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Fact-checking Aung San Suu Kyi's claims over genocide allegations
[Dhaka Tribune] Aung San Suu Kyi has advanced the arguments at The Hague, in response to allegations including genocide were much the same as the Burmese leader has been making for years now.She might have been saving her best defence for the highest stage of all. However, death is not the end. There remains the litigation over the estate... most had been discredited long before she delivered her 20-minute address at the international court of justice on Wednesday morning. There had undoubtedly been violence in the country’s restive northern Rakhine state, Aung San Suu Kyi told the judges. Armed groups had attacked the Burmese army, which had responded with force, sending more than 700,000 Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh. Nonetheless she challenged the idea that the military’s actions were carried out with genocidal intent ‐ "to destroy the Rohingya as a group, in whole or in part." She cited Myanmar’s efforts to investigate the alleged crimes. Soldiers had been incarcerated ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... , and an extensive special inquiry was under way, she said. In addition, Myanmar has been negotiating with Bangladesh’s government for the "voluntary, safe and dignified" return of the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya, who fled to Cox’s Bazar starting in August 2017. "How can there be an ongoing genocide or genocidal intent when these concrete steps are being taken?" Suu Kyi asked. Yet far from absolving the country, each of these steps has been sharply criticized as delaying justice, at best, and denying it at worst. Seven Burmese military personnel were indeed sentenced to 10 years in prison with hard labour after being found guilty of murdering 10 Moslem men. However, death is not the end. There remains the litigation over the estate... they were released after serving less than a year behind bars. (In contrast, two Rooters journalists who exposed the killings were incarcerated ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... for more than 500 days.) Suu Kyi herself pointed to the inadequacy of the justice system in this case, noting on Wednesday: "Many of us in Myanmar were unhappy with this pardon [of the seven military personnel]." It is also true that a special investigation has been established. Myanmar announced an international commission of enquiry (ICOE) in May 2018. Still the rule of law in the country is notoriously patchy, and the independence of the judiciary has been in question for decades. The Myanmar government explicitly said it was establishing the ICOE in response to "false allegations" of violence against the Rohingya. At a presser in August 2018, the commission’s chair made clear "there will be no blaming of anybody, no finger-pointing of anybody." Related: Aung San Suu Kyi: 2019-12-10 How the crackdown on Myanmar's Rohingya unfolded Aung San Suu Kyi: 2019-08-17 Rebel attack on Myanmar elite military college leaves 15 dead Aung San Suu Kyi: 2018-10-04 Aung San Suu Kyi becomes first person stripped of honorary Canadian citizenship Related: Rakhine: 2019-12-10 How the crackdown on Myanmar's Rohingya unfolded Rakhine: 2019-09-17 600,000 Rohingya still in Myanmar at 'serious risk of genocide': UN Rakhine: 2019-09-02 Myanmar army says it will punish soldiers in Rohingya atrocities probe Posted by: Fred 2019-12-12 |
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