Oh boy, the Lady is not happy.
Over the weekend, Aung San Suu Kyi’s office publicly denounced the claims of the BBC and a UNHCR official in regards to their comments on the government’s treatment of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State.
On November 22, BBC World News released a video titled “Rohingya Muslims ‘hated and hounded from Burmese soil’” with footage of the conditions of Rohingyas living in Rakhine state.
Not surprisingly, the government was not pleased.
In a letter that the Lady’s office sent to the BBC and later released to the public, the Myanmar Embassy in London wrote that upon receiving word of the program’s scheduled release, they “responded the true information and actual situation in Rakhine State with reliable documents.”
“We are very disappointed because it was found that the said program has been based on rumours, hearsays and one sided views…We strongly disagree with this news program which contained allegations that are false and distorted information,” they wrote.
Additionally, the government has lodged a complaint with the Assisgant High Commissioner of the UNHCR against John McKissick, a UNHCR official based in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, who told the BBC that the Myanmar government was carrying out an “ethnic cleansing of the Muslim minority in Myanmar.”
In a post on the Ministry of Information’s official Facebook page, the ministry writes,
“The [Myanmar] ambassador also pointed out that those statements breach the code of conduct of the UN, damage the image of the UNHCR and Myanmar and the government, before requesting the assistant high commissioner to verify the statements and Myanmar may lodge a complaint if necessary.”
“The Myanmar ambassador urged the assistant high commissioner to verify whether John McKissick actually made the statements to the BBC, and to refute and protest the allegations if he made the statements.”
Since a series of deadly attacks on border guard officers in Rakhine, several areas have been closed off and placed under military lockdown. Althugh stories of the abuse and torture of Muslim Rohingyas living in the area have spread online, nothing has been verified by independent news organizations.
On Twitter, BBC Myanmar correspondent Jonah Fisher said, “Every day for the last week I have contacted Suu Kyi’s office requesting that she or her spox [spokesperson] go on camera to talk Rakhine. Still nothing.”
