US targets military with new sanctions

WASHINGTON: Senior US Republican and Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation on Thursday to impose targeted sanctions and travel restrictions on senior Myanmar military officials over the treatment of the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority.

Announced the day before Republican President Donald Trump leaves on his first trip to Asia since taking office, the legislation is sponsored by a group of lawmakers including the Republican Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John McCain, and Senator Ben Cardin, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, according to an early summary of the bill.

The State Department also announced on Thursday that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is leaving shortly on a trip to Asia that will include a stop in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

Among other things, the bill reimposes a ban on jade and rubies from Myanmar, requires a report on which individuals should be subjected to visa bans and targeted sanctions, and instructs the US Treasury Department to only vote for international financial assistance programmes that do not partner with enterprises owned by the Myanmar military.

A companion bill to the Senate package is also being introduced in the House of Representatives, also with bipartisan support, increasing the measure’s chances of eventually becoming law.

Members of Congress have been clamouring for a strong response to the plight of the Rohingya, and the Trump administration has been weighing labelling their treatment “ethnic cleansing.”

Over 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine state in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, mostly to Bangladesh, since security forces responded to Rohingya militants’ attacks on Aug 25 with a crackdown. The United Nations has denounced it as an example of ethnic cleansing.