Silence of the Buddhists

Dear editor: To most people in the Western world, Buddhism is usually looked upon as a religion practised by peaceful people.

Rightly or wrongly, horrendous acts of terrorism perpetuated by various Muslim groups around the world for so long, causes Islam to be viewed as anything but peaceful in many Westerner’s eyes.

Yet, in predominantly Buddhist Myanmar, the exact opposite seems to be occurring, with terrible violence and aggression being waged against the Rohingya Muslim minority.

Some of their ancestors lived in an enclave of the former Burma for centuries, but were never granted citizenship; they remain stateless, never having been accepted nor integrated due to religious differences.

Tensions escalated in 2016 with Rohingya homes and villages being torched; hundreds of thousands of men women and children forced to flee for their lives to Bangladesh, their ethnic homeland.

Although the United Nations have issued pleas for tolerance to the Myanmar government, the expulsions continue with increasing brutality, causing global news agencies to finally take notice.

The country’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has done nothing to stop the violent ethnic cleansing, even claiming last week that all reports are fake news, while the world’s most prominent Buddhist Monk, Tenzin Gyatso — better known as the 14th Dalai Lama — has been silent.

Ironically, both these worldrenowned personalities received Nobel Peace Prizes for life-long struggles against tyrannical regimes, in 1991 and 1989, respectively, and with great fanfare became only the third and fourth recipients of honorary Canadian citizenship.

There have been many more international honours and recognitions heaped upon the heads of these two Buddhists, but when they should now be leading by peaceful example in a bloody and terrifying religious conflict, the watching world is deafened by their silence and lack of moral leadership. Bernie Smith Parksville