Reports of bulldozing of alleged mass graves showed a “deliberate attempt by the authorities to destroy evidence of potential international crimes, including possible crimes against humanity,” Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein added in a speech to the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Nearly 700,000 Rohingya have fled Rakhine into Bangladesh since insurgent attacks sparked a security crackdown in August, joining 200,000 refugees from a previous exodus.

Zeid noted that his office said on Tuesday that it believes ethnic cleansing is still underway in Rakhine.

Rohingya are still fleeing because of “systematic” if lower-intensity persecution and violence there, he said.

“Victims have reported killings, rape, torture and abductions by the security forces and local militia, as well as apparently deliberate attempts to force the Rohingya to leave the area through starvation, with officials blocking their access to crops and food supplies,” Zeid told the Geneva forum.

“This Council is aware that my office has strong suspicions that acts of genocide may have taken place in Rakhine State since August,” he added.

There was no immediate comment by the Myanmar government. In the Council, its delegation is allowed to respond on Thursday.

His office had received reports of land inhabited by Rohingya being appropriated and members of other ethnic groups replacing them.

“A recent announcement that seven soldiers and three police officers will be brought to justice for the alleged extra-judicial killing of ten Rohingya men is grossly insufficient,” he added.

Myanmar’s government must take steps to provide real accountability for violations and respect the rights of Rohingya, including to citizenship, Zeid said.

A fact-finding mission set up by the Council, headed by former Indonesian Attorney-General Marzuki Darusman, is due to report on its initial findings on Monday after interviewing victims and survivors in Bangladesh and other countries.

Pending their final report, the U.N. General Assembly should establish a new independent mechanism to expedite criminal proceedings in courts against those responsible, Zeid said.

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Source: Reuters

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He claimed the panel was a “whitewash” and accused Ms Suu Kyi, his long-time friend, of lacking “moral leadership”.

Myanmar said he should “review himself” over the “personal attack”.

More than 650,000 Rohingya people, from a mostly-Muslim minority in Buddhist Myanmar, fled to Bangladesh last year in the face of a military crackdown.

Many are now living in refugee camps in the neighbouring country. Bangladesh has said they will all be returned to Myanmar within two years.

Mr Richardson added that Ms Suu Kyi had been “furious” when he raised the case of two Reuters reporters on trial in Myanmar.

Mr Richardson, a former adviser to the Clinton administration, has known Ms Suu Kyi for decades, and visited the Nobel laureate while she was under house arrest in the 1990s.

He told Reuters he was resigning from the advisory board because it was a “whitewash” and he did not want to be part of a “cheerleading squad for the government”.

He was “alarmed by the lack of sincerity with which the critical issue of citizenship was discussed,” he wrote in a statement.

–

Source: BBC

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One former UN official said the head of the UN in Myanmar (Burma) tried to prevent human rights advocates from visiting sensitive Rohingya areas.

More than 500,000 Rohingya have fled an offensive by the military, with many now sheltering in camps in Bangladesh.

The UN in Myanmar “strongly disagreed” with the BBC findings.

In the month since Rohingya Muslims began flowing into Bangladesh, the UN has been at the forefront of the response. It has delivered aid and made robust statements condemning the Burmese authorities.

But sources within the UN and the aid community both in Myanmar and outside have told the BBC that, in the four years before the current crisis, the head of the United Nations Country Team (UNCT), a Canadian called Renata Lok-Dessallien:

• tried to stop human rights activists travelling to Rohingya areas
• attempted to shut down public advocacy on the subject
• isolated staff who tried to warn that ethnic cleansing might be on the way.

One aid worker, Caroline Vandenabeele, had seen the warning signs before. She worked in Rwanda in the run-up to the genocide in late 1993 and early 1994 and says when she first arrived in Myanmar she noticed worrying similarities.

“I was with a group of expats and Burmese business people talking about Rakhine and Rohingya and one of the Burmese people just said ‘we should kill them all as if they are just dogs’. For me, this level of dehumanisation of humans is one sign that you have reached a level of acceptance in society that this is normal.”

