Myanmar and Bangladesh: Rohingya

Baroness Cox Excerpts

Tuesday 11th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Cox (CB)]

My Lords, while strongly endorsing every concern regarding the plight of the Rohingya people, may I ask the Minister whether she is aware that the Shan and Kachin peoples are often suffering from military offences by the Burmese army, including rape, torture, extrajudicial killings and expropriation of land, with hundreds of thousands driven from their homes into camps across the border in Thailand? I have been there and seen their suffering. Would the Minister therefore include the less publicised plight of those people, together with the Rohingya, in any representations to the Burmese Government from the international community?

[Baroness Goldie]

Again, I thank the noble Baroness for a very pertinent question. The British Government remain concerned over continued human rights abuses in Burma’s ethnic border areas, where hostilities are still taking place. We have repeatedly called on the military to end hostilities comprehensively, and called on all sides to enter into dialogue towards a sustainable and comprehensive nationwide ceasefire and political reconciliation process. Those points are made repeatedly through diplomatic conduits; the Foreign Secretary made those points in January this year, and the then Minister for Asia and the Pacific, Mr Alok Sharma, made the same points to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on 27 February. We continue to take an interest in, and endeavour to represent, concerns about the detained Kachin pastors and the three Shan journalists.