Britain, S Korea, UN rights body put pressure on junta
YANGON: International pressure continued to build on Myanmar’s military leaders after Britain and South Korea announced punitive action and a top UN rights body official called the current regime “illegal” and “murderous”.
Britain on Friday advised its citizens to flee Myanmar. The turmoil prompted the country’s former colonial ruler to urge its citizens to get out if they could, warning that “political tension and unrest are widespread since the military takeover and levels of violence are rising”.
“The foreign, commonwealth & development office advises British nationals to leave the country by commercial means, unless there is an urgent need to stay,” the British foreign ministry said.
South Korea said it will suspend defence exchanges with Myanmar and ban arms exports to the country, its foreign ministry said on Friday. The ministry also said Seoul would limit exports of other strategic items, reconsider development aid and grant humanitarian exemptions for Myanmar nationals to allow them to stay in South Korea until the situation improves.
“Despite repeated demands of the international community, including South Korea, there are an increasing number of victims in Myanmar due to violent acts of the military and police authorities,” the ministry said.
The military authorities are cracking down with increasing severity on daily protests against their February 1 coup, with at least 70 people killed, according to the UN’s top rights expert on the country.
Thomas Andrews, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, gave a stark assessment of the crisis. The country is “controlled by a murderous, illegal regime” that was likely committing “crimes against humanity,” Andrews told the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
These crimes likely include “acts of murder, enforced disappearance, persecution, torture” carried out with “the knowledge of senior leadership”, including junta leader Min Aung Hlaing, Andrews said.
While stressing that such offences can only be determined in a court of law, he said there was clear evidence that the junta’s crimes were “widespread” and part of a “coordinated campaign”.
Thursday saw at least twelve protesters killed in different parts of the country. Rights group Amnesty International released a report on the crisis on Thursday, accusing the junta of using battlefield weapons on unarmed protestors and carrying out premeditated killings.