Rohingya crisis: EU, US weighing sanctions against Myanmar army leaders

The European Union and the United States are considering targeted sanctions against Myanmar military leaders over an offensive that has driven more than 500,000 Rohingya Muslims out of the country, officials familiar with the discussions say.

Interviews with more than a dozen diplomats and government officials based in Washington, Yangon and Europe revealed that punitive measures aimed specifically at top generals were among a range of options being discussed in response to the crisis.

Nothing has yet been decided and Washington and Brussels may decide to hold off for now, the sources said. There are also discussions about increasing aid for violence-riven Rakhine state.

The active discussion of sanctions – not even on the table a month ago – shows how the dramatic exodus of Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar’s northwest is putting pressure on Western policymakers to take action.

While much of the outcry overseas has focused on Nobel laureate and Myanmar’s national leader Aung San Suu Kyi, few Western diplomats see an alternative to her leadership. Suu Kyi does not control the military, which still wields considerable power under Myanmar’s army-written constitution.
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Rohingya crisis: This is what genocide looks like

The world is witnessing a state-orchestrated humanitarian catastrophe on the Myanmar-Bangladesh border. The latest UN figures show a staggering 370,000 Rohingya have fled into Bangladesh since August 25. An unknown number have perished. Around 26,000 non-Muslims have also been displaced.

This is just the latest crisis to confront the Rohingya in recent years. In October 2016, over 80,000 Rohingya fled violence which the UN said very likely amounted to crimes against humanity. In 2015, thousands were stranded on boats on the Andaman sea, described as “floating coffins”. Their lives inside Myanmar were so desperate that they gambled with dangerous human trafficking networks. Many drowned, died of starvation or ended up in death camps on the Thai-Malaysian border.

The Rohingya have long endured a bare and tenuous life. The World Food Programme has documented high levels of extreme food insecurity: an estimated 80,500 Rohingya children under five require treatment for acute malnutrition. Since October 2016, critical life-saving humanitarian activities have been severely restricted.
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Rohingya crisis: 379,000 refugees have fled to Bangladesh, says UN report

The United Nations office in Bangladesh on Wednesday raised the number of Rohingyas who have fled the conflict-torn Rakhine state in northwestern Myanmar since August 25 to 379,000, which is 9,000 more than the last count.

On Tuesday, the UN had said that 370,000 Rohingyas had fled to Bangladesh since the violence broke out last month, Efe news reported.

A majority of the new arrivals, around 188,000, had been put up in makeshift camps, said the Inter Sector Coordination Group in a report.

The report added that another 156,000 Rohingyas were living in temporary settlements and existing camps, while around 35,000 were being hosted by local communities.

"The new arrivals continue to flow from transit sites (...), other host community villages and the Teknaf Metropolitan Area, towards existing makeshift settlements and new spontaneous sites," said the report, underlining a significant rise in the number of refugees in "spontaneous" camps.

The current crisis erupted on August 25, following an attack by the insurgent Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) on police and military posts in the northwestern Burmese state of Rakhine that had led to a violent offensive by the Myanmar Army.
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Rohingya crisis marks end of Aung Suu Kyi's Nobel Peace Prize: Iran Leader

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday said that violence in Myanmar against the Rohingya Muslims marks the "death of Nobel Peace Prize", a media report said.

Khamenei called Myanmar's State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, a "cruel woman" since the crimes against Rohingya Muslims are taking place under her eyes, Tehran Times daily reported.

Suu Kyi, who was once hailed by the global community for standing up to the Myanmar military, has taken almost no action to put an end to the deadly violence against the Rohingyas. She has been sharply criticised around the world for her inaction.

Khamenei also strongly criticised the silence and inaction of international bodies and self-proclaimed human rights advocates on the ongoing atrocities in Myanmar.

He said the crisis in Myanmar is a political issue and should not be reduced to a religious conflict between Muslims and Buddhists.
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