For more than a year I have been corresponding with Ms Vandenabeele, who has served in conflict areas such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Rwanda and Nepal.

Between 2013 and 2015 she had a crucial job in the UNCT in Myanmar. She was head of office for what is known as the resident co-ordinator, the top UN official in the country, currently Ms Dessallien.

The job gave Ms Vandenabeele a front-row seat as the UN grappled with how to respond to rising tensions in Rakhine state.

Back in 2012, clashes between Rohingya Muslims and Rakhine Buddhists left more than 100 dead and more than 100,000 Rohingya Muslims in camps around the state capital, Sittwe.

Since then, there have been periodic flare-ups and, in the past year, the emergence of a Rohingya militant group. Attempts to deliver aid to the Rohingya have been complicated by Rakhine Buddhists who resent the supply of aid for the Rohingya, at times blocking it and even attacking aid vehicles.

It presented a complex emergency for the UN and aid agencies, who needed the co-operation of the government and the Buddhist community to get basic aid to the Rohingya.

At the same time they knew that speaking up about the human rights and statelessness of the Rohingya would upset many Buddhists.

So the decision was made to focus on a long-term strategy. The UN and the international community prioritised long-term development in Rakhine in the hope that eventually increased prosperity would lead to reduced tensions between the Rohingya and the Buddhists.

For UN staff it meant that publicly talking about the Rohingya became almost taboo. Many UN press releases about Rakhine avoided using the word completely. The Burmese government does not even use the word Rohingya or recognise them as a distinct group, preferring to call them “Bengalis”.

During my years reporting from Myanmar, very few UN staff were willing to speak frankly on the record about the Rohingya. Now an investigation into the internal workings of the UN in Myanmar has revealed that even behind closed doors the Rohingyas’ problems were put to one side.

–

Source: BBC

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The MP said at the moment, the authorities are not allowing independent observers as “the country is putting a lot of restrictions.”

[contextly_sidebar id=”FCaEk84W3dDKHBlP7B87YOWwghuZO6dm”]But if the opportunity arises, Mr. Mubarak said he would seize it.

“It wouldn’t be an option off the table. It is something I would look at again, and if the need arises to go to Myanmar and see for myself, and up the activism against this grotesque killing of people, why not? I will be happy to do that,” he said on Eyewitness News.

“As a Muslim, I care about human beings. It is a human rights issue. It has absolutely nothing to do with religion or politics, and we have got to be each others keeper.”

Mr. Mubarak has been passionate about the escalating humanitarian crisis in Myanmar, and he led his pressure group on a demonstration on Monday in Ghana’s capital, Accra.

They have accused world leaders of turning a blind eye to the happenings in Myanmar, and they presented a petition to the Israeli Embassy in Ghana, who they accused of supporting the Asian state with weapons.

Rohingyas have been fleeing attacks in Western Myanmar, specifically Rakhine state, which began on August 25, 2017.

The military has been accused of burning Rohingya villages, but the army has explained that it is only responding to attacks by militants and not targeting civilians.

–

By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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Amnesty said this was evidence security forces were trying to push the minority Muslim group out of the country.

The army says it is fighting militants and denies targeting civilians.

Some 389,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since violence began last month. They have long been persecuted in Myanmar as “illegal immigrants”.

At least 30% of Rohingya villages in Rakhine state are now empty, the government says.

They have lived in the state in Myanmar, also known as Burma, for generations but are denied citizenship.

Myanmar has faced international condemnation over the crisis.

On Thursday US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Myanmar’s democracy was facing a “defining moment”.

“I think it is important that the global community speak out in support of what we all know the expectation is for the treatment of people regardless of their ethnicity,” he said in London.

“This violence must stop, this persecution must stop.”

A day earlier UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the Rohingya were facing a catastrophic humanitarian situation, and attacks on villagers were unacceptable. The UN Security Council has called for urgent steps to end the violence.

What does the Amnesty report say?

Amnesty said it had new evidence based on fire-detection data, satellite imagery, photos and videos, as well as interviews with eye-witnesses, of “an orchestrated campaign of systematic burnings” targeting Rohingya villages for almost three weeks.

