06 Feb 2017
By Simon Lewis | YANGON
YANGON: Human Rights Watch on Monday called for
Myanmar to punish army and police commanders if they allowed troops to rape and
sexually assault women and girls of the Rohingya Muslim minority.
The New York-based campaign group said it had documented
rape, gang rape and other sexual violence against girls as young as 13 in
interviews with some of the 69,000 Rohingya Muslims who have fled to Bangladesh
since Myanmar security forces responded to attacks on border posts four months
ago.
"The sexual violence did not appear to be random or
opportunistic, but part of a coordinated and systematic attack against
Rohingya, in part because of their ethnicity and religion," a Human Rights
Watch (HRW) news release said.
Reuters was unable to contact a Myanmar government
spokesman to respond to the allegations.
An estimated 1.1 million Rohingya live in the western
state of Rakhine, but have their movements and access to services restricted.
Rohingyas are barred from citizenship in Myanmar, where many call them
"Bengalis" to suggest they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.
Independent journalists and observers have been barred
from visiting the army's operation zone in northern Rakhine since the Oct. 9
attacks that killed nine border police.
The government has so far dismissed most claims that
soldiers raped, beat, killed and arbitrarily detained civilians while burning
down villages, insisting instead that a lawful operation is underway against a
group of armed Rohingya insurgents.
The HRW report comes just days after United Nations
investigators said Myanmar's security forces had "very likely"
committed crimes against humanity, posing a dilemma for de facto leader Aung
San Suu Kyi.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner took charge of most civilian
affairs in April after a historic transition from full military rule, but
soldiers retain a quarter of seats in parliament and control ministries related
to security.
U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad
al-Hussein said on Friday that Suu Kyi had promised to investigate the U.N.'s
allegations.
HRW said it had gathered evidence on 28 separate sexual
assaults, including interviews with nine women who said they were raped or gang
raped at gunpoint by security forces during the army's so-called
"clearance operations" in northern Rakhine.
The women and other witnesses said the perpetrators were
Myanmar army troops or border police, who they identified by their uniforms,
kerchiefs, arm bands and patches, HRW said.
“These horrific attacks on Rohingya women and girls by
security forces add a new and brutal chapter to the Burmese military’s long and
sickening history of sexual violence against women,” said HRW senior
emergencies researcher Priyanka Motaparthy.
“Military and police commanders should be held
responsible for these crimes if they did not do everything in their power to
stop them or punish those involved.”