Myanmar Authorities Dupe UN Human Rights Rapporteur into Visiting Wrong Place

By Anwar M.S.January 16, 2017 

By Rohingya Mirror

January 16, 2017

Maungdaw — The Myanmar authorities accompanying Ms. Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar who is on a four-day visit in Arakan, duped her into visiting a wrong village in southern Maungdaw last Saturday (Jan 14), it has been reported. 

On Saturday morning, the UN Rapporteur set off to meet the villagers of ‘Koetankauk (Dounsay Fara) in Rathedaung Township as initially scheduled. However, the authorities took her to the village of ‘Thawan Chaung’ in southern Maungdaw bypassing ‘KoeTankauk’ (in northern Rathedaung).

She came to know she was in a wrong place when she asked the villagers of Thawan Chaung after being in the village. Angered with the accompanying authorities double-crossing her, she left the place and didn’t return to ‘KoeTankauk’ village again.

On Sunday (Jan 15) morning, she visited the violence-hit northern Maungdaw region which has been sealed off since the Myanmar military began offensives on the Rohingya civilians in the region on October 9, 2016.

Deceived by the Myanmar Authorities once earlier, she asked the authorities to stop accompanying her in northern Maungdaw and instead, she chose to visit a few Rohingya villages in the region on her own accompanied only by her interpreters.

She visited the village of Kyikanpyin (locally known as Hawar Bil) and met up with the villagers especially women. After that, she visited Wapeik (Wabek) village but couldn’t meet anyone as the village had been deserted by the villagers due to brutal operations by the Myanmar armed forces (i.e. the Military and the Border Guard Police).

Post that, she visited a few other Rohingya villages such as KyetYoePyin (Kiyari Ferang), PyaungPaik (Haant Gojja Fara), Ngakura (Nagpura) and Sinthaepyin (Haanti Fara).

During the visits by the UN Rapporteur especially without any members of Myanmar armed force accompanying her , the victims in the region were able to open up to her how the Myanmar armed forces torched their homes, unlawfully killed hundreds of innocent people, raped more than 200 women, arbitrarily arrested hundreds of civilians and plundered their properties. It has been learnt that Ms. Yanghee Lee got chance to also talk to some victim women who have become pregnant after being raped by the Myanmar forces.

Some locals in Maungdaw have raised their concerns over the possible distortions in interpretations by a female interpreter named Ms. Khet Khet that accompanied the UN Rapporteur during the visits. The interpreter is a Rakhine woman known for being an anti-Muslim racist remarks on the Rohingya during her term with UNHCR as a Community Development Facilitator in Arakan State.

Ms. Lee’s trip to assess the human rights situation in Arakan will end today and overall it could be considered successful one.

Source by: http://www.rvisiontv.com

OIC Looks To Restore Rohingya’s Status In Myanmar – Syed Hamid

Pic: Bernama

PETALING JAYA: The emergency meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Foreign Ministers this Thursday in Kuala Lumpur will discuss restoring the status of the Rohingya in Myanmar.

OIC Special Envoy for Myanmar Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar said the main objective was to create protection for the ethnic minority, whose rights as citizens have been denied.

“Malaysia proposed the meeting because of the urgency of the matter, and not because we want to interfere in Myanmar’s internal affairs. Neither do we want to confront the Myanmar government.

“This is not a communal issue as claimed by the government but rather a religious issue because they (the Myanmarese) are targeting Muslims in their conflict with the Rohingya,” he told Bernama here today.

The ongoing troubles in the Rakhine state had caused thousands of Rohingya to flee Myanmmar with reports of atrocities, including rape and murder. Whole villages are said to have been burned to the ground, in some cases with the residents still in their houses.

The actions of the Myanmmar security forces against the Rohingya were a gross violation of human rights, Syed Hamid said, adding that the conflict could threaten the peace, security and economy of the region and encourage radicalism.

“We support the Myanmar government’s effort to transform the country to become a much better nation under the new leadership. But the transformation must be inclusive of all sectors of its society.

“They must acknowledge the existence of the Rohingya, whose citizenship was stripped for no reason. They are the natives of the country and, without that recognition, the problem will continue to overflow to neighbouring states,” he said.

The former foreign minister also expressed concern over the Myanmar government’s refusal to allow the Food Flotilla Mission to enter the country to distribute humanitarian aid to the Rohingya.

“They have allowed the humanitarian mission from Indonesia to enter. Why can’t they allow this flotilla mission to enter as well?

“They must understand that the flotilla is organised by a non-governmental organisation and will include NGOs from other countries. It is not organised by the Malaysian government,” he added.

Syed Hamid also said that the Asean community, which Myanmar de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has referred to as a family, must respect and understand its obligations not only under the Asean Charter but also international law.

