{"id":3801,"date":"2018-09-21T11:57:10","date_gmt":"2018-09-21T05:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/new-eng\/?p=3801"},"modified":"2026-01-28T10:57:03","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T04:27:03","slug":"uks-hunt-says-pressed-suu-kyi-on-justice-and-accountability-for-rohingya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/?p=3801","title":{"rendered":"UK\u2019s Hunt Says Pressed Suu Kyi on \u2018Justice and Accountability\u2019 for Rohingya"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

NAYPYITAW \u2014 Myanmar\u00a0must ensure there is \u201cno hiding place\u201d for those responsible for crimes against its Rohingya minority if it is to avoid a lasting stain on the country\u2019s reputation, Britain\u2019s foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Hunt told Reuters he pressed\u00a0Myanmar\u2019s civilian leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, on the importance of holding the armed forces accountable for any atrocities, adding that if that did not happen within the country other options should be considered, including referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC).<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there isn\u2019t accountability through domestic processes the international community will not let it rest at that,\u201d Hunt said in an interview at the end of a two-day visit to the former British colony previously known as Burma.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to be absolutely clear that there can be no hiding place for anyone responsible for these kinds of atrocities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Myanmar\u2019s main government spokesman, U Zaw Htay, was unavailable for comment.<\/p>\n

United Nations-mandated investigators have said\u00a0Myanmar\u2019s military carried out mass killings and gang rapes of Rohingya with \u201cgenocidal intent\u201d in an operation in Rakhine State, in the west of the country, that drove more than 700,000 refugees across the border to Bangladesh.<\/p>\n

The investigators called for commander-in-chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and five generals to be prosecuted for genocide and crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

Myanmar\u00a0has rejected the UN findings as \u201cone-sided.\u201d It says the military action, which followed militant attacks on security forces in August last year, was a legitimate counterinsurgency operation.<\/p>\n

Myanmar\u00a0has launched several domestic probes that have largely dismissed allegations made by Rohingya refugees. In July, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi appointed a commission chaired by retired Filipino diplomat Rosario Manalo to investigate the allegations of human rights violations.<\/p>\n

Reuters case raised<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hunt said he had witnessed a \u201cclimate of fear\u201d during a visit to Rakhine, where he was taken to empty centers built by\u00a0Myanmar\u00a0to house Rohingya the government says it is ready to welcome back. Refugees needed to see \u201caccountability and justice\u201d for atrocities to feel confident enough to return, he said. \u201cIf there isn\u2019t accountability and justice, this will be as big a stain on Burma\u2019s history as the Khmer Rouge are for Cambodia.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked whether he would support referring\u00a0Myanmar\u00a0to the ICC, Hunt said there were \u201ca number of different options.\u201d<\/p>\n

In separate comments on Twitter, Hunt noted an ICC referral would need the support of the UN Security Council \u201cwhich it may not get so we need to look at other options too.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Security Council referral would need nine votes in favor and no vetoes from the permanent members Russia, China, the United States, Britain and France. Diplomats say Russia and China are unlikely to agree to such a move.<\/p>\n

The ICC declined to comment. On Tuesday, the ICC prosecutor said her office had begun a preliminary examination into whether alleged forced deportations of Rohingya from\u00a0Myanmar\u00a0into Bangladesh could constitute war crimes or crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

During his trip, Hunt visited a group supporting political prisoners in Yangon and met Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in the capital, Naypyitaw. The military declined Hunt\u2019s request for a meeting, he said.<\/p>\n

Hunt said he was \u201cextremely concerned\u201d about the case of two Reuters journalists who were arrested last December while investigating a massacre in Rakhine.<\/p>\n

Reporters Ko Wa Lone and Ko Kyaw Soe Oo were sentenced to seven years in prison after being convicted this month under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act.<\/p>\n

Hunt said he raised specific concerns with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi about the conviction and asked her to consider giving them a pardon.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe indicated that the judicial processes would probably need to be concluded before that could be considered, but I did put that squarely on the table as something I hoped she would consider,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a critical moment for Burma as one of the newest democracies in the world to show that its court system is effective and there is due process, and I think there are a number of grounds for concern that that didn\u2019t happen in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Topics:<\/strong>\u00a0Diplomacy, Politics, Rohingya<\/p>\n

Irrawaddy<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NAYPYITAW \u2014 Myanmar\u00a0must ensure there is \u201cno hiding place\u201d for those responsible for crimes against its Rohingya minority if it is to avoid a lasting stain on the country\u2019s reputation, Britain\u2019s foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said on Thursday. Hunt told Reuters he pressed\u00a0Myanmar\u2019s civilian leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, on the importance of holding […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3799,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3801"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3801\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3802,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3801\/revisions\/3802"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}