Rohingya crisis: 100,000 new refugees within just one week – International community is failing to protect the civilian population

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) accuses the international community of failing to protect the persecuted Rohingya minority in Burma/Myanmar. “It is unacceptable that the world watches idly while crimes against humanity are being committed in Burma and while 100,000 people are systematically displaced every week. The international community must increase its political pressure on Burma’s army and the government in order to stop the crimes – immediately,” stated Ulrich Delius, the director of the STP, in Göttingen on Thursday. Further, he warned: “If the only reactions are to express concern and to send appeals to those who are responsible, the entire population group of the Rohingya will be expelled from Burma within one month.”

Further, the STP emphasized that, in the scope of the Millennium Summit of the United Nations in September 2005, the members of the European Union (EU) had agreed on the concept of responsibility to protect – according to which, in cases of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity, the international community must protect the civilian population with appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and, if necessary, military means.

“Realistically, nobody would currently assume that there could be a UN peacekeeping mission in Burma, simply because China would refuse to agree to an according mandate in the World Security Council. However, it is quite irritating that most of the governments aren’t commenting on the crimes, although they have been sufficiently documented by human rights organizations and the United Nations,” said Delius.
According to the STP, the measures agreed on by the EU are “completely inadequate and shameful”, as the only consequence so far is that leading military officials from Burma will no longer be invited to Europe. This poor response by Europe’s nations of law is neither appropriate nor sufficient to put an end to the crimes against humanity,” Delius criticized.

Since the end of August 2017, almost 600,000 Rohingya have fled from violent attacks by Burmese soldiers. At least 288 of their villages were attacked and systematically destroyed, and many refugees reported about a massive persecution of the civilian population, about politically motivated murders and a “burnt earth”-policy followed by the army and the allied Buddhist extremists.