Source: Bernama

Worldwide Statement: Request OIC to support UN Commission of Inquiry

Men from a Rohingya village outside Maugndaw in Rakhine state, Myanmar October 27, 2016. Picture taken October 27, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun

 

Statement from Rohingya Communities Worldwide

 

Request OIC to support UN Commission of Inquiry

17th January 2017

We, the undersigned organisations, representing Rohingya communities around the world, would like to express our deepest appreciation to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Government of Malaysia with Honourable Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak for holding an Emergency Meeting of the OIC Foreign Ministers on Rohingya crisis on 19 January in Kuala Lumpur.

The longstanding Rohingya problem of ethnic, religious and political problem has been going on for over seven decades from 1942 Muslim Massacre in Arakan. Particularly the successive military regimes from 1962 have been making all out efforts to annihilate the Rohingya people from their ancestral homeland of Arakan, by means of frequent armed operations and oppressive laws under consistent state policies of discrimination, exclusion and extermination against them. In violation of the customary international law the military had enacted the world’s most oppressive Myanmar Citizenship Law of 1982 criminally depriving the Rohingya of their right to nationality as well as their human rights and freedom.

Due to mass atrocity crimes, more than half of the Rohingya population has had left the country. Those who are still in Arakan are being systematically destroyed since 1978. From June 2012 state-sponsored genocidal onslaughts occurred and reoccurred in Arakan and about 3,000 Rohingya were killed, drowned and missing in addition to large-scale destruction of their villages, mosques and madarassas and properties. More than 140,000 displaced Rohingya were herded to squalid semi-concentration camps while over 100,000 escaped persecution to take refuge in foreign countries.

From 9 October 2016, under the pretext of hunting down the assailants of the police outposts, the military, security forces and Buddhist Rakhine militias have been carrying mass atrocity crimes creating the Maungdaw district a “killing zone”, unobserved by the outside world due to sealing off the area in Northern Arakan. An estimated 500 people were killed or burned down; at least 300 women and girls were raped, unknown number of people arrested, about 2500 houses torched, valuables and properties looted and foodstuff destroyed forcing about 65,000 people to cross over to Bangladesh. These crimes are still on-going. State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been protecting the criminal military, is morally and officially responsible for the crimes against Rohingya that amount to genocide and crimes against humanity as per Articles 6 and 7 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998). The UN Human Rights Commission stated that violation of human rights of Rohingya may constitute crimes against humanity.

The Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD-led government has manifestly failed or is unwilling to conduct any credible investigation into atrocity crimes against Rohingya. Instead the government with the military is shamelessly denying any human rights violations against them. Thus the defenceless Rohingya continue to be subjected to crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing. In the absence of national protection, the international community has a responsibility to intervene into Arakan in order to end the violations and protect the civilian population.

We therefore call upon the OIC and its member states to officially support the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry into the totality of the situation in Rakhine State, where most Rohingya live.

We further call upon the OIC to endeavour utmost for ensuring that the establishment of such a Commission is included in the Burma/Myanmar resolution at the next session of the Human Rights Council.

We believe that the establishment of a UN Commission of Inquiry is a crucial first step to start to address the cycle of discrimination, persecution and violence our people face. The Commission must investigate human rights violations which have taken place in order to establish the truth, investigate government laws and policies used against the Rohingya, and make recommendations to the government of Burma/Myanmar and the international community on how to address the situation, ensuring strict compliance with international law and human rights standards.

Our existence as a race is under threat. Failure to act now will prolong our suffering and create greater regional problems and insecurity in the future, and hence we look to you for help in our most desperate hour.

Signatories:

1. Arakan Rohingya National Organisation
2. Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK
3. British Rohingya Community in UK
4. Burmese Rohingya Community in Denmark
5. Burmese Rohingya Association Japan
6. Burmese Rohingya Community Australia
7. Burmese Rohingya Association in Queensland-Australia (BRAQA)
8. Canadian Burmese Rohingya Organisation
9. Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organisation in Malaysia (MERHROM)
10. Rohingya American Society
11. Rohingya Arakanese Refugee Committee
12. Rohingya Community in Germany
13. Rohingya Community in Switzerland
14. Rohingya Community in Finland
15. Rohingya Community in Italy
16. Rohingya Community in Sweden
17. Rohingya Organisation Norway
18. Rohingya Society Malaysia
19. Rohingya Society Netherlands

For more information, please contact:

Tun Khin (Mobile): +44 7888714866

Nay San Lwin (Mobile): +49 69 26022349

Ko Ko Lin (Mobile): +880 1726068413

 

Source by: http://www.rohingyablogger.com