Arakan News Agency
In defiance of all humanitarian norms, the Myanmar Army Commander’s Office claimed that ethnic cleansing, killings, rape and burning by soldiers against Rohingya Muslims in Arakan province were justified in the country’s Buddhist majority constitution.
The Office claimed that a committee headed by Lt. Gen. A. Wyne launched an internal investigation into the practices of army soldiers, in response to attacks by gunmen from the Rohingya on August 25th,
The United Nations said the practices were ethnic cleansing.
Myanmar has refused to allow a UN panel to investigate allegations of abuses in a similar counter-attack by the military in October 2016.
But local investigations, including an earlier internal military investigation, have largely rejected what refugees have said about human right abuses by the security forces during so-called “purges”. Thousands of refugees have continued to arrive in Bangladesh over the past few days through the Naf River, which separates them from the Arakan province, although Myanmar has confirmed a cessation of hostilities on September 5th.
Relief agencies estimate that 536,000 refugees have arrived in the Cox-Bazar region, placing enormous pressure on the resources of relief groups and local communities.
Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has pledged to hold accountable perpetrators of human rights violations and says Myanmar will accept the return of refugees who can prove they are her own.
Myanmar army chief General Min Aung Hlaing denied the Japanese ambassador the existence of ethnic cleansing based on images showing Muslims “leaving quietly rather than fleeing in terror.” UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who chairs a committee set up by Suu Kyi to find solutions for ethnic and religious divided Arakan, briefed the Security Council on developments at an informal closed-door meeting on Sunday.
Annan said he hoped any possible Security Council resolution would “urge the government to move forward realistically and provide conditions that allow refugees to return with dignity, a sense of security and the need not to return to the camps.”
