AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
PUBLIC STATEMENT
AI Index: ASA 16/008/2012
19 June 2012
Myanmar: Meet immediate humanitarian needs and address systemic discrimination
As the situation in northern Rakhine State remains very tense, Myanmar authorities should ensure full
and unfettered humanitarian access to displaced people, and conduct an independent and impartial
investigation into recent communal violence, Amnesty International said in a statement today.
The Myanmar government should also aim to replace the state of emergency in Rakhine State at the
earliest opportunity, facilitate international monitors, and address decades of systemic discrimination
against ethnic minority Rohingyas.
The widespread violence in at least eight areas that began on 8 June has reduced considerably, but
human rights abuses continue to take place among the Buddhist Rakhine, Muslim Rakhine, and
Muslim Rohingya communities, as well as by state security forces. This is especially the case in
Maungdaw and Rathidaung.
According to the government, at least 50 people have been killed, and over 30,000 displaced by the
violence. Several thousand homes have been destroyed.
The basic humanitarian needs of these people must be met immediately, as many still lack adequate
food, water, shelter, and medical attention. The Myanmar authorities should allow local and
international aid agencies full and unhindered access to all displaced persons—including an estimated
1,500 persons illegally denied refuge across the border last week by Bangladesh.
Yesterday, Bangladesh border guards similarly detained at least 150 Rohingya men who were trying to
enter Bangladesh in small boats on the Naf River. They were fleeing a wave of mostly arbitrary arrests
by Myanmar border forces and the army since 15 June in Maungdaw.
The immediate causes of the violence should be thoroughly, independently, and impartially
investigated, and perpetrators of human rights violations—including among the security forces—held
accountable.
Amnesty International further noted that the underlying causes of the violence are as critical as its
effects, and should be addressed with equal commitment by the Myanmar authorities.
Amnesty International’s work around the world has shown that states of emergency, though sometimes
necessary, suspend certain rights even while protecting others. The state of emergency in Rakhine
State should be lifted at the earliest opportunity, and a team of international monitors, possibly made
up of ASEAN nationals, deployed to the relevant areas.
Given that the conflicting Rakhine and Rohingya communities are also divided on religious lines,
monitors should endeavor to ensure that religious freedom is not restricted in the name of achieving
inter-ethnic peace.
Amnesty International emphasized that restoring the pre-violence status quo is not sufficient, however,
as systemic discrimination against the Rohingya characterizes decades of state policy in Myanmar.
Tens of thousands of Rohingyas were forcibly displaced by security forces in 1991-1992. Despite
being a state party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Myanmar continues to deny
Rohingya children the right to a nationality. Refused citizenship the under the 1982 Citizenship Act,
1the ethnic and religious minority is restricted to various degrees in their rights to study, work, travel,
marry, practice their religion, and receive health services.
As evidenced by recent statements by former political prisoners in Myanmar, this discrimination stems
from and further contributes to prejudice against the Rohingya.
Myanmar authorities must grant Rohingyas the citizenship to which they have right and rescind all
discriminatory policies and practices against them.
Background
On 28 May, a 27-year-old Buddhist Rakhine woman was raped and killed in Maungdaw. The next day
police reportedly detained three Muslim suspects. On 3 June, a crowd of some 300 Rakhines in
Toungup township stopped a Yangon-bound bus, and reportedly believing that the perpetrators were
on-board, beat to death 10 Muslim passengers. Intensive inter-ethnic and religious violence ensued
and continued through 14 June, despite the government declaring a state of emergency in Rakhine
State on 10 June, and the situation has remained tense.
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