By THE NATION
WHILE MYANMAR
officials have praised the final report submitted last week by Surakiart
Sathirathai on the Rakhine crisis, former members of the panel and observers
said the job was actually incomplete.
The report, in fact,
had not been finalised for submission, due primarily to the resignation a few
days earlier of its main drafter, former Thai ambassador to Myanmar Kobsak
Chutikul.
This final report
highlights questions about the advisory board’s credibility. In the end, it
becomes another addition to a list of bodies set up by Myanmar to deflect
criticism and distract demands for genuine solution, said Human Rights Watch’s
Sunai Phasuk.
“How can the board’s
assessments and recommendations be taken seriously when it chose not to even
state that the Rohingya are the main victims of violence and abuses in Rakhine
State, as well as to address their plight at the hands of Myanmar authorities,”
he said.
Not only that what
triggered the violence were put under the rug, the board also failed to
emphasize the need for an international independent commission of inquiry into
violence and abuses committed in Rakhine State that will identify alleged
perpetrators to be brought to justice, he said.
Myanmar’s Union
Minister Win Myat Aye, who is the vice chairman of the Union Enterprise for
Humanitarian Assistance, Resettlement and Development in Rakhine (UEHRD) and
chairman of the Committee for Implementation of the Recommendations on Rakhine
state, said the timing of Surakiart’s final report was perfect.
Myanmar’s de facto
leader Aung San Suu Kyi had chosen Surakriat, a former Thai foreign minister,
to chair the Advisory Board to an implementation committee last December. The
move was aimed at advising the country on the implementation of 88
recommendations by late UN chief Kofi Annan.
The current wave of
the Rakhine crisis kicked off when Annan submitted his report in August last
year, prompting attacks by militants on a Myanmar security outpost in Rakhine
state. In response, the military launched its “clearance operation”, seen by many
as ethnic cleansing, which claimed thousands of lives and displaced some
700,000 people.
People are also
questioning the abrupt manner in which the Surakiart-led panel lost its
one-year renewable mandate, especially since there is a lot of work left to do
and Bt3 million in the budget remains unutilised, a source close to the matter
said. Win Myat Aye, however, said he was unaware of such unused funds.
The credibility of
the Advisory Board took a hit when Bill Richardson, the former US ambassador to
the UN, left the board in January, followed by Kobsak who stepped down last
month to send a “cautionary message” to Nay Pyi Taw that it needed to address
the issue seriously. The Richardson Centre in Washington tweeted recently that
the Advisory Board has been wrapped up after just seven months and no
improvement has been seen in the Rakhine situation.
The tweet said that
Richardson stood by his resignation letter, in which he expressed alarm at the
lack of sincerity in Nay Pyi Taw on the the “critical issue” of citizenship and
the “cheerleading squad” nature of the Advisory Board.
The recommendations
as seen by The Nation in Surakiart’s final report encouraged the Myanmar
government to work on citizenship issues, but refrained from mentioning
citizenship for the Rohingya, which is the root cause of the crisis.
“The Advisory Board
is aware that various countries have different categories of citizens and a
number of steps need to be taken before achieving full citizenship such as
granting permission to work, temporary residence and permanent residence,” the
report said.
However, local
members of the board congratulated themselves on their work, claiming progress
had certainly been made. Win Mara, a member of the board and chairman of the
Myanmar National Human Rights Commission, said: “We are happy to witness that
the government has actively undertaken some of the actions we urged them to do.
For one thing, we urged them to urgently form the Independent Commission of
Enquiry as a national initiative, and they followed our recommendation.”
Aung Tun Thet, the
chief coordinator of UEHRD, said Surakiart’s team had done a great job.
“They successfully
carried out their responsibility. We are really happy with their report. Their
recommendations are great, as they are experienced international experts,” he
said.