United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees Visits Myanmar

By Ariel Lin
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

YANGON, Myanmar – The United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, visited Myanmar earlier this week.  According to a Myanmar official, he met with the junta’s ministers in charge of foreign affairs, home affairs, immigration and border areas.  Mr. Guterres also toured Myanmar’s border with Bangladesh and Rakhine state where most of the Rohingya reside.

Rohingya is a Muslim ethnic group that Junta refuses to recognize as citizens of Myanmar.  Earlier this year, Myanmar’s consul general to Hong Kong says that the Rohingya could not possibly be Myanmar since they were “dark brown” and “ugly as ogres.”

Rohingya issue has caught attention from the international community recently.  Thousands of Rohingya fled Myanmar to escape poverty and hardship were mistreated by Thai military.   The international media published photographs that show the Thai military rounded up Rohingya and set adrift in boats towed out to sea with limited supplies.  Some of them were rescued in Indian and Indonesian waters.  The UN refugee agency has expressed concern over the fate of hundreds rescued Rohingya.

At the Association of South-East Asian Nations last month, Myanmar agreed to allow Rohingyas to return to the country if they could prove they were Bengalis.  Bengalis is included on the government’s list of 135 recognized ethnic minority groups in Myanmar.

For more information, please see:

AFP – UN refugee chief visits Myanmar – 10 March 2009

Reuters – UNHCR chief in Myanmar, to visit Rohingya area – 10 March 2009

Time – Visiting the Rohingya, Burma’s Hidden Population – 09 March 2009

Voice of America – UN Official to Discuss Refugees with Burmese Government – 09 March 2009

Author: Impunity Watch Archive