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In the heart of Rakhine State, the land tells a story that the world no longer wants to hear. Where once stood thriving Rohingya villages — homes, mosques, schools and rice paddies — there are now military barracks and security compounds. The Myanmar military has not only destroyed the evidence of its crimes, it has physically overwritten the memory of a people.

A UN-backed report released last month revealed that the junta has razed scores of Rohingya villages and built fortified outposts on their remains. These are not isolated incidents but part of a deliberate strategy to ensure that the Rohingya can never return and that their very existence can be denied in the future. Bulldozers and concrete have become the final tools of genocide.

Eight years after the 2017 campaign of ethnic cleansing, this is how the genocide continues — quietly, methodically and with almost no international attention. While global headlines have moved on, Myanmar’s military is entrenching the results of its crimes. The country’s geography is being rewritten to erase its victims.

The symbolism is chilling. Building military infrastructure atop Rohingya villages serves two purposes. It destroys the physical evidence that investigators might one day use in prosecutions before the International Criminal Court or the International Court of Justice. And it sends an unmistakable message that the land now belongs to the perpetrators, not the victims.

The Myanmar junta has razed scores of Rohingya villages and built fortified outposts on their remains

Dr. Azeem Ibrahim

This is not new in the history of atrocity. After the Bosnian war, Serb militias constructed police outposts over mass graves and village sites to block forensic access. In Darfur, Sudanese forces transformed torched villages into garrisons. The goal is always the same: to erase memory, rewrite ownership and close the book on accountability.

For the Rohingya, who have already lost their homes, their citizenship and much of their cultural identity, this latest phase completes a process of annihilation that began long before 2017. The military is not just trying to win a war. It is trying to win history.

The implications for repatriation are devastating. Bangladesh still hosts nearly a million Rohingya refugees, confined to overcrowded camps where hope has long since faded. Dhaka has repeatedly pushed for their return, but how can there be repatriation when the villages they fled no longer exist?

The camps at Cox’s Bazar were always meant to be temporary. But what happens when the homeland itself is permanently altered? Many Rohingya now fear that returning would mean resettlement in military-controlled zones, stripped of autonomy, safety and dignity. In effect, repatriation risks becoming a euphemism for reconfinement, this time inside the country that tried to wipe them out.

The junta’s strategy of land seizure also complicates future reconciliation. Without property restitution or even recognition of prewar ownership, there is no basis for justice or recovery. Every concrete block laid over a Rohingya village is another barrier to peace.

Perhaps most damning is the global response, or lack thereof. The UN has documented the destruction. Human rights groups have issued reports. Yet the reaction from states has been muted, overshadowed by newer crises and donor fatigue. The international community has become accustomed to treating the Rohingya tragedy as an intractable problem, frozen in time.

But this complacency is dangerous. Genocide does not end when the killing stops. It continues through systematic erasure, when the perpetrators reshape land and law to ensure that victims can never return, testify or rebuild. By failing to act now, the world legitimizes this second phase of the atrocity.

The accountability process has stalled. The case at the International Court of Justice drags on, the International Criminal Court investigation remains limited and sanctions have been piecemeal at best. Meanwhile, aid to Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh has been cut by nearly 40 percent since 2022, leaving children malnourished and families desperate. The international community is not only ignoring justice, it is enabling despair.

Without property restitution or even recognition of prewar ownership, there is no basis for justice or recovery

Dr. Azeem Ibrahim

What can be done? First, the UN and partner governments must prioritize the preservation of evidence. Every destroyed village should be mapped and documented through satellite imagery before it is built over. Independent investigators should have access to those sites to prevent the complete disappearance of proof.

Second, donor nations must tie any future repatriation agreements to clear conditions, including land restitution, civilian oversight in Rakhine and the dismantling of military structures built on Rohingya land. Anything less would amount to legitimizing the junta’s land grab.

Third, there must be targeted sanctions on military units directly involved in these land seizures and construction projects, including bans on foreign companies that supply materials or equipment for such developments. Naming and shaming is not enough, financial isolation must follow.

Finally, there should be a renewed diplomatic effort to involve the Arakan Army, which now controls most of Rakhine State, in discussions about future governance. Despite its own problematic record, it represents a reality on the ground that cannot be ignored if any safe return is to be considered. Engagement must aim to secure guarantees of protection for Rohingya civilians under any post-junta arrangement.

Genocide seeks not just to kill a people but to destroy the idea that they ever existed. The Rohingya are being erased twice, first from their land and now from the map itself. But memory can resist. The diaspora, human rights advocates and independent journalists must continue documenting, preserving and speaking the names of the lost villages.

The world must understand that rebuilding military bases over Rohingya soil is not reconstruction, it is obliteration disguised as progress. Every outpost and checkpoint is a monument to impunity.

If the international community allows Myanmar’s generals to rewrite the geography of genocide without consequence, it will have abandoned one of the clearest moral tests of our time. The Rohingya crisis is no longer only about refugees or repatriation, it is about whether humanity will tolerate the deliberate deletion of a people from history.

• Dr. Azeem Ibrahim is the director of special initiatives at the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, DC. X: @AzeemIbrahim