“The evidence is irrefutable – the Myanmar security forces are setting northern Rakhine State ablaze in a targeted campaign to push the Rohingya people out of Myanmar. Make no mistake: this is ethnic cleansing,” said Tirana Hassan, the group’s crisis response director.

Amnesty said security forces would surround a village, shoot people as they fled and burn down their houses, describing the acts as “crimes against humanity”.

It said it had detected at least 80 major fires in inhabited areas since 25 August, following attacks on police posts by the rebel Arkan Rohingya Salvation Army (Arsa).

No fires of this magnitude had been seen in similar periods over the last four years, Amnesty added.

The rights group said it had also received credible reports of Rohingya militants burning homes of Buddhist ethnic Rakhine but had been unable to verify them.

What do the authorities say?

Myanmar’s envoy to the UN has blamed the Rohingya insurgents for the violence in Rakhine state and said that his country would never tolerate such atrocities.

Government spokesman Zaw Htay has urged displaced people to find refuge in temporary camps set up in Rakhine state, but said Myanmar would not be able to allow all those who fled to Bangladesh to return.

On Wednesday, the head of Myanmar’s armed forces, Gen Min Aung Hlaing, said that the country “could not accept and recognise the term ‘Rohingya’ by hiding the truth” (meaning Myanmar’s claim that they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh).

“Rakhine ethnics [Buddhists] are our indigenous people who had long been living there since the time of their forefathers,” he said.

What other evidence is there?

At the government’s own admission, 176 Rohingya villages, more than 30% of the total in northern Rakhine state, are now empty.

Reports of atrocities preceded the Amnesty report, with testimony from fleeing Rohingya of involvement by security forces in the razing of their villages.

Though access to Rakhine state is heavily controlled, the BBC’s Jonathan Head was one of a few journalists taken on a government-run tour recently and witnessed Muslim villages being burned with police doing nothing to stop it.

While the current crisis has seen nearly 400,000 Rohingya flee, the UN says Bangladesh was already hosting several hundred thousand undocumented Rohingya who had fled earlier violence.

Other Rohingya have been living in camps for displaced people within Myanmar.

Who are the Rohingya?

There were at least a million members of the Rohingya ethnic group living in Myanmar, most of them Muslim, though some are Hindu. They are thought to have their origins in what is now Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, but many have been present in Myanmar for centuries.

The law in Myanmar does not recognise the Rohingya ethnic minority as one of its “national races” and they are effectively denied citizenship. Human Rights Watch describes the Rohingya as one of the largest stateless populations in the world.

“Restrictions on movement and lack of access to basic health care have led to dire humanitarian conditions for those displaced by earlier waves of violence,” the group says.

Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has called on Myanmar to take the Rohingya refugees back.

–

Source: BBC

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Some 370,000 Rohingya Muslims have crossed to Bangladesh since violence in Rakhine state escalated last month.

Ms Suu Kyi is facing allegations from supporters in the West that she has failed to speak out over the violence.

Myanmar’s military says it is fighting Rohingya militants and denies reports that it is targeting civilians.

A government spokesman for Ms Suu Kyi, Zaw Htay, said “the state councillor will not attend” the General Assembly, where she spoke last year. He did not give further details.

Another spokesman, Aung Shin, told Reuters news agency that “perhaps” Ms Suu Kyi has “more pressing matters to deal with”, adding: “She’s never afraid of facing criticism or confronting problems.”

Ms Suu Kyi was due to participate in discussions at the General Assembly session in New York from 19 to 25 September.

In her first address to the General Assembly as national leader in September last year, Ms Suu Kyi defended her government’s efforts to resolve the crisis over the treatment of the Rohingya.

Myanmar’s envoy to the UN has blamed Rohingya insurgents for the violence in Rakhine state and said that Myanmar would never tolerate such atrocities.

But many of those who have fled say troops responded to attacks by Rohingya militants on 25 August with a brutal campaign of violence and village burnings aimed at driving them out.

On Tuesday, Myanmar denounced the suggestion by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Raad al-Hussein, that its treatment of Rohingya Muslims amounted to “ethnic cleansing”.

