Human Rights Watch wants alleged Myanmar abuses investigated
YANGON, Myanmar — A human rights group urged Myanmar’s government on Monday to back an independent international investigation into alleged abuses by security forces against members of the Muslim Rohingya ethnic minority, including the reported systematic use of sexual violence.
U.S.-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement that soldiers and Border Guard Police took part in rape, gang rape, invasive body searches and sexual assaults while conducting counter-insurgency operations in the western state of Rakhine from October through mid-December.
The estimated 1 million Rohingya face official and social discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, also known as Burma. Most do not have citizenship and are regarded as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, even when their families have lived in Myanmar for generations. Communal violence in 2012 forced many to flee their homes, and more than 100,000 still live in squalid refugee camps.
“The sexual violence did not appear to be random or opportunistic, but part of a co-ordinated and systematic attack against Rohingya, in part because of their ethnicity and religion,” Human Rights Watch said.