Myanmar: UN wants aid access

The United Nations called on the Myanmar government on Monday to allow rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access to Rakhine State, where fighting between state troops and autonomy-seeking rebels has displaced thousands of people.

The Rakhine State government issued a notice last week blocking non-government organisations and UN agencies from travelling to rural areas in five townships in the northern and central parts of the state affected by the conflict.

The International Committee of the Red Cross and UN World Food Programme were exempted from the ban, it said.

Myanmar’s president urged the military to “crush” the rebels of the Arakan Army during a rare meeting with the commander-in-chief last week.

The president, Win Myint, is a loyalist of the de facto government leader, Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Fighting has forced about 5,000 people to flee from their homes and take shelter in monasteries and communal areas across the region since early January, according to the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Pierre Peron, a spokesperson for the UN office, said: “We are seriously concerned about new restrictions on humanitarian access which leave thousands of women, children and men in affected areas of Rakhine without access to adequate assistance and protection.

“We hope the government responds positively to our call for rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access, and to ensure the protection of civilians in accordance with international humanitarian and human rights law,” he said in an e-mail.

The Rakhine State municipal affairs minister, whose name is also Win Myint, said the restrictions on humanitarian access were put in place for security reasons. –