Ban Ki-moon urged to press for action on Rohingya discrimination
Media Release From Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK)
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Must Press For Practical Steps on Rohingya
We, BROUK are grateful for the UN Secretary General stressing the need for action on problems facing Rohingya, during his press conference with State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi today.
The Annan Commission is looking at long-term solutions on the Rohingya issue, but many problems faced by the Rohingya, including what Ban Ki-moon’s own United Nations has described as crimes against humanity, cannot wait a year or more for this report of the Commission. We therefore request that Ban Ki-moon ask the NLD government to take immediate action to lift all aid restrictions in Rakhine State, and to lift restrictions on movement, education and marriage. These are basic human rights and there is no need or justification for the NLD to continue with these military regime era policies of discrimination.
At the same time we are also concerned that at the 21st Century Pinlong Conference Rohingya and other Muslims are excluded. The Pinlong Conference is going beyond ceasefires, and wider issues about the future of the country are being discussed. Rohingya and Muslim voices should not be excluded from such discussions.
Even though we welcome the announcement last week of the Kofi Annan led Commission, we are seriously concerned that people are dying in the camps where they fled to four years ago after they fled mobs that had burned their homes and villages. They are dying in part because the new government has kept in place severe restrictions on delivery of aid.
“We need long-term solutions and short-term action to start to address the Rohingya crisis,” said Tun Khin, President of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK. “We hope that Ban Ki-moon is stressing the need for this approach rather than just waiting for the Annan Commission to make its report.”
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