Suu Kyi aide trashes Rohingya report

A close aide to Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi on Wednesday dismissed mounting international pressure over alleged abuses of Rohingya Muslims as “biased and unfair”, despite UN evidence of murder, rape and torture by security forces.

The United Nations has said Myanmar may have committed crimes against humanity during a fourmonth crackdown on the stateless minority.

Rights envoy Yanghee Lee is expected to turn up the heat next week by calling

What Yanghee Lee (rights envoy) is doing is not fair. It’s biased

Win Htein, Aide of Myanmar de facto leader Suu Kyi

a formal ‘commission of inquiry’ into alleged abuses that have seen over 70,000 Rohingyas flee to Bangladesh.

The crisis has piled unprecedented pressure on Myanmar’s elected government, led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

“What Yanghee Lee is doing is not fair. It’s biased,” Win Htein, a close aide of Suu Kyi, said. “We do not care about this kind of unfair report. Because we do not care, we do not worry.”

On Tuesday, the Army again defended its actions, using a rare press conference in Naypyidaw to insist its troops acted in accordance with the law.

Chief of General Staff Mya Tun Oo rejected allegations of abuse by rights groups and foreign media as “lop-sided”. A total of 76 “Bengalis”, a derogatory term used by many in Myanmar that implies the Rohingyas are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, had been killed, he said, not the hundreds alleged by the UN.

The government has created its own commission to probe the claims led by retired general turned vice president Myint Swe.

A member of the commission said their investigations had been “thorough” and rejected the UN report as “one-sided”.