Advocacy group Human Rights Watch has criticised slow progress in addressing historical land grabs, which continue to leave large numbers of people destitute, and inadequate legal reform in protecting land tenure.
Nine months into the National League for Democracy government’s term in office, the human rights situation in Burma has improved only marginally, and in some cases even backslid, according to New York-based Human Rights Watch’s annual report for 2016.
Ahead of a planning meeting before the June summit of the G8 group of industrialised countries New York based Human Rights Watch (HRW) has urged ministers to include Burma on the agenda.
The closure of the Islamic schools and subsequent imprisonment of Muslims involved in their operation has been described as “clear religious discrimination, and blatant violation of freedom of religion” by one human rights advocate.
Two Kachin pastors and a Buddhist abbot jailed for “Unlawful Association” are freed, but Reuters journalists remain behind bars.
Burma is not ready for the repatriation of Rohingya refugees, said the most senior United Nations official to visit the country this year, after Burma was accused of instigating ethnic cleansing and driving nearly 700,000 Muslims to Bangladesh.
Many refugees across Southeast Asia have no access to citizenship and few rights in the country where they live.
Lead Story News Rakhine Refugees Rohingya
Burma has bulldozed the remains of Rohingya Muslim villages to make way for refugee resettlement, not to destroy evidence of atrocities, an official leading reconstruction efforts in the troubled northern state of Rakhine said on Monday.
International Relations Lead Story News Rakhine
Veteran US diplomat Bill Richardson was pursuing “his own agenda” when he was asked to step down from Burma’s international advisory board on the Rohingya crisis, the Burmese government said on Thursday.
Lead Story Migrants Issues News
Trafficked into work and routinely abused, migrant fishermen in Thailand are still subject to forced labour despite efforts by the government to clean up the industry, advocacy groups say.
International Relations Lead Story News Rohingya
The UN refugee agency and other groups have urged a rethink of the plan to send Rohingya refugees back to Burma amid fears of forced repatriations and the inability of aid agencies to ensure the safety of hundreds of thousands who fled bloodshed at home.
The petition is the latest indication of the challenges ahead for Bangladesh and Burma as they try to engineer the return of up to 655,500 refugees.
The Rakhine State government has offered financial assistance of 500,000 kyats ($370) to each of the families of seven people who were killed during a police crackdown on a protest in Mrauk-U Township, Rakhine State, earlier this week.
The prominent Rakhine nationalist politician Aye Maung was arrested on Thursday and is facing criminal prosecution after he gave a speech in which, according to state media, he “urged the people to take advantage of the weakness of the government and to march towards the goal of sovereignty.”
International Relations Lead Story News Refugees Rohingya
Bangladesh and Burma agreed on Tuesday to complete within two years the return of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims who fled an army crackdown last year in Rakhine State.
International Relations Lead Story News
Burma “feels sad” over a US decision to sanction a military general, a government spokesman said, after Washington linked the commander last week to abuses against the Rohingya Muslim minority.
Lead Story News Rakhine Rohingya
The 10 bodies that were exhumed have yet to be identified. No official statement has been made as to the ethnicity or nationality of the victims.
International Relations Lead Story News Refugees Rohingya
Burma and Bangladesh have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) concerning the repatriation of more than 600,000 refugees from Rakhine State’s Rohingya Muslim community who have fled the state’s north en masse over recent months.
“It is standard practice in voluntary repatriation operations that UNHCR would be involved to ensure international standards are met for any type of return agreement,” said a UNHCR spokesman.
Several U.S. State Department officials accuse the Secretary of State of failing to curtail the enlistment of child soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan and Burma.
Arakan International Relations Lead Story News Rohingya
A United Nations General Assembly committee on Thursday called on Burma to end military operations that have “led to the systematic violation and abuse of human rights” of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State.
International Relations Lead Story News
Leading figures in the Catholic Church and international politics have advised Pope Francis not to use the term Rohingya during a trip to Burma due to political sensitivities, but human rights groups want him to uphold international law on self-identity.
Human rights monitors on Wednesday urged Burma to withdraw a ban on protests in its largest city, Yangon, amid fears that free speech is under pressure under the government led by democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi.
Arakan Lead Story Military News Rohingya
Human rights groups pour scorn on a Burmese military investigation into alleged atrocities against Rohingya Muslims, branding it a “whitewash” and calling for UN and independent investigators to be allowed into the country.
ASEAN Human Rights International Relations Lead Story News
Leaders of Asian nations meeting in Manila on Monday skirted around the mass exodus of Rohingya Muslims triggered by Burma’s military crackdown, disappointing human rights groups who were hoping for a tough stand on the humanitarian crisis.
International Relations Lead Story News
Blessed by calmer seas, several hundred more Rohingya Muslims on Thursday joined a multitude of refugees in Bangladesh, as calls grew for upcoming regional summits to exert more pressure on Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi to stem the crisis.
Lead Story News Politics Suu Kyi
Hundreds of party faithful rallied at a staging grounds in Taungoo on Saturday morning in a show of support for beleaguered State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, the National League for Democracy’s longtime figurehead.
Lead Story News Refugees Rohingya
Humanitarian organisations helping Rohingya Muslim refugees in Bangladesh said on Wednesday they need $434 million over the next six months to help up to 1.2 million people, most of them children, in dire need of life-saving assistance.
International Relations Lead Story News Rohingya
Two weeks since the Burmese government pledged to begin a process for the return of hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees who have fled to Bangladesh, questions about the practicality of a mass repatriation loom large.
Arakan Health Lead Story News Rohingya
In a speech last week, Aung San Suu Kyi said all people in Arakan State “have access to education and healthcare services without discrimination.” For critics, however, that’s simply not true — a contention supported by a report that Suu Kyi’s own government has embraced.
