Sunday, July 16, 2017

The Irrawaddy Magazine

The Irrawaddy Magazine

Rohingya Villagers Tell Media of Army Abuses

Posted: 15 Jul 2017 10:56 PM PDT

KYAR GAUNG TAUNG, Rakhine State – Rohingya Muslim women lined up to tell reporters of missing husbands, mothers and sons on Saturday, as international media were escorted for the first time to a village in Myanmar's northern Rakhine State affected by violence since October.

"My son is not a terrorist. He was arrested while doing farm work," said one young mother, Sarbeda. She had bustled her way – an infant in her arms – through several other women telling reporters their husbands had been arrested on false grounds.

In November, Myanmar's army swept through villages where stateless Rohingya Muslims live in the area of Maungdaw.

Some 75,000 people fled across the nearby border to Bangladesh, according to the United Nations.

UN investigators who interviewed refugees said allegations of gang rape, torture, arson and killings by security forces in the operation were likely crimes against humanity.

Myanmar's government, led by Nobel laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, has denied most of the claims, and is blocking entry to a UN fact-finding mission tasked with looking into the allegations.

The government has also kept independent journalists and human rights monitors out of the area for the past nine months.

This week, the Ministry of Information escorted more than a dozen foreign and local journalists representing international media, including Reuters, to the area under a guard of officers from the paramilitary Border Guard Police.

Brutal Tactics

The reporters spent nearly two days in Buthidaung, a township in Maungdaw district of Rakhine State, where they were taken to sites of alleged militant activity.

They were taken to Kyar Gaung Taung, one of three settlements requested by the journalists. Officials cited time constraints for the limited access.

Reuters had previously gathered accounts from residents by phone and from former residents who have fled to Bangladesh, of brutal counterinsurgency tactics unleashed in Kyar Gaung Taung and several nearby villages in mid-November.

When a group of journalists insisted on speaking to villagers away from security forces, allegations of abuses by troops emerged almost immediately.

Kyar Gaung Taung resident Sarbeda, 30, had been able to visit her son, Nawsee Mullah, 14, at a police camp where he is being held separately from adult detainees. She was not sure if he had a lawyer, she said.

Reuters reported in March that 13 boys under the age of 18 were detained during security operations. They were included in a list of 423 people charged under the colonial-era Unlawful Associations Act, which outlaws joining or aiding rebel groups.

At least 32 people from Kyar Gaung Taung village had been arrested and 10 killed, said a village schoolteacher, who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals. He estimated that half the village's 6,000 residents had fled during the clearance operation.

Burned to Death

Another villager, Lalmuti, 23, pointed to a small pile of ashes where she said she found her father's remains. She described how he was bound and thrown into a house and burned to death.

Her mother was later arrested when authorities deemed her complaint about the killings to be fabricated. She is serving a six-month jail sentence, Lalmuti and two other villagers said.

Reporters were not given a chance to put these allegations to authorities, and Reuters was unable to reach officials to confirm the details of the cases by phone.

In a press briefing on Friday, Brig-Gen Thura San Lwin, commander of Myanmar's Border Guard Police, said some villagers had made what he said were erroneous claims and were subsequently charged and jailed for lying to the authorities.

"The media said we torched houses and that there were rape cases – they give wrong information," Thura San Lwin told reporters.

He also disputed the UN's estimates for the number of people who fled, claiming local records showed that only 22,000 people were missing in the conflict.

Myanmar officials say a domestic investigation, led by Vice President Myint Swe – a former lieutenant general in the army – and a commission headed for former UN chief Kofi Annan – which is not mandated to investigate human rights abuses – are the appropriate ways to address problems in Rakhine State.

The post Rohingya Villagers Tell Media of Army Abuses appeared first on The Irrawaddy.

NLD Warns Yangon Chief Minister for Controversial Remarks

Posted: 15 Jul 2017 10:10 PM PDT

YANGON — Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy party has warned the Yangon Chief Minister for his controversial remarks on the country's military chief, according to one of the party's secretariat members.

U Nyan Win told The Irrawaddy that the warning was made on Thursday.

"We can't reveal the details of the warning. We have issued an internal memo on Friday regarding the issue," he said.

The memo viewed by The Irrawaddy said: "The party's CEC has warned U Phyo Min Thein for what he said at a workshop held in collaboration with USAID . . . CSOs and Media in Yangon on July 9."

In his address at the event, the chief minister said: "There are no civil-military relations in the democratic era" and that "the military's commander-in-chief position is the same as the level of director-general, according to the [state] protocol."

The Myanmar military released a statement on Tuesday, urging the government to "take necessary actions" against Yangon Chief Minister U Phyo Min Thein regarding the remarks concerning the head of the military.

In another announcement made the following day, the army said Yangon's chief minister was not suitable for "constructive, long-term relations" with the army and called his comments about the military chief an "insult."

The Myanmar government spokesperson told The Irrawaddy on Thursday that the Yangon Chief Minister's remarks on the army chief's position do not reflect the government's stance and had "caused misunderstandings between the government and the military."

"As the chief minister is responsible [for what he said], we have instructed him to do what he needs to do," U Zaw Htay said.The NLD administration has attracted the military's ire with their comments twice. In May, the party's spokesperson U Win

Htein said he suspected that the military may have been involved in spreading rumors aimed at destabilizing the NLD government. When the military complained, he said he didn't intend to make accusations against anyone, and that his comments were a "slip of the tongue."

The post NLD Warns Yangon Chief Minister for Controversial Remarks appeared first on The Irrawaddy.
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