Ataullah abu Ammar Jununi ( ar, عطالله أبو عمار جنوني) is the leader of the

Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), formerly known as Harakah al-Yaqin ( "faith movement" in English), is a Rohingya insurgent group active in northern Rakhine State, Myanmar. According to a December 2016 report by the International Cri ...

(ARSA), a

Rohingya The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an ...

insurgent group active in northern

Rakhine State Rakhine State (; , , ; formerly known as Arakan State) is a Administrative divisions of Myanmar, state in Myanmar (Burma). Situated on the western coast, it is bordered by Chin State to the north, Magway Region, Bago Region and Ayeyarwady R ...

. Ataullah appears in several videos released online by ARSA, where he gives press statements and speeches.

Early life

Ataullah was born in

Karachi Karachi (; ur, ; ; ) is the most populous city in Pakistan and 12th most populous city in the world, with a population of over 20 million. It is situated at the southern tip of the country along the Arabian Sea coast. It is the former cap ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

to a migrant family, who had fled the

religious persecution Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or a group of individuals as a response to their religion, religious beliefs or affiliations or their irreligion, lack thereof. The tendency of societies or groups within soc ...

in his native

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

(also known as Arakan, Burma) sometime in the 1960s. At an early age, Ataullah's family moved to

Mecca Mecca (; officially Makkah al-Mukarramah, commonly shortened to Makkah ()) is a city and administrative center of the Mecca Province of Saudi Arabia, and the Holiest sites in Islam, holiest city in Islam. It is inland from Jeddah on the Red ...

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

, where he was enrolled in an Islamic school. In his later years in Mecca, Ataullah served as an

imam Imam (; ar, إمام '; plural: ') is an Islamic leadership position. For Sunni Muslims, Imam is most commonly used as the title of a worship leader of a mosque. In this context, imams may lead Islamic worship services, lead prayers, ser ...

to the Rohingya

diaspora A diaspora ( ) is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of origin. Historically, the word was used first in reference to the dispersion of Greeks in the Hellenic world, and later Jews after ...

community of around 150,000.

Insurgency

The International Crisis Group (ICG) said in a report that it interviewed members of his group. The think-tank said that the leader of the group has close links with Saudi Arabia. The ICG report released in December 2016 states that he left Saudi Arabia in 2012, shortly after religiously motivated violence erupted in

. A

Myanmar government Myanmar ( also known as Burma) operates ''de jure'' as a unitary assembly-independent republic under its 2008 constitution. On 1 February 2021, Myanmar's military took over the government in a coup, causing ongoing anti-coup protests. ...

press release claims Ataullah spent six months training in modern

guerrilla warfare Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare in which small groups of combatants, such as paramilitary personnel, armed civilians, or Irregular military, irregulars, use military tactics including ambushes, sabotage, Raid (military), raids ...

under the

Taliban The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalist, militant Islamist, jihadist, and Pasht ...

. The ICG report stated that though not confirmed, there are indications he went to Pakistan, and possibly elsewhere, and that he received practical training in modern guerrilla warfare. Several members of the group also stated to ICG that he may have received additional training in

Libya Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya bo ...

before his return to Rakhine State, but this remains unconfirmed. On 9 October 2016, Ataullah led hundreds of ARSA insurgents to the

Bangladesh–Myanmar border The Bangladesh–Myanmar border is the international border between the countries of Bangladesh and Myanmar (formerly ''Burma''). The border stretches , from the tripoint with India in the north, to the Bay of Bengal in the south. About of the bo ...

, where they attacked Burmese border police posts. A week later, Ataullah appeared in a video online, claiming responsibility for the attacks. Ataullah led a second large-scale attack on 25 August 2017, which resulted in the deaths of 71 people. ARSA was blamed for the Kha Maung Seik massacre (the killings of 99

Bengali Hindus Bengali Hindus ( bn, বাঙ্গালী হিন্দু/বাঙালি হিন্দু, translit=Bāṅgālī Hindu/Bāṅāli Hindu) are an ethnoreligious population who make up the majority in the Indian states of West Benga ...

) that occurred on the same day, a charge Ataullah denies. Ataullah's half-brother Muhammad Shah Ali, a member of ARSA, was arrested by the

Armed Police Battalion The Armed Police Battalion is a specialised unit of the Bangladesh Police. It is headquartered in Dhaka. History The Armed Police Battalion was formed on 1 October 1975 as a specialized force of the Bangladesh Police through The Armed Police Batta ...

on 16 January 2022 in a camp near Cox's Bazar while carrying arms and drugs. Ataullah was accused by

Bangladesh Police The Bangladesh Police ( bn, বাংলাদেশ পুলিশ) of the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a law enforcement agency, operating under the Ministry of Home Affairs. It plays a crucial role in maintaining peace, and enforcemen ...

in an investigative report submitted in June 2022 of ordering the murder of Mohib Ullah because he feared his and his organization Arakan Rohingya Society for Peace and Human Rights's popularity, which he believed could be an impediment in ARSA's operations. The police also stated that he had told Mohib Ullah to shut down the operations of his organization and join ARSA, but he refused.

References

Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Rohingya people Pakistani people of Rohingya descent People from Karachi {{Pakistan-bio-stub