Arakan News Agency
Human Rights Watch says they hope to see countries from the Association of Southeast Asia Nations (ASEAN) push towards a resolution of Myanmar’s Rohingya crisis.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) hoped to see the allies pushing forward to the solutions in Monday’s meeting.
“We’re hoping that this will be the beginning of an ongoing campaign by some of the ASEAN states to demand answers from Burma and to expect better treatment of the Rohingya. If it’s just a one of those meetings when they go, listen to Aung San Suu Kyi and merrily go home, satisfied with her answers, I think that we will not see any improvement in the situation. What is clear however, ASEAN does have efficacy to be able to force Myanmar to answer questions,” Phil Robertson, deputy director of the Asia Division at HRW said.
“The larger issue is whether this is going to contribute to a solution in the long term for the Rohingya. Ultimately these governments need to press Burma to allow the Rohingya to stay and to have citizenship and be accepted as full participants in the Burmese state. Otherwise, we’re going to continue to have these occasional pogroms against the Rohingyas, the Rohingya being forced to flee to Bangladesh into boats. It will continue to be a regional problem that we saw two years ago,” said Robertson.
The pressure on the government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi over the crisis in the northwestern state is growing and the United Nations has called on Suu Kyi to go to the state to reassure civilians they will be protected.
