camps, advocate the referral of Burma to the International Criminal Court, participate in the genocide case that was brought to the International Court of Justice, and aim to open Universal Jurisdiction cases against the military. He also requested that, should they choose to help, they involve the Rohingya people in any decision regarding their future.