Malaysia Calls for Justice, Citizenship for Rohingya Muslims

  • 6/22/2019
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Malaysia on Saturday said the perpetrators of violence against Myanmars Rohingya minority Muslims must "be brought to justice." A military crackdown in 2017 drove more than 740,000 Rohingya into Bangladesh, carrying accounts of rape, mass killings and the razing of villages in Rakhine state. UN investigators have called for Myanmars top generals to be tried for genocide. But Myanmars army and de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi have defended the action. In talks Saturday with Southeast Asian counterparts, Malaysias Foreign Minister Saifuddin Bin Abdullah called for the "perpetrators of the Rohingya issue to be brought to justice", his ministry said in Tweet. He also said repatriation of the minority from the fetid, overcrowded refugee camps of Bangladesh "must include the citizenship of the Rohingya." Malaysia, a Muslim country which hosts a large Rohingya refugee population, is one of the few members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to speak up for the minority.  The 10-member bloc normally abides by a principle of non-interference in each others internal affairs. Rakhine state, the western region home to the Rohingya, remains cut by violence. Only a handful of the Muslim minority have returned under a discredited repatriation deal. Myanmar has not offered citizenship to the mass of Rohingya in Bangladeshs camps should they return, while the minority also want safety guarantees and restitution of seized lands and torched villages before agreeing to go back.

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