Annual report on religious freedom cites the plight of Rohingya, other minority religious groups including Christians
Karen villagers, injured during airstrikes following the military coup, rest after receiving treatment while taking shelter in a jungle near Hpa-pun in Myanmar’s Karen state on March 29, 2021. (Photo: Free Burma Rangers/AFP)
Rohingya genocide and persecution of ethnic minorities including Christians by Myanmar’s military junta have been highlighted by the US State Department in its latest annual report on religious freedom.
In the report released on June 2, the United States has determined that violence against the Rohingya minority amounts to genocide and crimes against humanity.
“In March, based on extensive legal review of the evidence, I made the determination that Burma’s military committed genocide and crimes against humanity with the intent to destroy predominantly Muslim Rohingya in 2017,” said Secretary of State Anthony J. Blinken.
The report cited UN and media reports saying that the situation remains unchanged for the Rohingya in Rakhine, where they face restrictions on freedom of movement and access to health care, education and employment.
The report further raised concerns about the plight of other minority religious communities including Christians in Kachin, Kayah, Karen and Chin states amid the escalating post-coup violence.
The junta’s targeting of and destruction of churches, and the arrests of priests and pastors in the predominantly Christian regions of Kayah and Chin states, were described as a matter of great concern.
“The US government pressed for full accountability for the perpetrators of human rights violations, including those concerning religious freedom”
The report referred to Pope Francis’ appeal for protecting places of worship in the conflict-torn nation and the gesture of kneeling on the streets and praying for Myanmar following the example of Myanmar’s peace icon, Sister Ann Rose Nu Tawng.
The US slapped a series of sanctions on the coup leaders, their families and military-linked companies over atrocities against civilians including ethnic tribes following the military coup
Myanmar continues to be on the list of countries blacklisted by the US State Department along with China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.
“We have seen two genocides of religious minority communities in recent years — in China and in Burma,” US Ambassador-at-Large Rashad Hussain of the Office of International Religious Freedom said during the report launch.
“The US government pressed for full accountability for the perpetrators of human rights violations, including those concerning religious freedom,” says the report.
Hundreds of thousands of the mostly Muslim Rohingya community have fled Buddhist-majority Myanmar since 2017 after a military crackdown that is now the subject of a genocide case at the United Nations’ highest court in the Hague.
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