Pitsuwan: ASEAN will offer humanitarian aids for Rohingya

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA – The Secretary General of ASEAN, Surin Pitsuwan, said that ASEAN would offer humanitarian aids for Rohingya conflict. ASEAN will also support and help whatever they can as Rohingya becomes the issue that ASEAN ministers are interested in.

Pitsuwan has also discussed the issue with Foreign Minister of Myanmar Wunna Maung Lwin and Foreign Minister of Bangladesh Dipu Moni. In the meeting he asked whether ASEAN could support in term of information or providing a fact finding mission.

“I am engaging the fact finding myself. It has been difficult on the access and the cooperation,” he said. The Rohingya issues has general impact on ASEAN. He said that a road map should be made to solve the issue.

Pitsuwan appreciates every effort made by the member states of ASEAN to help relieve the pain of Rohingya. Indonesia, as a member of ASEAN, through President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has already written and expressed its view on the issue.

Maung Lwin informed Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa that President Thein Sein had received the letter and appreciated it. He said that Thein Sein would immediately reply. Apart from that, Natalegawa and Maung Lwin discussed the importance of Myanmar to be transparent and to open the region so that international community can investigate directly.

Natalegawa also said that Maung Lwin was considering allowing delegations from other countries, such as the Secretary General of Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), to check the situation on the field. Natalegawa added that the settlement of Rohingya could not be separated from reform process in Myanmar.

UN voices concern

A top United Nations envoy on Saturday voiced grave concern over alleged abuses by Myanmar security forces after sectarian violence in Rakhine State and urged a full and credible state investigation.

Tomas Ojea Quintana, the U.N. special human rights rapporteur, called on the government to find out the truth about violence in June between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and stateless Muslim Rohingyas and address reports of extrajudicial killings and torture by its police and soldiers.

"I am concerned ... at the allegations I have received of serious human rights violations committed as part of measures to restore law and order," Quintana said in a statement at the end of a six-day visit to Myanmar, his sixth to the country.

"While I am in no position to be able to verify these allegations at this point in time, they are of grave concern. It is therefore of fundamental importance to clearly establish what has happened in Rakhine State and to ensure accountability."

The conflict has exposed deep-rooted communal animosity and put the spotlight on promises by the government in office since 2011 to protect human rights after decades of brutal army rule.

In a report this week citing witnesses and interviews with 57 people in Rakhine State, the New York-based Human Rights Watch said there was evidence of "state-sponsored persecution and discrimination" against the Rohingyas, which number at least 800,000 in Myanmar.

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