{"id":84630,"date":"2015-01-22T07:43:07","date_gmt":"2015-01-22T07:43:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=84630"},"modified":"2015-01-22T07:43:07","modified_gmt":"2015-01-22T07:43:07","slug":"monks-sexist-insult-angers-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=84630","title":{"rendered":"Monk’s ‘sexist insult’ angers UN"},"content":{"rendered":"

The UN human rights chief has called on Myanmar to condemn a Buddhist nationalist monk for calling a UN special envoy a “bitch” and a “whore”.<\/p>\n

UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said Ashin Wirathu’s comments amounted to “incitement to hatred”.<\/p>\n

The comments related to South Korean envoy Yanghee Lee, who was in Myanmar last week to address the plight of its Muslim minority.<\/p>\n

Wirathu spent almost a decade in jail for inciting anti-Muslim violence.<\/p>\n

The monk is a leader of the 969 movement, which says Myanmar should remain a Buddhist country and calls for restrictions and boycotts on Muslims.<\/p>\n

Mr Zeid called the language “sexist” and “insulting”.<\/p>\n

“I call on religious and political leaders in Myanmar to unequivocally condemn all forms of incitement to hatred including this abhorrent public personal attack,” Mr Zeid said in a statement.<\/p>\n

‘Systematic discrimination’<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Since the end of military rule in Myanmar, also known as Burma, in 2011, Buddhist nationalism, largely led by monks including Wirathu, has been energised.<\/p>\n

In 2012, scores of people died and thousands were left homeless after violence broke out between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine state, mostly from the Rohingya minority. Anti-Muslim violence has flared several times since then.<\/p>\n

The UN says the Rohingya are being persecuted, and last week passed a resolution calling on Myanmar to give them citizenship.<\/p>\n

\"UN<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Yanghee Lee said displaced Rohingya were living in “abysmal” conditions in refugee camps<\/div>\n

Ms Lee, who was on a 10-day trip to the South East Asian country, said the Rohingya faced systematic discrimination.<\/p>\n

She criticised draft legislation, proposed by a coalition of nationalist Buddhist monks, that includes curbs on interfaith marriage and religious conversions.<\/p>\n

Last Friday, Wirathu spoke at a public rally where he criticised the UN interference and personally attacked Ms Lee, according to local media.<\/p>\n

“We have explained about the race protection law, but the bitch criticised the laws without studying them properly,” he said from the stage to the crowd.<\/p>\n

“Don’t assume that you are a respectable person because of your position. For us, you are a whore.”<\/p>\n

In his statement, Mr Zeid said instead of focussing on people, leaders should address the substance of the concerns raised by the special envoy.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Myanmar’s government said it was investigating the speech.<\/p>\n

The BBC’s Jonah Fisher in Yangon said monks are a powerful political lobby in Myanmar.<\/p>\n

With a general election this year the question now is which leaders will speak up and risk Wirathu and the monks turning on them, he adds.<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UN human rights chief has called on Myanmar to condemn a Buddhist nationalist monk for calling a UN special envoy a “bitch” and a “whore”. UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said Ashin Wirathu’s comments amounted to “incitement to hatred”. The comments related to South Korean envoy Yanghee Lee, who was in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-84630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=84630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84630\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=84630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=84630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=84630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}