Role of UN resident coordinator in Myanmar Renata Lok-Dessallien in keeping Rohingya crisis in a low key in the UN system over the years should be investigated, experts said.
They said this while making comments on a reported incident of ‘suppression’ by Renata of a report, prepared by a UN consultant and submitted in May this year.
It accurately predicted a ‘serious deterioration’ in the six months following its submission and urged the UN to undertake ‘serious contingency planning’, according to The Guardian.
Professor CR Abrar of Refugee and Migration Movements Research Unit of the University of Dhaka said the reported incident of not allowing by the UNRC in Myanmar to make a report on Rakhine situation public was ‘a violation of the tasks of the UN is supposed to do’.
This violation, in some way, helped the Burmese army to do what they were doing now, he observed.
This incident of violation should be looked into, Abrar stressed, as the international community could have been more alert to the present crisis had the UN highlighted this problem at that time.
A senior Bangladesh diplomat told New Age that the government was in touch with the UN headquarters about the role of Renata in Rohingya issues.
Security forces would be ‘heavy-handed and indiscriminate’ in dealing with the Rohingya, wrote independent analyst Richard Horsey, the report’s author, in a prediction that came true as Myanmar military launched a massive crackdown on August 25 after ARSA allegedly attacked dozens of security outposts on the day.
Nearly 5,15,000 minority Rohingyas, mostly women, children and aged people, fled unbridled murder, arson and rape during ‘security operations’ by Myanmar military in Rakhine to Bangladesh since August 25 to October 6, raising the total number of undocumented Myanmar nationals and registered refugees in Bangladesh to over 9,33,000, according to UN agencies estimate.
The UN rights body chief described the current situation as ‘textbook example of ethnic cleansing’, and independent rights bodies were suggesting that Myanmar security forces were engaged in crimes against humanity in the region.
Rights body Human Rights Watch’s Asia director Phil Robertson said, ‘It’s not been human rights up front, it’s been human rights down in back’.
The UN report, ‘The Role of the United Nations in Rakhine State’ suggested that there should be ‘no silence on human rights and protection concerns’ and preventing mass atrocities should ‘be at the core of how the UN operates’.
Renata should face probe: experts
Staff Correspondent
Role of UN resident coordinator in Myanmar Renata Lok-Dessallien in keeping Rohingya crisis in a low key in the UN system over the years should be investigated, experts said.
They said this while making comments on a reported incident of ‘suppression’ by Renata of a report, prepared by a UN consultant and submitted in May this year.
It accurately predicted a ‘serious deterioration’ in the six months following its submission and urged the UN to undertake ‘serious contingency planning’, according to The Guardian.
Professor CR Abrar of Refugee and Migration Movements Research Unit of the University of Dhaka said the reported incident of not allowing by the UNRC in Myanmar to make a report on Rakhine situation public was ‘a violation of the tasks of the UN is supposed to do’.
This violation, in some way, helped the Burmese army to do what they were doing now, he observed.
This incident of violation should be looked into, Abrar stressed, as the international community could have been more alert to the present crisis had the UN highlighted this problem at that time.
A senior Bangladesh diplomat told New Age that the government was in touch with the UN headquarters about the role of Renata in Rohingya issues.
Security forces would be ‘heavy-handed and indiscriminate’ in dealing with the Rohingya, wrote independent analyst Richard Horsey, the report’s author, in a prediction that came true as Myanmar military launched a massive crackdown on August 25 after ARSA allegedly attacked dozens of security outposts on the day.
Nearly 5,15,000 minority Rohingyas, mostly women, children and aged people, fled unbridled murder, arson and rape during ‘security operations’ by Myanmar military in Rakhine to Bangladesh since August 25 to October 6, raising the total number of undocumented Myanmar nationals and registered refugees in Bangladesh to over 9,33,000, according to UN agencies estimate.
The UN rights body chief described the current situation as ‘textbook example of ethnic cleansing’, and independent rights bodies were suggesting that Myanmar security forces were engaged in crimes against humanity in the region.
Rights body Human Rights Watch’s Asia director Phil Robertson said, ‘It’s not been human rights up front, it’s been human rights down in back’.
The UN report, ‘The Role of the United Nations in Rakhine State’ suggested that there should be ‘no silence on human rights and protection concerns’ and preventing mass atrocities should ‘be at the core of how the UN operates’.
The 28-page document was given to Renata and ‘she didn’t distribute it further because she wasn’t happy with it’, The Guardian reported, ‘because Renata didn’t like the analysis’.
A spokesperson for the UN secretary general, however, denied the allegations claiming that ‘human rights stand at the centre of everything the UN does’.
Renata, a Canadian national, did not mention in her statement as UNRC made on August 25, about launching of Burmese army operations in north Rakhine prompted by alleged ‘ARSA attack’ on security posts.
She also reportedly tried to stop the Rohingya rights issue being raised with the host government and to prevent human rights advocates from visiting Rohingya areas, before the current crisis in Rakhine was erupted, according to a BBC report.
For most of the UN staff in Myanmar, publicly talking about ‘Rohingya’ matters became almost taboo.
Renata was also criticised for her dubious role in reported foreign interference by ‘arranging’ a phone call by a top UN official to then Bangladesh Army chief, as well as by mentioning about a ‘UN letter’ tacitly suggesting withdrawal of army’s duty from January 22, 2007, general elections.
Former army chief General Moeen U Ahmed said in his book ‘Shantir Swapne’ that he received a phone call on January 11, 2007, from a UN under secretary general, who, according to Moeen, threatened withdrawal of Bangladesh forces from the UN peacekeeping missions ‘if the army plays any role’ in elections without participation of all political parties.
The alleged ‘threat’ led to declaration of state of emergency on January 11, 2007, and postponement of January 22 general elections in Bangladesh.
Renata, however, reportedly claimed later that there was no interference from the international community.
Source: New Age
