Shirin Ebadi - From Burmese Dissident to Mystifying Politician: Aung San Suu Kyi’s neglect of the Rohingya Muslims
In advance of a United
Nations envoy’s visit to the country, Burmese officials in June instructed U.N.
officials to refer to Burma’s Muslim minority as “people who believe in Islam in
Rakhine state.” This is the latest chapter in what has become a tragic campaign
to reassure Buddhist nationalists that the government will continue to oppress
the Rohingya—even to the point of denying them their name and citizenship in
Burma.
Sadly, this campaign
is being led by Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu
Kyi. After decades of
defiant activism, house arrest and unimaginable personal sacrifice, Ms. Suu Kyi
is finally in a position to bring democracy to her country. Ms. Suu Kyi’s party
won Burma’s national elections in November 2015, and this spring, in addition
to being named foreign minister, she was appointed state counselor, the de
facto prime minister. The new title effectively gives her the power to run
Burma.
I’m sure it is a responsibility that my
fellow Nobel peace laureate—a woman who was under house arrest off and on for
more than two decades—takes very seriously. Yet those of us who spoke up for
Aung San Suu Kyi those many years when her human rights were being
violated—including His Holiness the Dalai Lama and
Archbishop Desmond Tutu—are deeply pained that she won’t extend the same
respect for human rights to Burma’s more than one million Rohingya.
Like thousands of
human-rights defenders around the world, we have also called upon Burma to
respect the rights of other political prisoners and minorities in
Burma—including the Karen, the Shan and the Chin. Global human-rights
organizations, along with courageous grass roots organizations in Burma, have
documented how the Burmese military and state have suppressed these minorities
through religious persecution, killings, rape, disappearances, torture and
other crimes against humanity.
After at least 100
Rohingya were killed during 2012 riots and
clashes with Buddhists in Rakhine state, we spoke out publicly to help Burma’s
Muslim minority. As a Muslim woman, I
feel it is my particular responsibility to ring the alarm bells about the
Burmese government’s campaign against the Rohingya. Burma has long denied the
Rohingya the recognition and basic rights, like access to education and freedom
of movement, that citizenship would afford. Since the riots, more than 140,000
Rohingya have been forced into refugee camps, and many of them now live
in conditions much resembling concentration camps. Tens of thousands have
risked losing their lives to make the dangerous journey by sea in overcrowded
boats to leave Rakhine state.
The Buddhist majority
in Burma—even many seasoned democracy activists—seem to see no contradiction in
their call for democracy and the cruel and inhumane treatment of the Rohingya.
This includes Aung San Suu Kyi. This is grimly ironic,
given that her supporters—including me—have for many years defiantly rejected
the word Myanmar, the name assigned to the country by the autocratic military
that ran the country since 1962. We respected the fact that Ms. Suu Kyi and her
followers called themselves Burmese, and the country Burma.
So how can Ms. Suu Kyi
now turn her back on the Rohingya?
I have paid a high
price in my life advocating for freedom, including defending the rights of the
Bah’ai, a religious minority, in Iran. Since 2009, I have been forced to live
outside of Iran—and have lost not only my home but also my marriage and many
friends. But I strongly believe there is no other way to live. Up until
recently, I thought that Ms. Suu Kyi and I shared this conviction.
In May, Ms. Suu Kyi’s
party announced that she will head up a committee dedicated to promoting peace
and development in Rakhine state. The announcement said the committee—which
reportedly will include 27 members of the new cabinet—will “coordinate” the
activities of U.N. agencies and international nongovernmental organizations in
that state.
This looks
suspiciously more like an effort to further tighten her government’s
authoritarian control over the region than a response to a human-rights crisis.
Let’s hope not. I’ll be the first to applaud if my sister Nobel peace laureate
bravely ignores the internal pressure to dehumanize the Rohingya and instead
stands up for their rights.
Ms. Ebadi, the
author of “Until We Are Free: My Fight for Human Rights in Iran” (Random House,
2016) and a co-founder of the Nobel Women’s Initiative, was awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize in 2003.
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