Time for UN Security Council to take action

Thirteen Nobel laureates including Professor Yunus, and 10 global leaders in a joint statement to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) have urged world leaders to stand united and send a strong message to the Myanmarese government that enough is enough. The systematic brutalisation of the Rohingyas, their forceful eviction from homes and the subsequent attempt to push them into Bangladesh all bear the hallmarks of the makings of an unfolding genocide. Kofi Annan, former Secretary-General of the UN and chairman of Myanmar's Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, who led a peace mission to Myanmar recently, stated that journalists should be careful about leveling charges of genocide. Yet, as the world now knows that is precisely what is going on there, thanks to the tales of horror told by Rohingya refugees who made it to safety in Bangladesh. 

The statement by eminent personalities is echoed by the Bangladesh government, which has formally demanded that Myanmar take back its citizens because they are Myanmarese and not Bangladeshi, as falsely claimed by the Yangon government. The international community and the UNSC have till date merely issued statements condemning brutality against the Rohingya. These people have had had their homes burnt, faced arbitrary arrests and allegedly been shot and killed in large numbers. The excuse used against these people that a group of Rohingyas had attacked and killed Myanmarese police does not warrant mass scale repression against an entire community of hundreds of thousands. The time has come for a much more forceful response from the UNSC, one that would make clear to Yangon that the world will not stand by and watch in silence the systematic persecution of the Rohingyas.