“Authority, power and wealth
don’t change a man. It only reveals him”, Imam Ali (A.S). Myanmar’s Nobel peace
prize winner, Aung san suu kyi, had spent almost 15 years under house arrest
before she began her political carrer. She is now the state Counsellor of
Myanmar. During her house arrest, she was praised all over the world because of
her unshakable stance for democracy and her unwavering commitment to the rights
of people. But these days her government is facing intense international
criticism over military action against Rohingya Muslims and her silence about
this violence. During the days of her incarceration, she was an emblem of
suffering, and now she is a symbol of silence, complicity and cruelty. The
determination with which she refused to capitulate to her oppressors then, is
now the material of her refusal to have mercy, to impose the suffering that
degrades, embitters and enrages an individual. She is a Nobel Peace Prize winner
who is devoid of the nobility of character. She is in power and her real cruel
face is evident to the whole world.
Most of Myanmar’s population is Buddhist, led by firebrand monks. There is
widespread hostility toward the Rohingya Muslim who are in the minority and are
discriminated against regularly. The government not only denies them citizenship
but also labels them illegal Bengali immigrants. The Buddhist monks are leading
an Islamophobic campaign, calling for them to be pushed out of the country. This
time the situation aggravated because of the militant attacks on Myanmar’s
security forces in Rakhine on August 25. The attacks sparked the worst military
backlash. In the last three weeks alone 300,000 mostly Rohingya civilians have
fled to Bangladesh, where refuge camps have almost burst at the seams.
Suu kyi along with the rest of Myanmar’s government is presiding over this
massacre. Even the UN human right chief said, “The country is waging a
systematic attack on the Rohingya Muslims.” According to reports, more than
1,000 Rohingya Muslims have been killed; scores have drowned try to make the
perilous sea journey in boats. Many of the dead were children. Others have died
while trying to flee the fighting in Rakhine state, where witness say entire
villages have been burned. Instead of speaking against this massacre and
violence, suu kyi’s foreign ministry defended the military for doing their
legitimate duty to restore stability, saying troops were under orders to
exercise all due restraint and to take full measures to avoid collateral damage.
The inaction of the UN and silence of Pakistani leaders on this issue is
condemnable and shameful. Muslims all over the world were expecting that the UN
would assert the principle of humanitarian intervention without discrimination,
but it is heart breaking that the UN is not fulfilling its duties. Chairman of
Pakistan Tahreek-e-Insaf Imran Khan wrote to UN secretary asking him to play his
due role in ending the persecution and genocide of Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar
termed the world body’s silence on the issue shameful. Imran khan said, “In the
past three years, more than 120,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled abroad under
desperate circumstances and conditions. Even today the Rohingyas have been
abandoned on the high seas with no humanitarian assistance forthcoming.”
Turkish President Tayyab Erdogan said that the death of hundreds of Rohingya
Muslims in Myanmar constituted a genocide aimed at Muslim communities in the
region.
“There is a genocide there. They remain silent towards this. All those looking
away from this genocide carried out under the veil of democracy are also part of
this massacre.”
He said it was Turkey’s moral responsibility to take a stand against the events
in Myanmar. Pakistani leaders should learn from Tayyab Erdogan.