Congressional critics slam U.S. State Department as rudderless

WASHINGTON — When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson made his first official trip to Myanmar on Wednesday, he largely ignored the country’s widespread human rights abuses.

Security forces have conducted or allowed what critics call systematic rape and murder against Myanmar’s Rohingya minority, leading to a refugee flood into Bangladesh. But standing in Naypyitaw, Myanmar’s capital, Tillerson declined to call for sanctions or other censure, saying more investigation is needed.

“If we have credible information that we believe to be very reliable that certain individuals were responsible for certain acts that we find unacceptable,” Tillerson said, “then targeted sanctions on individuals very well may be appropriate.”

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International already have documented atrocities against the Rohingya, a Muslim minority in the Buddhistmajority country. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said there is “mounting evidence” of ethnic cleansing.

Whether Tillerson was ill-informed or following administration policy wasn’t immediately clear. Unlike his recent predecessors, President Donald Trump did not bring up human rights concerns during his justcompleted visit to China, or during his subsequent visit to the Philippines, where the government is blamed for the ex- trajudicial killings of thousands of people.

But Tillerson’s soft-pedaling of the crisis fed growing concerns on Capitol Hill that he is leaving the State Department largely rudderless and that U.S. diplomacy is woefully absent from Myanmar and other places where it is needed — including efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Syrian civil war.

The unease drew unusual rebukes this week from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, who say U.S. diplomats, aid workers, academics and development specialists are retiring or quitting the State Department in alarming numbers. The exodus has weakened U.S. diplomacy and sent morale into a tailspin, they said.