Salem-News.com Burma articles Page 9

Myanmar Peace Talks Fail to Nail Down Cease-Fire Agreement: RFA

The government had aimed to hammer out details of the cease-fire at a meeting this week.

(RANGOON RFA) - Myanmar’s government and armed ethnic rebel groups failed to hammer out details of a nationwide cease-fire accord at the end of landmark peace talks Tuesday, putting off further discussions until next month.

The government delegation and representatives from more than a dozen rebel groups will hold their next meeting in southern Myanmar’s Kayin (Karen) state capital Hpa-An in December, the two sides said in a joint statement after a two-day meeting in Myitkyina, the capital city of Kachin state.

Our Walls Bear Witness: The Plight of Burma`s Rohingya

US Holocaust Memorial Museum honors Burma's Rohingya Muslims; victims of ongoing Genocide.

(WASHINGTON, DC) - Denied citizenship and rendered stateless by the Burmese government, the 800,000 Rohingya lack basic rights, including the right to work, marry, and travel freely, and they routinely suffer severe abuse.

Following violent attacks in 2012 that destroyed numerous Rohingya communities, more than 100,000 are now confined to displacement camps and segregated areas, where they continue to be subjected to violence, including crimes against humanity.

Boat Carrying 70 Muslim Rohingya Sinks Off Myanmar

A boat carrying 70 Rohingya Muslim refugees capsized Sunday off Myanmar's coast.

(SITTWE World Bulletin) - A boat carrying almost 70 Rohingya Muslim refugees fleeing sectarian tensions capsized Sunday off Myanmar's coast, police said, leaving dozens missing in treacherous seas.

The boat was believed to be taking the Rohingya from Myanmar's western state of Rakhine to Malaysia, where thousands of members of the Muslim minority have sought sanctuary since violent clashes with Buddhists erupted last year.

Rohingya Belong to Burma

"Muslims of Arakan certainly belong to one of the indigenous races of Burma....In fact, there is no pure indigenous race in Burma, if they do not belong to indigenous races of Burma, we also cannot be taken as indigenous races of Burma" - Sao Shwe Thaike, the first elected President of the Union of Burma.

(DHAKA) - Like other indigenous races of Burma, the Muslims of North Arakan inhabit a sufficient contiguous territory in sufficient numbers in a defined geographical area having all necessary characteristics of an indigenous race which can never be denied by any right thinking person uninfluenced by feelings of racial and religious hatred.

That different races have different names, but the Muslims specially the orthodox type throughout the world to what ever nationality they may belong keep, on their birth, the Islamic names in Arabic language.

BURMA: Military MP Says Army Chief Could Become Candidate for President

The 60-year-old Ming Aung Hlaing took over as commander of Burma’s Armed Forces after long-time military junta leader Than Shwe retired in June 2010.

(RANGOON) - The leader of Burma’s military lawmakers has said the group wants to nominate current Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing for president following the 2015 elections. The plan is possible because the country’s president is elected by Parliament, where military officers hold a quarter of the seats.

Brig-Gen Wai Lin, an officer with the Southern Command and a Lower House MP who leads the military lawmakers, told The Irrawaddy that he expects Sen-Gen Ming Aung Hlaing to be a leading candidate for the presidency.

UN Envoy Condemns Myanmar Violence on Muslims

A United Nations envoy in Myanmar has condemned the violence taking place against Muslims in Myanmar, saying that it threatens reforms in the country

(RANGOON ) - Violence against a Muslim minority in Myanmar is feeding a wider anti-Muslim feeling that poses a serious threat to the country's dramatic economic and political reforms as it emerges from half a century of military rule, a U.N. envoy said on Thursday.

The government says at least 192 people were killed in June and October 2012 clashes between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims, most of whom Myanmar deem illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, despite roots going back generations.

Myanmar Urged to Ratify Chemical Weapons Treaty

The signing came ten months after Thein Sein pledged to abide by the U.N.’s arms embargo on North Korea and to allow the IAEA full access to Myanmar weapons sites.

(HONG KONG) - The Nobel Peace Prize awarded to a global chemical weapons watchdog on Friday has prompted a call for Myanmar to ratify a key international treaty banning the arms.

New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Myanmar must ratify the Chemical Weapons Convention two decades after signing if it wants to prove to the international community it is serious about reforms.

URGENT MEMORANDUM: Save Human Lives, Stop Genocide Towards Minority Rohingya in Myanmar

The International Communities must open their eyes. This is GENOCIDE against minority Muslims in Myanmar. This is the biggest crime against humanity.

(YANGON) - Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organization Malaysia (MERHROM) would like to draw your attention in regards to the recent attack on minority Rohingya Muslim in Thandwe, Arakan State of Myanmar which started on 29 September 2013.

MERHROM strongly condemned the Myanmar government on the continuous attack on Muslims in Myanmar which took place over 60 years without the world knowing what we went through inside Arakan State. The continuous attack on Rohingya clearly proves the plan of the Myanmar government to eliminate minority Muslims across Myanmar.

Myanmar Religious Leaders Urge Harmony After Anti-Muslim Clashes

Muslim residents told the Associated Press that during the clashes—in which a 94-year-old woman was stabbed to death—local police had failed to protect them a mob of hundreds of Buddhists armed with knives and sticks who went on a rampage in Pauktaw and Thabyuchine villages.

(YANGON RFA) - Religious leaders in a western Myanmar town reeling from deadly anti-Muslim clashes urged calm on Monday after fresh violence broke out in the country’s central Irrawaddy Delta region.

On Sunday night a mob of Buddhist residents destroyed five Muslim houses in the region’s Kyaunggon township, some 70 miles (100 kilometers) outside the former capital Yangon.

U.S. Urges Myanmar to Thoroughly Investigate Thandwe Violence

The press release also urges the Union government and local authorities "to do more to ensure progress in security, rule of law, justice, humanitarian access, and reconciliation in Rakhine State to stem the sources of on-going tension, and create conditions for sustainable peace and development in the State".

(THANDWE, Myanmar) - The U.S. Embassy in Myanmar on Wednesday issued a press release condemning violence in Thandwe, Rakhine State, urging Myanmar authorities to respond quickly and decisively to the violence and protect all the residents and their properties.

A Director of a Myanmar government office who does not want to disclose the identity told Mizzima that “handlings [of the violence] differ according to areas.