International Community Urges Myanmar To End Discrimination Against Rohingya People

Bandung, W.Java, June 3 (Antara) - The international community continues to urge the Myanmar government to not implement its policy of discriminating against the Rohingya ethnic community, Indonesia's Vice President Jusuf Kalla stated. "International pressure continues to be applied," Kalla noted here on Wednesday. According to the vice president, during the last international meeting on this issue, appeals were made to the government of Myanmar to understand the problems and to take action to solve the Rohingya problem, but it takes time. Earlier, AFP news agency reported that President Barack Obama had urged Myanmar to stop discrimination against the ethnic minority of Rohingya if the country wants to succeed in making a governmental transition after the people were ruled by the military government for decades. About 1.3 million Rohingya Muslims reside in the western part of Myanmar. The government does not grant citizenship to most of them. The Rohingya ethnic community has drawn significant attention from the international community. Approximately 3.5 thousand Rohingya refugees arrived in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia, while thousands of others are still adrift at sea. Reuters news agency released the news broadcasted by Myanmar on May 29 regarding the latest data of the first national census since the last three decades that excluded the existence of the Rohingya Muslim minority in the country. In addition, the latest census of Myanmar also does not reveal information about the composition of ethnicity and religion of the 51.5 million people. Myanmar's census data confirms that the country does not recognize the 1.1 million Rohingya people as its official citizens. The group is compelled to survive in conditions similar to the apartheid regime in South Africa. The Myanmar government refuses to grant citizenship to most of the 1.3 million Rohingyas and does not accept them as one of its official ethnic minorities. Myanmar refers to them as Bengalis that means the migrants from neighboring Bangladesh. The Myanmar government rejects any form of internationalization of the Muslim minority status issue since the mass clashes between the Rohingya and majority Buddhists broke out in Rakhine province in 2012.