Washington’s United Nations ambassador had harsh words for Myanmar over its failure to hold anyone accountable for communal violence in the country over the last two years, that she lay responsibility for at the door of “extremist monks.” Speaking on US foreign policy at the University of Louisville’s McConnell Center on January 12, Ambassador Samantha Power, US Permanent Representative to the United Nations, said Myanmar is “still a long way from being a rights- respecting democracy.” According to the US government transcript of the speech, Ms Power spoke of the positive developments in terms of Myanmar’s political and economic reforms, driven partly by democracy activists and people demanding change, and the positive role of opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. However, the civilian government and the 2008 Constitution continue to give the military the broad authority to dismiss Parliament and veto any constitutional amendment, and the state of human rights remains a concern, said Ms Power. “Attacks against the Rohingya and other Muslim groups have even increased, egged on by extremist monks, particularly in Burma’s Rakhine State. Yet virtually no one has been held accountable, and the humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate, with more than 100,000 Rohingya confined in squalid camps. Making matters worse, the government recently proposed legislation that would force the Rohingya to renounce their ethnicity in order to be registered as citizens,” she said. Ambassador Power said that the vast majority of changes that the United States made concerning Myanmar were conditioned upon the regime’s meeting specific human rights and democracy benchmarks, such as dialogue with the opposition and the release of prisoners, giving the United States the flexibility and the leverage to reinstate sanctions if sufficient progress was not made. She said her country has great hope for Myanmar’s future but she was worried about the potential for backsliding. Hundreds of placard-waving residents including 100 Buddhist monks protested the arrival in Sittwe of the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar Ms Yanghee Lee, on January 8, calling on her to be impartial in delivering her next report on the human rights situation in Rakhine State. Daw Nyo Aye, one of the leaders of the protest, told Mizzima on January 8, reports on the State had been one-sided, “They focused on the rights of the Bengali, but they did not take into account the ethnic Rakhine people’s suffering. If this is so, it would be better if they [the UN delegation] didn’t come to Rakhine State,” she said.
Posted on: Wed, 14 Jan 2015 07:31:01 +0000
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