The Rohingyas, a stateless mostly Muslim minority in Buddhist-majority Rakhine, have long experienced persecution in Myanmar, which says they are illegal immigrants.

The UN Security Council is due to meet on Wednesday to discuss the crisis.

–

Source: BBC

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One of them, a 15-year-old boy being treated in Bangladesh, lost both legs.

A woman at the same hospital said she had trodden on a landmine after she and her family were fired on. It’s unclear who laid the mines in either case.

More than 300,000 Rohingya have escaped Myanmar (Burma) in recent weeks. The army there denies targeting civilians.

On Sunday the human rights group Amnesty International accused the authorities of laying landmines at border crossings used by fleeing Rohingya.

A Myanmar military source told Reuters news agency that mines had been placed along the border in the 1990s and the army had since tried to remove them, but added that none had been planted in recent days.

The hospital visited by the BBC has seen an influx of people with landmine injuries, doctors say.

The 15-year-old boy, Azizu Haque, arrived with his legs destroyed. His brother, in another hospital, suffered the same fate, his mother says.

“Their injuries are so bad it’s as if they are dead,” she told the BBC. “It’s better that Allah [God] takes them, they are suffering so much.”

The injured woman, Sabequr Nahar, says she fled Myanmar because the military had been targeting her community, and she was crossing the border with her three sons when she stepped on a landmine.

“We’d been fired on, shot at, and they planted mines,” the 50-year-old said.

On Monday UN human rights chief Zeid Raad al-Hussein said that a “cruel military operation” was taking place, calling it “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”.

Rohingya who have fled Myanmar say villages have been burned and civilians attacked in a brutal campaign to drive them out.

The UN Security Council said it was looking to meet on Wednesday to discuss the violence after Sweden and Britain requested a closed-door meeting on the “deteriorating situation” in Rakhine state.

The Rohingya, a stateless mostly Muslim minority in Buddhist-majority Rakhine, have long experienced persecution in Myanmar, which says they are illegal immigrants.

Bangladesh is already host to hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who have fled previous outbreaks of violence in Rakhine.

Existing refugee camps are full and the new arrivals are sleeping rough in whatever space they can find, reports say.

Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s de facto leader, is facing mounting criticism for failing to protect the Rohingya.

But the Rohingya are extremely unpopular inside Myanmar. On Sunday, police fired rubber bullets to break up a mob attacking the home of a Muslim butcher in Magway region in central Myanmar. One protester was quoted by AFP news agency saying it was a response to events in Rakhine.

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The 85-year-old South African archbishop, who has formally retired from active work said he was forced to write publicly on the matter due to Madam Suu Kyi’s posture.

In an open letter on Thursday to Suu Kyi, Desmond Tutu said, ‘Your emergence into public life allayed our concerns about violence being perpetrated against members of the Rohingya but what some have called “ethnic cleansing” and others “a slow genocide” has persisted – and recently accelerated …”

“We pray for you to speak out for justice, human rights and the unity of your people. We pray for you to intervene in the escalating crisis and guide your people back towards the path of righteousness,” Desmond Tutu said.

“We know that you know that human beings may look and workshop differently – and some may have greater firepower than others – but none are superior and non-inferior; that when you scratch the surface we are all the same… My dear sister: if the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep. A country that is not at peace with itself, fails to acknowledge and protect the dignity and worth of all its people, is not a free country,” he added

There are about 1 million Rohingya Muslims in Burma and they have for several years complained of being victims of persecution from the state.

But Madam Suu Kyi largely remained silent on the matter despite being awarded a Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1991 for her non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights.

Many global icons have condemned Madam Suu Kyi for the stance in the matter including, Malala Yousafzai, the youngest ever peace prize winner.

The UN refugee agency announced an estimated 270,000 Rohingya have sought refuge in Bangladesh over the past two weeks due to attacks from the military.

An online petition for the revocation of Aung San Suu Kyi’s Nobel Peace Prize has been launched on Change.org and have so far gathered about 400,000 signatures.

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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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