Suu Kyi Asks for Help with Rohingya Muslim Crisis
At a meeting of leaders at the Australia-Asean summit in Sydney, Suu Kyi addressed the issue “comprehensively (and) at some considerable length”, the Australian prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, said.
“Aung San Suu Kyi ... seeks support from Asean and other nations to provide help from a humanitarian and capacity-building point-of-view. Everyone seeks to end the suffering.”
More than 700,000 of the Rohingya ethnic and religious minority have fled Myanmar for Bangladesh since August, fleeing systemic violence from the country’s military, including murder, rape and the deliberate torching of villages.
The UN has said the persecution “bears all the hallmarks of genocide” but Myanmar has vehemently denied the allegations, claiming the military’s operation was in response to attacks by Rohingya militants.
Suu Kyi has spoken little publicly about the conflict – and pointedly refuses to use the word Rohingya, which is not a minority recognized by the Myanmar government.
“It is not the intention of the Myanmar government to apportion blame or to abnegate responsibility,” she said in a speech last September. “We condemn all human rights violations and unlawful violence.”
Asean has a declared policy of non-interference in the affairs of member states but the Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, has said that the ongoing persecution of Rohingya is of international concern.
“Because of the suffering of Rohingya people and that of displacement around the region, the situation in Rakhine state and Myanmar can no longer be considered to be a purely domestic matter … because it has the potential of developing into a serious security threat to the region.”
He said thousands remained vulnerable in Rakhine and over the border.
“People who see no hope in the future will be a fertile ground for radicalization and recruitment by Daesh (ISIL or ISIS) and affiliated groups,” he said. “We must be vigilant and increase our collaboration, because the defeay of Daesh in Iraq and Syria has forced it to go underground and re-emerge elsewhere, especially in crisis zones where it can grow and operate.”
The Asean chairman – Singapore’s prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong – said instability in one Asean state held ramifications for all.
“All of us in the region, we will be anxious if there is any instability, if there is trouble in any of our member countries,” he said. “We are also concerned as human beings if there’s a humanitarian situation which has developed and people’s welfare and lives and safety are at stake. And we do our best to help the governments to re-establish stability and tranquility in the situation.”
Lee said he was not aware of specific security threats posed by the ongoing displacement of Rohingya from Myanmar.
“I do not have any specific intelligence on what’s happening in Rakhine state, whether there are terrorist groups as has been suggested,” he said. “These are possibilities which you cannot rule out and which you must keep on the watch-out for.”
Turnbull said the issue of the Rohingya crisis was “discussed constructively” and that Australia and Asean member states were ready to assist.
“Everyone seeks to end the suffering that has been occasioned by the (conflict and the) displacement of persons. Our goal is to support the peaceful and speedy resolution of the humanitarian ... disaster that has resulted from the conflict,” he said, according to the Guardian.
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