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Photo: UNOCHA/David
Ohana
Mizzima News:
May 8, 2013
The Myanmar National Human Rights Commission has urged the government and
the Central Committee for Implementation of Stability and Development in
Rakhine State to urgently implement the recommendations of the Rakhine
Investigation Commission in the strife-torn region.
In a statement
released in state-run newspaper The New Light of Myanmar on May 8, the rights
group called for “just and effective actions to be taken in accordance with law
against the perpetrators of the acts of violence that had occurred; steps to be
taken to build mutual trust for the physical and mental rehabilitation of the
victims”.
It also recommended
a special children's education program in the affected areas to build “mutual
trust”.
The Rakhine
Investigation Commission's report released on April 29 recommended doubling
security forces in the state, for Myanmar to “immediately” resolve Rohingya's
citizenship status and recognize the basic human rights of those deemed
stateless.
On Monday, President
Thein Sein pledged to uphold the rights of Muslims and to establish a
harmonious society for all Myanmar citizens in a speech to the nation.
On May 1, UN
Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar Tomás Ojea Quintana expressed
concern at the Rakhine Commission’s lack of recommendations to address impunity
and ensure investigations into “credible allegations of widespread and
systematic human rights violations targeting the Muslim community in Rakhine
State.”
He did, however,
welcome “some forward-thinking recommendations” by the Investigation Commission
into communal violence between Rakhine Buddhists and members of the Muslim
Rohingya community in Myanmar’s western Rakhine State last year which left at
least 200 dead and 140,000 homeless.
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