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Brge Brende breaks Norways years of silence on the Rohingya of Burma

Development Today Nr 16/2014 - December 9, 2014
www.development-today.com
By Ann Danaiya Usher
The UN Rapporteur on Burma Yanghee Lee points to systematic discrimination. Former PM Kjell Magne
Bondevik speaks of crimes against humanity. Nobel Lareate Amartya Sen calls it a slow genocide. In a
rare public statement on the situation of the muslim minority in Rakhine state, Foreign Minister Brge
Brende has expressed Norways concern.
A UN resolution last month expressed serious concern over the plight of the Rohingya in Burmas western
Rakhine state where 140,000 people have been living in internment camps following violence between
Buddhists and Muslims in 2012. Hundreds of thousands more are subject to movement restrictions and
denied basic rights and medical care.
The government of Burma, also known as Myanmar, categorises the Rohingya as migrants from Bangladesh
and calls them Bengalis; a term that is both insulting and indicates foreign-ness. The UN resolution urges
the government to grant equal access to full citizenship for the Rohingya minority.
The government has rejected the resolution out of hand. U Ye Htut, President Thein Seins spokesperson,
said Burma would not grant citizenship to anyone who did not meet the countrys legal criteria. Along a
similar line, Thein Sein recently denied that the Rohingya are fleeing torture in Rakhine, telling the Voice of
America - Burmese Service that such media reports were fabrications.
As international pressure to bring attention to the plight of the Rohingya slowly grows, many are asking why
Norway has been so quiet over so many years.
As a key player supporting reforms in Burma and one of the first countries to lift economic sanctions,
Norways relative silence on the Rohingya has been conspicuous. Norway has leant legitimacy to the reforms
implemented by the Thein Sein government, and contributed to the opening up of trade with Western
countries. Since 2012, Norway has worked with the government to support ceasefire agreements with armed
ethnic groups through the so-called Myanmar Peace Support Inititiatve (MPSI).
Back in August 2012, Akhtar Chaudhry, who was at the time a Socialist Liberal MP, raised a question in the
Norwegian parliament about the Rohingya. Then Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stre responded that Norway
was worried about the situation and had raised the matter with Thein Sein. Gahr Stre pointed out that the
president had established a commission to investigate the violence, and he saw this as a positive sign.
Apart from this intervention, and in spite of mounting evidence of massive human rights violations and an
increasingly deparate humanitarian crisis, there have been no press statements from Oslo about the
Rohingya and surprisingly little debate. Burma is now one of 12 focus recipients of Norwegian aid.
Why has Norway been so quiet on the Rohingya issue? Development Today put this question to the Foreign
Ministry in Oslo and was told that the Norwegian government raises the issue in private.
In our dialogue with Myanmars government we have repeatedly, since 2012, raised the issue of the
situation of the Rohingyas in Rakhine, says State Secretary Morten Hglund. The issue was also raised by
Foreign Minister Brende in a meeting with President Thein Sein during the state visit to Myanmar earlier this
week.
Kristian Stokke, human geographer at the University of Oslo who studies democratic movements and civil
society transformation, says Norway is quiet on the Rohingya because it wants to preserve its special
relationship with the regime. Talking publicly about the Rohingya would be like sand in the machine, he
says to Development Today. www.development-today.com
It would distract from the Foreign Ministrys agenda. If