By RFA
Christine Schraner Burgener, appointed to her post in
April by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, spoke with Myanmar’s leader
about how the U.N. can help with the return and resettlement of the Rohingya,
said Chan Aye, director general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“They were then relocated to their places of origin, and
some of those who have homes there were relocated to their friends’ houses via
the refugee reception centers,” he said.
The United Nations special envoy to Myanmar met with
State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi in Naypyidaw on Friday to discuss the Rohingya
crisis in beleaguered Rakhine state, where the repatriation of some of the
720,000 Muslim refugees who fled to Bangladesh last year during a crackdown has
yet to get under way.
A former Swiss diplomat, Burgener met with Aung San Suu
Kyi, who also serves as foreign affairs minister, at the start of a nine-day
visit.
She had earlier met with Lt. Gen. Soe Win, vice chief of
staff of the Myanmar Army, on Monday to discuss the Rakhine issue and the use
of child soldiers by the military, Chan Aye said.
Burgener will also meet with Win Myat Aye, minister of
social welfare, relief, and resettlement, who is overseeing the repatriation of
Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh, with Attorney General Htun Htun Oo, and with
officials in Rakhine state, he said.
Myanmar has agreed to take back Rohingya refugees who
have been verified as eligible to return to Rakhine state, though the process
has not begun in earnest.
Burgener, who has an office in Naypyidaw, is tasked with
enhancing cooperation between the U.N. and Myanmar to address the crisis in
Rakhine, help bridge differences in the ethnically and religiously divided
state, and assist the Myanmar government with its peace process efforts.
She will issue a statement about her latest visit after
it end on Oct. 20.
Burgener previously spent two days in Rakhine’s Maungdaw
township in June, where she toured repatriation facilities and villages
affected by violence during the brutal military campaign that targeted Rohingya
civilians following deadly attacks on police outposts by a Muslim militant
group.
The U.N. and other members of the international community
have said that the crackdown amounted to ethnic cleansing and genocide.
During that visit, she also met with Aung San Suu Kyi and
military commander-in-chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing.
An important visit
“This visit is quite important,” said Myanmar political
analyst Aung Thu Nyein. “The U.N. has recently been putting a lot of pressure
on Myanmar, and the government has so far refused to grant a U.N. investigation
commission permission to enter.”
“Considering the way she was welcomed on arrival at the
airport, it seems that the government is not placing much emphasis on the
visit,” he said. “[But] we have to realize that this woman has the power to
serve as a negotiator to address the differences between the U.N. and the
Myanmar government.”
Burgener will also likely broach the topic of Myanmar’s
slowly progressing peace process in which Aung San Suu Kyi and the National
League for Democracy (NLD) government have brought the national military and
ethnic armies to the negotiating table to try to end seven decades of civil
war.
“In the past, special envoys did not have the opportunity
to talk about the peace process, but now this woman has the chance to give
suggestions or advice on the issue to the parties concerned,” said Aung Myo
Min, executive director of Equality Myanmar, an NGO that facilitates human
rights education and advocacy programs.
“But the question is how much the Myanmar government or
the world will listen to her recommendations,” said Aung Myo Min, who met
Burgener during her first visit to Myanmar in June.
The government has denied credible evidence and reports
by the U.N. and rights groups that security forces committed widespread
atrocities against Rohingya civilians, including indiscriminate killings, rape,
torture, and arson, during the crackdown. Instead, it has defended the campaign
as a counterinsurgency operation against Muslim militants who carried out the
attacks on police outposts.
Myanmar has refused to let into the country a
U.N.-appointed fact-finding mission, representatives from the U.N.’s human rights
office, and the special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, to probe the
Rohingya crisis.
After conducting remote monitoring of the situation, the
U.N.-mandated fact-finding mission that investigated atrocities committed
against the Rohingya issued a report in September detailing violence by
security forces and calling for the prosecution of top commanders as well as
the removal of the country’s powerful military from politics.
The government, however, has been working with the U.N.’s
refugee and development agencies, which are conducting field assessments and
surveys in northern Rakhine, to facilitate the return and reintegration of
Rohingya refugees.
A man passes
through the construction site of the Hla Pho Khaung processing camp for
returning Rohingya refugees near the Bangladesh border in Maungdaw district,
western Myanmar's Rakhine state, April 24, 2018. A man passes through the
construction site of the Hla Pho Khaung processing camp for returning Rohingya
refugees near the Bangladesh border in Maungdaw district, western Myanmar's
Rakhine state, April 24, 2018. Credit: AFP Six more Rohingya return
Meanwhile, six Rohingya, including a family of five who
had fled to Bangladesh, returned to Rakhine state on Wednesday after
authorities approved them for repatriation, Maungdaw district administrator
Myint Khine told RFA's Myanmar Service.
One is from Yaydwinbyin (south) village, and the family
of five is from Kyaingyaungtaung village, he said.
“Their houses had been ravaged by fire, so they are now
living with friends in the town,” he said, adding that they refugee reception
center has provided them with basic staples such as rice, oil, and beans, as
well as blankets and mosquito nets.
“We came back because we could no longer stand the threat
of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) in the Bangladesh refugee camps,”
said one of the returnees, Mahmoud Sharaf, referring to the Muslim militant
group that conducted deadly attacks on police outposts in northern Rakhine in
2017 and on border guard stations in 2016.
ARSA members operating in the sprawling refugee camps
recently killed one of his neighbors named Aragula, he said.
“More people are now showing an interest in returning to
Myanmar after we told them about our living conditions here,” Mahmoud Sharaf
said. “It’s pretty quiet here. The security situation is so different here
compared with over there. Maungdaw district and township authorities are
providing us with basic staples.”
More than 100 Rohingya refugees who have returned to
Myanmar after being screened, including 90-some who were adrift in a boat after
leaving Bangladesh and a family of six in August, are being looked after by
township authorities, Myint Khine said.
Many Rohingya refugees have expressed fear of returning
to Myanmar where they are considered illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, face
systematic discrimination, and are denied access to health care and freedom of
movement.
Myanmar will likely begin repatriating the first group of
Rohingya refugees after representatives from its Joint Working Group meet with
their Bangladeshi counterparts at the end of October, the online journal The
Irrawaddy reported Friday, citing Social Welfare Minister Myat Aye.
The group is responsible for working out the details of
an agreement between the two countries to repatriate some of the hundreds of
thousands of Rohingya who fled.
The repatriations will likely take place soon after the
meeting because the two U.N. agencies have already finished assessing 23
villages under consideration for potential returns, the report said.