Myanmar’s minorities need attention
When states and international bodies fail to protect peoples’ rights due to geopolitical reasons or other motivations, citizens’ groups must spring into action.
STATE sovereignty is a shield against foreign aggression. It cannot be employed as a sword to murder one’s own citizens.
Regrettably, the Myanmar military rulers are accused of spending the last 69 years since independence in 1948 waging war against ethnic minorities, de-recognising them, designating them as “enemies” and “others” and exposing them to horrendous discrimination and violence.
The aim appears to be to “cleanse” the country of all non-Burmese and non-Buddhist influences. Another surreptitious aim, say observers, is for the Burmese army to maintain control of the economy and natural resources and to perpetuate a degree of internal conflict to legitimise the idea that only the military can preserve the state and safeguard the rights of the “true” Burmese.
To most international observers, the decades-old policies and atrocities of the Myanmar junta against the Rohingya, Kachin and other minorities fit the definition of ethnic cleansing, war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide under international law.
Despite these horrors, world institutions like the United Nations Security Council, the General Assembly and the International Criminal Court, whose duty is to prevent or punish these crimes, remain paralysed.
The problem is that China, Russia, Ukraine, India and Israel have deep commercial interests in and lucrative arms sale contracts with Myanmar. India’s Narendra Modi and Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu have other reasons, as well, to look the other way at the slaughter of Muslims.
Another problem is that under international law if genocide is proved, the world community has an obligation to stop it. The militarily powerful nations of the world have shown no desire to engage in Myanmar militarily and are resorting to platitudes to express their concerns.
In this milieu of international apathy, citizens and citizens’ groups have no other choice than to seize the initiative to arouse the conscience of the world community. This was the rationale behind the recently- convened Permanent People’s Tribunal (PPT) at the Faculty of Law, Universiti Malaya.
The PPT, established in Bologna, Italy in 1979, is an international opinion tribunal that is independent of any state authority.
It is similar to the Russell Tribunal on Vietnam (1966-67) and the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal on Iraq and Palestine (set up in 2007).
The PPT is inspired by the Universal Declaration of People’s Rights (Algiers, 1976) whose aim is to “give visibility and legitimacy to the authority of Peoples” when states and international bodies fail to protect peoples’ rights due to geopolitical reasons or other motivations.
The PPT was composed of seven judges from seven countries and met at the Universiti Malaya from Sept 18-22. It invited all parties to attend and present evidence. Myanmar failed to send a representative.
Those who showed up included non-governmental organisations, international UN agencies and victims of the on-going tragedy. Evidence was received that within the last three weeks, half a million people have crossed the border from Western Myanmar into Bangladesh “telling harrowing stories of the carnage they left behind as they crammed into open fishing boats or trudged along muddy paths, carrying babies and elderly; and bundles of meagre possessions, seeing the plumes of smoke soar into the air as their homes and villages were burnt to the ground”.
A representative of the Kachin people outlined cases of torture and execution since 2011. There is no freedom to practise their customs and traditions or preserve their languages.
Traditional lands and national resources have been seized. Many women’s organisations gave evidence behind closed doors of rape, other forms of sexual harassment and other crimes that compelled them to leave their homeland in fear of their lives.
The Rohingya have been systematically denied their identity and rights for decades. Their language, culture, history and religion have been criminalised and suppressed.
There are arbitrary detentions and torture, enforced disappearances, gang rapes, killing of family members in front of their eyes, burning of homes, extra-judicial killings and children being burned alive. Bodies of victims are thrown in mass graves and set alight.
The violence is perpetrated by border guards and other army forces accompanied by Buddhist mobs, sometimes including monks.
For decades, Myanmar appears to have pursued a policy of converting a pluralistic society to a predominantly Burmese, Buddhist entity. The citizenship law of 1982 requires all Muslims to show proof of ancestry dating back to 1824.
Citizenship cards were seized and new ones were not issued, rendering the holder ineligible for civic rights.
It was alleged that there are no Muslims in parliament, military service, police, administration and academia.
The Kofi Annan report has severely criticised this aspect of the de-identification of minorities.
After hearing all this horrendous evidence, the PPT came to the unanimous conclusion that the state of Myanmar is guilty of war crimes perpetrated against the Kachin people. There was also no reasonable doubt about crimes against humanity against the Rohingya and other Muslim civilian populations.
On the issue of genocide against the Rohingya, the PPT found evidence in the 1988 Peace and Development Council Rohingya Extermination Plan to articulate a government policy not to provide the Rohingya with citizenship cards. The PPT was of the view that the general intent to commit genocide was proved by this and other continuing atrocities.
The PPT made a number of recommendations to minimise further harm, to mitigate the huge humanitarian crisis and to promote democracy, participation and citizenship. It called upon the European Union, United States, Japan, China and other prosperous nations to provide financial aid to Bangladesh, Malaysia and other nations that have opened their hearts to the plight of the Rohingya.
An arms embargo and other targeted sanctions against the Myanmar Government and its officials is also necessary.
Emeritus Professor Datuk Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi is Tunku Abdul Rahman Professor of Law at Universiti Malaya. The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.