Hunt defends Suu Kyi but says Rohingya need justice
JEREMY HUNT defended the Burmese leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s “difficult position” over the Rohingya crisis yesterday, even as he warned that the world would not rest until the persecuted minority received justice.
Britain may back the referral of Burma to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, the Foreign Secretary confirmed, after returning from Rakhine state, the centre of a brutal military campaign of murder, rape and arson that drove 700,000 Rohingya Muslims to seek refuge in Bangladesh.
Describing an ongoing “climate of fear” in the state, he said: “Burma needs to know that the international community won’t let it rest.”
The country is facing increasing international pressure to face accountability for crimes committed against the Rohingya, including a call from United Nations investigators for Burma’s top generals to be tried for genocide.
Yangon (Rangoon) has set up its own independent commission to address the army’s actions. “If we don’t see that process happening, we will use all the tools at our disposal to make sure there is justice... the world is watching,” Mr Hunt said after a meeting with Ms Suu Kyi that he called “lively” and “frank”.
However, Mr Hunt also rallied to Ms Suu Kyi’s defence in a departure from global condemnation of the Nobel peace prize winner for her failure to take action.
“She doesn’t control the military,” he said on Twitter. “They have a constitution that is half way toward a democ- racy and the military are not accountable to her and are able to act with impunity. So we have to understand the difficulty of her position.”
Others investigating the cruelty inflicted on the Rohingya have not been so lenient. Chris Sidoti, an Australian lawyer who co-wrote a searing UN report on atrocities against the Rohingya, said Ms Suu Kyi acted as a “fig leaf ” for the military “by dismissing the overwhelming number of reports of mass rape as fake”.
Stomach-churning details emerged in the 440-page report of depraved acts of inhumanity, including village massacres, children burned alive and women tied to trees and raped.
UN investigators said the evidence warranted charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Mr Sidoti welcomed Mr Hunt’s trip and urged world leaders to visit Burma and persuade it to cooperate with international investigations and address the impunity of the army.
During his visit, Mr Hunt said Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh could not safely return until they saw “proper judicial process, accountability and justice for the perpetrators of atrocities”.