Rakhine chief minister lied, denied real situation in interview to Indian magazine: European Rohingya Council

The European Rohingya Council (ERC) has condemned the Rakhine chief minister’s comments in an interview with an Indian magazine and said his words amounted to “lies and utter denial of the real situation”.

Maung Maung Ohn, among his many comments in the interview, said there was no persecution of minorities in his state, and the government would not use Rohingya in official documents.
 
He also described this minority group as law-breakers and said, if given privileges, they would demand a separate state.
 
The ERC, which is registered in the Netherlands for upholding the cause of their compatriots, reacted angrily to these comments.
 
“The ERC is deeply troubled with the lies and propaganda made by Rakhine state’s Chief Minister Maung Maung Ohn in his interview with the Outlook,” it said in a statement.
 
They said the minister was “ignorant, stupid, deaf and dumb” and that his denials betrayed the “genocidal intent of Myanmar government” as far as the Rohingya minority community was concerned.
 
“ERC categorically denies and refutes his lies and distortion of truths with the factual information and findings”, it said, countering each point the chief minister made.
 

Rohingya Muslim illegal immigrants gather at the Immigration Detention Centre during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan in Kanchanaburi province in this July 10, 2013 file photo. Reuters

Rohingya refugees from Myanmar shout slogans as they hold placards during a rally, calling for a stop to the killings and violence toward Rohingyas in Myanmar, in Kuala Lumpur in this June 17, 2012 file photo. Reuters

Fleeing sectarian violence, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya people have taken refuge in Bangladesh, but the authorities in Myanmar have so far refused to take them back.

They have also been denied citizenship and left out of the just concluded population count.

This denial is also a stumbling block in the relations between neighbours Bangladesh and Myanmar.

On the persecution of minorities in his state, the chief minister denied the charge.

The ERC has described his claim as “lies” and an “utter denial” of the ground reality. “This is completely contrary to the findings by international independent researchers.”

It said the daily harassment, restrictions on movements, education and livelihood, and denial of primary health care access “come to its peak in Rakhine state”.

“More than 140,000 Rohingya were forced to live in concentration-like camps, where they are dying every day because of malnutrition, curable and infectious diseases, and sudden attack by Rakhine Buddhist thugs, torture by police, etc”.

They quoted Prof Penny Green of Queen Mary University of London as saying, “The Rohingyas have been subject to stigmatisation, harassment, isolation, and systematic weakening”.

“The Rohingyas are faced with only two options: stay and face annihilation, or flee,” the professor, who has done a research on the issue, said.

The chief minister told Outlook said the state of Rakhine had two major ethnic groups—those who inhabited the land a long time ago and the Bengalis, who migrated from another country.

“The term ‘Rohingya’ was not mentioned anywhere before the ’50s or ’60s,” he said.

Rohingya boat people wait for their breakfast at a temporary shelter in the Idi Rayeuk district of Indonesia's Aceh province in this February 5, 2009 file photo. Reuters

Ethnic Rohingya refugees from Myanmar wave as they are transported by a wooden boat to a temporary shelter in Krueng Raya in Aceh Besar in this April 8, 2013 file photo. Reuters

The ERC refuted this as “factually and historically wrong, and genocidal in nature”.

“A person with a sound mind can never lie to an international media in such way.

“Historical records show that both ethnic groups (Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya) have been living side by side for centuries in Rakhine state.

“Despite mountains of evidence that Rohingyas have been indigenous to the Arakan, and that Rohingyas have been recognised by four successive governments of Myanmar after independence from British colonial rule, persistent denial of their ethnicity shows the genocidal intent of the Myanmar government.”

It also condemned the chief minister’s statements that if they were given privileges at home, the Rohingyas would demand separate statehood.

The ERC describes this as “a textbook example” of the Myanmar government’s reluctance to give equal citizenship rights to the Rohingyas.

“The government does not want the Rohingya to have equal social, political and even legal status like other citizens of the country. This again proves the genocidal intent to destroy a community,” read the statement.

It said the minister also tried to portray the Rohingyas as lawless.

“This is completely contrary to the reality. Rohingyas are peace-loving and law-abiding people of the country, which has been on record throughout the history.”