The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), formerly known as Harakah al-Yaqin (), is a Rohingya insurgent group active in northern Rakhine State, Myanmar. According to a December 2016 report by the International Crisis Group, it is led by Ataullah abu Ammar Jununi, a Rohingya man who was born in Karachi, Pakistan, and grew up in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Other members of its leadership include a committee of Rohingya émigrés in Saudi Arabia.
Myanmar's Anti-Terrorism Central Committee declared ARSA a terrorist group on 25 August 2017 in accordance with the country's counter-terrorism law. ARSA is also considered a terrorist group by Malaysia.
ARSA has been accused by Myanmar's government of being involved with and subsidised by foreign Islamists, despite there being no firm evidence proving such allegations. ARSA subsequently released a statement on 28 August 2017, calling government allegations against it as "baseless" and claiming that its main purpose is to defend the rights of Rohingyas.
History
Prior to 2016
According to the International Crisis Group (ICG) and a spokesperson for ARSA, the group was formed in 2013, following the 2012 Rakhine State riots, under the name Harakah al-Yaqin (translated as "Faith Movement" in English). A former member of ARSA described how he was recruited by the group's leader, Ataullah abu Ammar Jununi, three years prior to the attacks in October 2016. Ataullah had approached villagers, asking for five to ten recruits to join his group and telling them that the time had come to "stop the mistreatment of the Rohingya people". Prior to the October 2016 attacks, ARSA had merely patrolled villages armed with bamboo sticks, making sure that villagers prayed at mosques. According to Rohingya locals and Burmese security officials, the group had again began approaching Rohingya men from various villages for recruitment six months prior to its first attack in October 2016, this time with the intention of training them across the border in Bangladesh for a future attack in Myanmar.
2016
In October 2016, under the name Harakah al-Yaqin, the group claimed responsibility for attacks on Burmese border posts along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, which left nine border officers and four soldiers dead. The Tatmadaw (Myanmar Armed Forces) announced on 15 November 2016 that a total of 69 insurgents had been killed by security forces in the recent fighting. The ICG reported on 14 December 2016 that in interviews with ARSA, its leaders claimed to have links to private donors in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The ICG also released unconfirmed reports that Rohingya villagers had been "secretly trained" by Afghan and Pakistani fighters.
2017
Burmese state media reported on 22 June 2017 that three insurgents had been killed by security forces in a raid on an insurgent camp supposedly belonging to ARSA, as part of a two-day "area clearance operation" by the government. Authorities confiscated gunpowder, ski masks and wooden rifles used for training.
In July 2017, the Burmese government accused ARSA of murdering 34 to 44 civilians and kidnapping 22 others in reprisal attacks against those ARSA have perceived as government collaborators. ARSA denied the accusations.
On 25 August 2017, the group claimed responsibility for coordinated attacks on at least two dozen police posts and an attempted raid on an army base. The government gave an official death toll of 77 Rohingya insurgents and 12 security forces in northern Maungdaw following the attacks. The government stated that ARSA insurgents had attacked a police station in the Maungdaw District with a handmade bomb alongside the coordinated attacks on several police posts. ARSA claimed they were taking "defensive actions" in 25 different locations and accused government soldiers of raping and killing civilians. The group also claimed that Rathedaung had been under a blockade for more than two weeks, starving the Rohingya, and that government forces were preparing to do the same in Maungdaw. The Myanmar Army also blamed ARSA for the killings of 99 Bengali Hindus in the Kha Maung Seik massacre, which occurred on the same day as the attacks.
Over 4,000 ethnic Rakhines fled their villages on 26 August 2017, as fighting between ARSA and the Tatmadaw escalated.