Rakhine National Party chairman Dr Aye Maung told Mizzima that his party plans to break off relations with all UN organisations because of the bias he perceives the UN to hold in its handling of Rakhine State.
14 January 2015| Written by Kay Zue Published in Myanmar
Rakhine National Party chairman Dr Aye Maung told Mizzima that his party plans to break off relations with all UN organisations because of the bias he perceives the UN to hold in its handling of Rakhine State.
The RNP addressed an open letter of complaint to the Rakhine State government on January 10 about the party’s stance and decision.
“They [UN officials] met with us and said that they met with both sides, but they did not pay attention to the Rakhine people’s views and the points we raised with them. They made decisions based on their opinions, so in future we won’t let them take advantage of us,” said Dr Aye Maung on January 13.
Dr Aye Maung was speaking in the wake of a brief visit by UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar Ms Yanghee Lee and her colleagues to Rakhine State as part of her second visit to Myanmar.
The Rakhine National Party, a merger of the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party and the Arakan League for Democracy, are the largest single party in the state legislature and hold numerous seats in the Union Parliaments.
The party chairman said the ethnic Rakhine people’s efforts to raise concerns about the Muslim minority were not successful because the Rakhine State government and central government took political advantage of the situation.
On December 29, 2014, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution urging Myanmar to give full citizenship to the Rohingya and to allow them to move freely throughout the country. The Rakhine National Party made objections to the resolution.
Both the party and the Myanmar government reject the term Rohingya, calling the people “Bengali” and claiming they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.
Several hundred Rakhine residents protested the arrival in Rakhine State of the UN envoy Ms Lee, calling on her to be impartial in delivering her next report on the human rights situation in Rakhine State. Her first report, delivered to the UN in October 2014, was highly critical of the treatment of Rohingya in Myanmar, calling the minority one of the most persecuted in the world.