Rohingya crisis besieges Suu Kyi at Singapore summit

SINGAPORE: Diplomatic niceties have been in short supply for Aung San Suu Kyi at a summit in Singapore, where the one-time rights champion has been publicly chastised over her handling of the Rohingya crisis, compounding a dismal week for Myanmar's de facto leader.

Suu Kyi has refused to speak up for the Rohingya, a stateless, persecuted Muslim minority driven by violence into Bangladesh in huge numbers.

Her reticence on the issue has cut her adrift from the global rights community including the United Nations, whose investigators say last year's Myanmar army campaign amounted to genocide.

Many of the honours previously showered upon Suu Kyi for her stoic, peaceful resistance during years of house arrest by Myanmar's junta have been rescinded.

This week the bad news got worse.

On Monday Amnesty International, whose campaign to free Suu Kyi galvanised global recognition of her democracy struggle, stripped her of its highest honour over her "indifference" to the atrocities against the Rohingya.

One day later at a regional summit in Singapore, criticism replaced the garlands she has received on the global stage since steering her party into government in 2016.

Suu Kyi was castigated by Malaysia's premier Mahathir Mohamad at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meet, a forum better known for platitudes than admonishments.

"Someone who has been detained before should know the sufferings and should not inflict it on the hapless," the forthright Mahathir told reporters on Tuesday shortly before the summit opened.

"But it would seem that Aung San Suu Kyi is trying to defend what is indefensible," he added, ploughing through the summit's tradition of politeness.

Dialling up the awkwardness, Mahathir spent the entire summit next to Suu Kyi at photocalls, roundtables and dinners -- thanks to the alphabetical proximity of Malaysia and Myanmar.

"You can sense (her reception) is not the same as before," a Southeast Asia diplomat said, requesting anonymity. "Everyone was expecting more from her."

The diplomatic siege deepened on Wednesday when US Vice President Mike Pence told her the "violence and persecution" against the Rohingya was "without excuse".