Myanmar: Aung San Suu Kyi says Rohingya issue needs careful handling

[Jonathan Fairfield]

Myanmar: Aung San Suu Kyi says Rohingya issue needs careful handling

Myanmar's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi for the first time spoke about her country's persecuted Rohingya Muslims, saying that the sensitive issue must be addressed "very, very carefully."

When asked if the Rohingya Muslim community should be given citizenship, she said: "The government is now verifying the citizenship status under the 1982 citizenship law. I think they should go about it very quickly and very transparently and then decide what the next steps in the process should be."

She told the Washington Post via a telephone interview that Myanmar has many minorities and that she is always "talking up for the right of minorities and peace and harmony and for equality and so on and so on ...."

Aung said the protection of rights of minorities is an issue which should be addressed very, very carefully, and as quickly and effectively as possible, adding that the government was not doing enough about the issue.

Read more: http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/myanmar-aung-san-suu-kyi-says-rohingya-issue-needs-careful-handling-1506733

[thousandpercent]

Aung San Suu Kyi says absolutely nothing, and it's news around the world. Looks like assignment to the Myanmar beat is the punishment a journalist gets for being lazy.

[Saan]

Aung San Suu Kyi will not say anything about the Rohingyas until after the election, if then.

To come out in their support will cost her the election.

[sanuk711]

Aung San Suu Kyi for the first time spoke about her country's persecuted Rohingya Muslims,---OP

Yer her silence on this persecution has just been deafening ...........

[Chao Lao Beach]

It is all politics......

[siam2007]

Aung San Suu Kyi will not say anything about the Rohingyas until after the election, if then.

To come out in their support will cost her the election.

As a frequent visitor to Myanmar since a decade, I have never believed she could be the redeemer she was made by the opposition movement.

In fact, if she wins the next election (and the government actually lets her take over ), the Myanmar people could be up for a big disappointment.....

[spidermike007]

She told the Washington Post via a telephone interview that Myanmar has many minorities and that she is always "talking up for the right of minorities and peace and harmony and for equality and so on and so on ...."

This is an astonishingly disingenuous remark coming from someone who has been ignoring this problem, to the very best of her ability, while these folks have been slaughtered, persecuted, dumped off boats, and treated like substandard human beings. I realize and she realizes, that she is dealing with one of the most corrupt, heinous, callous, ugly, power hungry governments on the planet. But, is that an excuse to be so silent on the issue? Is she truly this bigoted, or is this simply a calculated decision for maximum votes? One hopes it is the latter. What surprises me, is during my visits to Burma (I refuse to call it Myanmar, out of an extreme hatred of the 70 or so multi billionaire generals and head pig, Than Shwe) who still run the country despite the fact that the US has agreed to say the opposite, one cannot help but notice that much of the population is of Indian, Bengali, and Bangladeshi (same thing) ethnicity. Why then, are the Rakhine (Rohinga) people being treated in such a manner? When I speak to people in Burma all say there is no issue with the vast majority of the Burmese people. There seem to be a group of super freak monks, who kind of remind me of Islamic State hooligans, in their degree of ignorance. But, this seems to be strictly a manufactured government issue according to the Burmese I have spoken with.

I do hope Suu Kyi starts to speak up, and become a bit more courageous on this issue. Somehow, in her current state of timidity, she is starting to resemble Blundering Barry.

Edited June 22, 2015 by spidermike007