The US government wants to officially classify the violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar as genocide. Five years ago, hundreds of thousands of members of the Muslim minority were killed by the military or expelled from the country.
The US government wants to formally classify the atrocities against the Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar as genocide and crimes against humanity. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will make the announcement during a speech at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, a US government official said. “Now the military will find it harder to commit further human rights abuses,” a US State Department official told Reuters.
Human rights groups have long urged the US government to call the atrocities genocide. The governments of US President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump have so far avoided this step. However, they have imposed a large number of sanctions on Myanmar. Blinken announced an investigation into the events at the end of last year.
Up to 850,000 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh
The military in Myanmar cracked down on the Rohingya in 2017. It is said to have murdered thousands of people, raped women and children, leveled villages and burned people alive in their homes.
Up to 850,000 members of the stateless Muslim minority fled to neighboring Bangladesh in 2017 for fear of military attacks. They have been living there in overcrowded refugee camps ever since. About 600,000 remain in Myanmar in the southwestern state of Rakhine. A UN commission of inquiry concluded in 2018 that the military action involved “genocidal acts”.
Human rights organization: Announcement overdue
The human rights organization “Burma Human Rights Network” (BHRN) welcomed the announcement as a “positive step”, but complained that it was long overdue. The military campaign against the Rohingya was marked by mass killings of civilians, sexualized violence and the complete destruction of entire villages.
“Further action must follow this statement,” said the organization’s founder and director, Kyaw Win. “A military that commits genocide and coups to overthrow a democratically elected government has no place in the civilized world.” BHRN called for the junta to be completely cut off from cash and weapons and “banned from the world stage”.
UN court condemns violence
Years ago, UN representatives had described the violence against the minority as genocide. A trial before the International Court of Justice against Myanmar for genocide against the Rohingya was complicated by a military coup last year. The de facto head of the civilian government, Aung San Suu Kyi, was ousted and sentenced to prison for numerous alleged offences.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner herself has been criticized for defending the military’s actions against the Rohingya. She firmly denied all allegations. The USA and the EU had already tightened their sanctions against the military rulers because of the ongoing violence in Myanmar.
