Tillerson condemns violence against Rohingya Muslims by Myanmar army
Over 389,000 Rohingya Muslims fled Myanmar for Bangladesh to escape ethnic unrest
DHAKA (AFP) - International pressure on Myanmar soared Thursday as US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called the violence against Rohingya Muslims "unacceptable," after the UN chief said the country s military campaign amounted to ethnic cleansing.
The increasingly harsh global condemnation comes as the number of Rohingya who have fled Myanmar for Bangladesh to escape ethnic unrest hit 389,000 Thursday, while the United Nations warned of a looming "worst case scenario" with all of the Muslim minority group trying to leave.
The number of refugees was up 10,000 in just 24 hours, as the three-week old crisis deepens.
"We need to support Aung San Suu Kyi and her leadership but also be very clear and unequivocal to the military power sharing in that government that this is unacceptable," Rex Tillerson said of Myanmar s first civilian leader in decades.
"This violence must stop. This persecution must stop. It has been characterised by many as ethnic cleansing. That must stop," he said during a visit to London, speaking alongside British counterpart Boris Johnson.
Johnson also called on Myanmar s de facto leader to use her "moral capital" to highlight the plight of the Rohingyas.
Suu Kyi, a Nobel laureate and long-time human rights champion, has been condemned for a lack of moral leadership and compassion in resolving the crisis.
She has no control over the powerful military, which ran the country for 50 years.
Relief workers are struggling to contain a humanitarian disaster unfolding around the Bangladesh border town of Cox s Bazar with 10,000-20,000 people crossing over each day -- far more than the UN and other agencies had expected.
Now, refugees are even being targeted by profiteering boat operators who have hiked prices 200 times to cross the river separating Myanmar and Bangladesh.
"We have to estimate the worst case scenario" where all Rohingya flee Rakhine, said Mohammed Abdiker Mohamud, a director of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN s migration agency.
"We cannot just put our heads in sand (and) say that everything will be OK," he added.
"Unless a political solution is found there is a possibility that the entire Rohingya community may come to Bangladesh."
- Immediate steps -
There were previously an estimated 1.1 million Rohingya in Rakhine state, who have endured decades of persecution in Buddhist-dominated Myanmar.
At least 300,000 had fled to Bangladesh before the latest crackdown started on August 25, following attacks by Rohingya militants on police targets.
The exodus since has taken the overall figure of those who have quit Myanmar to at least 700,000.
The UN Security Council has called for "immediate steps" by Myanmar to end the violence.
At a press conference in New York, UN chief Antonio Guterres on Wednesday urged a halt to the military campaign in Rakhine and said the mass displacement of Rohingya amounted to ethnic cleansing.
"I call on the Myanmar authorities to suspend military action, end the violence, uphold the rule of law and recognize the right of return of all those who had to leave the country," the secretary-general told a press conference.
Asked if he agreed the Rohingya population was being ethnically cleansed, he replied: "When one third of the Rohingya population has got to flee the country, can you find a better word to describe it?"
Myanmar denies targeting Rohingya, instead insisting Rohingya militants have set fire to villages in Rakhine state.
But tens of thousands continue to pour over the border to Bangladesh, some with harrowing tales of soldiers firing on civilians before razing entire communities -- often with the help of ethnic Rakhine Buddhist mobs.
Even before arriving to safety in Bangladesh, refugees who have trekked through jungles for days to reach the border have been faced with hugely inflated prices for a seat on a boat crossing the Naf river that divides the two countries.
An AFP correspondent at the river said boat owners were charging refugees up to $100 for a 10-30 minute trip that would normally cost less than 50 cents.
"The boatmen threatened to throw us into the sea if we refused to give them our valuables," said Nadera Banu, 19, who got married only last year but is already a widow.
"I gave up the final memento of my husband, a gold locket given on my wedding day, to escape."
Bangladeshi magistrates operating mobile courts in Cox s Bazar and nearby districts have now started sentencing boat owners and local villagers to terms of up to six months in prison, officials said Thursday.
Once in Bangladesh, refugees -- with UNICEF saying 60 percent of new arrivals are children -- are faced with desperate conditions in already overstretched camps around Cox s Bazar. UN agencies have warned the country is struggling to cope.
"There are acute shortages of everything, most critically shelter, food and clean water," UNICEF s representative in Bangladesh Edouard Beigbeder said in a statement.
"Conditions on the ground place children at risk of high risk of water-borne disease. We have a monumental task ahead of us to protect these extremely vulnerable children."
