Three Nobel Peace Prize winners on Wednesday call on leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the Burma Army to end the “genocide” of stateless Rohingya Muslims, without waiting, otherwise they will face prosecution in international justice.
The United Nations and various human rights organizations have documented evidence of serious violations of the rights of the Burmese army against the Rohingya, including killings, rapes and arson attacks, which have prompted 700,000 members of this community have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh since late August.
“She (Aung San Suu Kyi) must stop turning a deaf ear to the Rohingya’s persecution, otherwise she risks of becoming an accomplice to the crimes,” Yemeni activist Tawakkol Karman told a press conference in Dhaka, after visiting Rohingya refugee camps at Cox’s Bazar, at the southern tip of Bangladesh.
“Wake up, otherwise you will have to deal with justice! Said Burma leader Tawakkol Karman, Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 2011.
Since she came to power in 2016, Suu Kyi, herself a Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 1991 for her fight for democracy, has not really condemned the attacks on the Rohingya.
“Silence is complicity”
The predominantly Buddhist authorities in Burma reject accusations of attacks against the Rohingya and ensure that security forces carry out legitimate operations against “terrorists” who are held responsible for attacks on Burmese forces.
Northern Irish peace activist Mairead Maguire, for her part, has heard reports of women who say they have been repeatedly raped and families murdered, children thrown into flames or drowned in rivers.
“We must counter the torture, rape and killings of members of our human community, as in the case of the Rohingya genocide,” said Maguire, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1976.
“It’s a genocide. We can not remain silent. Silence is complicity, “she added.
The three laureates demand that those responsible for Rohingya attacks be brought before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
“While there are more than one million Rohingyas displaced, many dead and missing, and while rape and sexual violence are used as weapons of war, it is high time for the international community to act.” said Iranian lawyer Shirin Ebadi, who in 2003 was the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize.