The Rohingyas tend to do what are known as ‘3D’ jobs – those that are Dirty, Dangerous and Degrading. Some employers further exploit their dire situation by paying Rohingya workers,…
In March 2008, Bengali photographer, educator, and activist Saiful Huq Omi traveled to a refugee camp, and spent ten days there, conducting hundreds of interviews. What he learned on that fateful trip would change his life forevermore. Over the next decade, Omi entered a shadow world where evil and chaos reign. His determination to bring light to the plight of the Rohingya rendered him one of them, both in spirit and in flesh, becoming a target for persecution himself.
The Bangladeshi photographer Saiful Huq Omi has spent six years photographing Rohingya Muslims who fled persecution in Myanmar only to find themselves stateless. When he visited refugees in Bangladesh, where more than 200,000 Rohingya now live, he heard stories of torture, rape and murder as well as those about a lack of basic freedoms. While few other people in the world were interested in the plight of these stateless refugees at the time, he felt compelled to focus on them. For Mr. Huq it was personal.
Photographs by Louie Palu, Asim Rafiqui, Rodrigo Abd, Andrea Bruce, Davide Monteleone, Saiful Huq Omi, Ami Vitale and Donald Weber.
The Aftermath Project, 2011. Softcover. 132 pp., black & white and color illustrations throughout, 11×11
This issue is over 200 pages and features work by Bangladeshi photographers Munem Wasif, Abir Abdullah, Tanvir Ahmed, Shahidul Alam, Monirul Alam, Murtada Bulbul, Saiful Huq Omi, Azidur Rahim Peu, Shehzad Noorani, Mohammad Kibria Palash, and Khaled Hassan.
