Burma: Aung San Suu Kyi Pleads For Ethnic Minority Rights

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Rangoon, Burma -- In her first speech before the Myanmar parliament, pro-democracy activist and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has pleaded for the country to respect the rights of its various ethnic minorities.

<< In her first speech before the Myanmar parliament, pro-democracy activist and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has pleaded for the country to respect the rights of its various ethnic minorities.

Suu Kyi’s comments come after weeks of unrest and violence in the Rakhine state of western Myanmar (also known as Burma) where the Muslim minority Rohingya have been attacked and targeted by the majority Buddhists. Government troops are also still fighting the ethnic tribes in Kachin state in the northern part of the country.

"To become a truly democratic union with a spirit of the union, equal rights and mutual respect, I urge all members of parliament to discuss the enactment of the laws needed to protect equal rights of ethnicities," she said.

"Furthermore, the flames of war are not completely extinguished.”

Suu Kyi, however, did not explicitly mention the Rohingya by name and has been strangely silent on the issue of the ethnic clashes in Rakhine.

The Nobel Peace Prize recipient, who recently returned from a global tour, also called for the government to address the widespread poverty found among ethnic minorities.

Burma has a large number of ethnic minority rebel groups, some of whom the government has entered into peace deals with in recent years.

According to Stimson, a research and analysis group, Burma has at least fourteen ethnic minority groups, with the Shan (9 percent) and the Karen (7 percent), the two largest by population.

The Shan are closely related to the peoples of neighboring Thailand -- their communities are endangered by huge construction projects, including dams at the Irrawaddy and Salween rivers, as well the proposed Sino-Burma oil and gas pipeline.

The Karen have fought the Burmese ever since the nation was granted independence from Britain after World War II. As a result of decades of military conflict, a large population of Karen refugees reside in crowded camps on the Thai border.

The Burman (or Bamar) majority are believed to represent about 70 percent of the nation’s population.

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Fight for religious rights but reject extremism, Anwar says

By Melissa Chi

PETALING JAYA, June 7 — Defend religious rights protected under the Constitution but stay away from extremism, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim told religious leaders last night.

The Pakatan Rakyat (PR) de facto chief met leaders of the inter-faith group Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism, and Taoism (MCCBCHST) at The Club here, yesterday to discuss current issues.

“To the Muslim representatives and representatives of the Buddhist religion, Christians, Hindus and others, we would like to reiterate our commitment to defend the principle of the supremacy of religious life enshrined in Article 3, under the Constitution.

“On that note, we also want to challenge the tendency of some to suggest extremism within their faiths without regard to the sensitivity of Muslims in this country,” he said in a statement after having a closed-door dialogue with them.

In addition to leaders from the non-Muslim faith council and the Opposition leader, PKR President Datuk Seri Wan Azizah Wan Ismail as well as several other PKR leaders, and the Malaysian Civil Liberties Movement (MCLM) President Haris Ibrahim, attended the dialogue.

Anwar (picture) was tight-lipped about the agenda of the meeting before it started but had only said that it would be related to current issues and the narrow-thinking of some Malaysians.

“Islam is a religion which upholds the principles of justice, peace loving, respecting the rights of its followers and the rights of followers of other religions to practice their faith. The main principles of sharia, known as sharia ‘maqasid’ conclude that it is a priority to protect religion, life, lineage, ‘aqal’, property and dignity.

“So based on the accurate understanding of Islam, there needs to be a comprehensive appreciation of religion by Muslims to ensure a way of life with integrity. Muslims who want to fulfill the purpose of mercy and justice as it is, are often advisable to reject oppression, corruption and all forms of abuse. Thus it is not surprising that many of the Muslims are upset with the attitude of Umno leaders and the inconsistencies of its controlled media in appreciating the religion. What’s more corruption and abuse of power is still widespread,” he said.

Prior to the meeting, Anwar said he hoped to come up with an action plan following the meeting, but did not elaborate in his statement sent out later.

“More recently, some Umno leaders and the party-owned media tried to undermine the peacefulness between religions in Malaysia with a sharp racial rhetoric, the shallow and not based on Islamic principles of justice, as recommended.

“Their efforts solely want to frighten and scare the Muslims and create misunderstandings between us. We regret that rhetoric and propaganda by the UMNO leaders and the media had only hinder efforts from both of parties to fulfil the purpose of Li ta’arafu message, which is trying to understand the different beliefs and cultures,” he said.

Last month, several Muslim organisations lodged police reports after reading a front-page article in the Umno-owned daily titled: “Malaysia, negara Kristian? (Malaysia, a Christian country?).

The working committee on seeking an understanding on issues among adherents, under the Cabinet’s Special Committee to Promote Interreligious Understanding and Harmony, was among four subcommittees formed on December 2 last year.

It is jointly helmed by Datuk Mustapha Ma and Reverend Hermen Shastri, and it last met on March 17, though sources told The Malaysian Insider that there was no headway in talks on thorny issues as Muslim representatives had failed to turn up for the meeting.

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