{"id":30253,"date":"2014-11-01T15:16:49","date_gmt":"2014-11-01T07:16:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=30253"},"modified":"2014-11-01T15:16:12","modified_gmt":"2014-11-01T07:16:12","slug":"un-resolution-urges-myanmar-to-change-campaign-that-would-erase-muslim-groups-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/11\/01\/un-resolution-urges-myanmar-to-change-campaign-that-would-erase-muslim-groups-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"UN resolution urges Myanmar to change campaign that would erase Muslim group\u2019s identity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Rohingya<\/a>
Rohingya militants. Stevejaw \/ Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A new U.N. draft resolution takes aim at Myanmar\u2019s aggressive campaign to have its Rohingya Muslims identify as a term they reject, urging \u201caccess to full citizenship on an equal basis.\u201d<\/p>\n

The European Union-drafted resolution, obtained Friday by The Associated Press, is one piece of international pressure on the\u00a0Southeast Asian\u00a0country to change its campaign, preferably before world leaders including President Barack Obama arrive for a regional summit in less than two weeks.<\/p>\n

Myanmar\u2019s 1.3 million Rohingya have emerged as a sensitive issue as Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist state, tries to move away from decades of repressive military rule toward democracy.<\/p>\n

The Rohingya have been denied citizenship and have almost no rights. Attacks by Buddhist mobs have left hundreds dead and 140,000 trapped in camps. Others are fleeing the country.<\/p>\n

Authorities want to officially categorize the Rohingya as \u201cBengalis,\u201d implying they are illegal migrants from neighbouring Bangladesh. The Rohingya counter that many of their families have been in Myanmar for generations. Effectively stateless, they are wanted by neither country and say the Myanmar government\u2019s campaign feels like an effort to have them systematically erased.<\/p>\n

The vast majority of Rohingya live in the state of Rakhine. President Thein Sein, a former general, is considering a \u201cRakhine Action Plan\u201d that would make people who identify themselves as Rohingya not only ineligible for citizenship but candidates for detainment and possible deportation.<\/p>\n

The resolution now before the General Assembly\u2019s human rights committee is nonbinding, but a strong vote in its support would send a message that international opinion is not on Myanmar\u2019s side.<\/p>\n

A Myanmar diplomat assigned to that committee, reached by telephone Friday for comment, said, \u201cIt\u2019s too early to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

The resolution expresses \u201cserious concern\u201d about the Rohingya\u2019s status. It calls on the government to \u201callow freedom of movement and equal access to full citizenship for the Rohingya minority\u201d and to \u201callow self-identification.\u201d<\/p>\n

Myanmar\u2019s plan worries some in the Muslim world, and the Organization for Islamic Cooperation pushed for strong language in the resolution.<\/p>\n

This week, Myanmar\u2019s ambassador to the United Nations, Tim Kyaw, told the General Assembly\u2019s human rights committee that his country is not \u201ctargeting a religion.\u201d He warned that \u201cinsisting on the right to self-identification will only impose obstacles to finding a lasting solution\u201d to ethnic tensions.<\/p>\n

Vijay Nambiar, the U.N. secretary-general\u2019s special adviser on Myanmar, told The Associated Press this week that Myanmar\u2019s government is facing increasing pressure to allow the Rohingya to identify as something other than Rohingya or Bengali.<\/p>\n

But, Nambiar said, \u201cIn the immediate future, the government says that\u2019s not possible.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new U.N. draft resolution takes aim at Myanmar\u2019s aggressive campaign to have its Rohingya Muslims identify as a term …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":30255,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news-w","mauthors-cara-anna","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}