{"id":1843,"date":"2018-03-20T07:51:03","date_gmt":"2018-03-20T07:51:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/?p=1843"},"modified":"2018-03-20T07:52:18","modified_gmt":"2018-03-20T07:52:18","slug":"myanmar-leader-aung-san-suu-kyi-seeks-humanitarian-help-for-rohingya-crisis-as-she-is-greeted-in-australia-with-protests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/myanmar-leader-aung-san-suu-kyi-seeks-humanitarian-help-for-rohingya-crisis-as-she-is-greeted-in-australia-with-protests\/","title":{"rendered":"Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi seeks humanitarian help for Rohingya crisis as she is greeted in Australia with protests"},"content":{"rendered":"

Aung San Suu Kyi arrives in Canberra to be met by a military honour guard and Australia’s Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull\u00a0Getty<\/span><\/p>\n

Samuel Osborne<\/a><\/p>\n

Nobel Peace Prize laureate accused of crimes against humanity<\/strong><\/p>\n

Myanmar<\/a>\u2019s de facto leader\u00a0Aung\u00a0San\u00a0Suu\u00a0Kyi<\/a>\u00a0has requested humanitarian support for the Rohingya\u00a0during a summit with regional leaders, even as she was herself greeted with street protests and accused of failing to prevent crimes against humanity towards the persecuted Muslim minority.<\/p>\n

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Ms Suu\u00a0Kyi\u00a0has faced international criticism of her handling of the Rohingya\u00a0refugee crisis, which has seen at least half a million flee Myanmar\u2019s north-west Rakhine state amid a crackdown by authorities.<\/p>\n

The Myanmar state counsellor\u00a0met with Australia\u2019s Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, in Canberra on Monday. Mr Turnbull had said he would raise human rights during the visit, and said it was also discussed\u00a0during a summit of the\u00a0Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in Sydney over the weekend.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0\u201cAung San\u00a0Suu Kyi addressed the matter comprehensively at some considerable length herself,\u201d Mr Turnbull said.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cSo our goal is to support a peaceful and speedy resolution of the humanitarian problems, the humanitarian disaster truthfully that has resulted from the conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Suu Kyi has been in Australia since Friday. On her arrival in the country, she was presented with a lawsuit accusing her of crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s Attorney General\u00a0said he would not allow the lawsuit, lodged by activist lawyers in Melbourne on behalf of Australia\u2019s Rohingya community, to proceed because Ms\u00a0Suu Kyi had diplomatic immunity.<\/p>\n

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Drone footage shows thousands of\u00a0Rohingya<\/span>\u00a0Muslims fleeing Myanmar<\/em><\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Since coming to power in 2016, Ms\u00a0Suu Kyi, who won the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize for her struggle for democracy in Myanmar, has faced growing criticism for failing to condemn or stop military attacks on her country\u2019s minority Rohingya Muslims.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Harrowing stories from pregnant Rohingya refugees revealed by midwives<\/strong><\/div>\n

Many\u00a0Rohingya have fled from Buddhist-majority Myanmar to neighbouring\u00a0Bangladesh<\/a>since August\u00a0after the\u00a0military responded to insurgent attacks on police with a clearance operation that the United Nations has described as ethnic cleansing.<\/p>\n

The military campaign has included the burning of Rohingya villages, systematic rape, shootings and other rights violations.<\/p>\n

Myanmar denies the charges of genocide and has asked for \u201cclear evidence\u201d of abuses by security forces.<\/p>\n

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Bullets and burns: injured Rohingya refugee<\/h2>\n
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Mr Turnbull\u00a0said Ms\u00a0Suu Kyi had used the weekend summit to seek humanitarian help from her fellow members of Asean\u00a0and Australia to deal with the refugee crisis.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Malaysia\u2019s\u00a0Prime Minister,\u00a0Najib Razak<\/a>, told the summit the refugee crisis was no longer solely a domestic issue for Myanmar, as fleeing Rohingya could be prime targets for terrorist radicalisation. British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has previously expressed similar concerns.<\/p>\n

Although Ms\u00a0Suu Kyi has been the de facto head of Myanmar\u2019s civilian government since her party took power, she is limited in her control of the country by a constitution written by the outgoing junta.<\/p>\n

The military has effective veto power over all legislation and controls key ministries,\u00a0including those overseeing security and defence.<\/p>\n

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\"rohingya-refugees.jpg\"<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Rohingya<\/span>\u00a0refugees after crossing the\u00a0Naf<\/span>\u00a0river from Myanmar into\u00a0Whaikhyang<\/span>\u00a0in Bangladesh (Getty)<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Unlike the UN, Britain and the\u00a0United States, Australia has not accused Myanmar of \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d or \u201ccrimes against humanity\u201d.<\/p>\n

But\u00a0Australia did support a UN\u00a0resolution in December condemning the \u201cvery likely commission of crimes against humanity\u201d by Myanmar security forces against the Rohingya.<\/p>\n

Human rights groups have criticised Australia for maintaining its limited military engagement with Myanmar.<\/p>\n

Australia provides English-language lessons and training courses to Myanmar officers to \u201cpromote professionalism and adherence to international laws\u201d, according to the defence department.<\/p>\n

However,\u00a0Australia maintains a long-standing arms embargo with Myanmar.<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by agencies<\/em><\/p>\n

Source: here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aung San Suu Kyi arrives in Canberra to be met by a military honour guard and Australia’s Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull\u00a0Getty Samuel Osborne Nobel Peace Prize laureate accused of crimes against humanity Myanmar\u2019s de facto leader\u00a0Aung\u00a0San\u00a0Suu\u00a0Kyi\u00a0has requested humanitarian support for the Rohingya\u00a0during a summit with regional leaders, even as she was herself greeted with street […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1844,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8,4,41,19,39,3,12,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1843"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1846,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843\/revisions\/1846"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arakanwatch.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}