bdnews24.com :
The New Yorker magazine has called Aung San Suu Kyi “the ignoble laurate” after the Nobel Peace Prize winner remained silent and unmoved by a crisis described by the UN as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”
The famed American publication also said that Suu Kyi’s champions were now ‘contemplating her fall from grace, and appalled’ that she kept mum over the atrocities carried out by the security forces on Rohingyas in Rakhine state.
“There have been widespread calls for the Nobel Committee to strip her of the prize. But there is no statutory procedure for doing so, nor is it clear how this would end the murder, rape, and mass exodus of the Rohingya at the hands of Myanmar’s Army,” the magazine added.
It said, the most urgent and powerful appeals to Aung San Suu Kyi came from her fellow Nobel laureates. The Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai, who won the prize for her advocacy of girls’ education, condemned the “tragic and shameful treatment” of the Rohingya.
“I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same.”
Addressing a letter to his “dear sister,” the anti-apartheid activist Desmond Tutu wrote of his “profound sadness” and called on Aung San Suu Kyi to end the military-led operations.
“If the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep,” he wrote.
The Dalai Lama subsequently urged her
to find a peaceful solution to the humanitarian crisis, saying that Buddha would have “definitely helped those poor Muslims.”
This is not the first time that laureates have spoken of their displeasure with Aung San Suu Kyi, the New Yorker said adding “in December last year, when the military conducted another brutal offensive against the Rohingya, thirteen Nobel winners, including Muhammad Yunus, Shirin Ebadi, and Leymah Gbowee, signed an open letter deploring the Army’s use of helicopter gunships, arbitrary arrests, and the rape of women.”
“Despite repeated appeals to Aung San Suu Kyi,” they concluded, using her honorific, “we are frustrated that she has not taken any initiative to ensure full and equal citizenship rights of the Rohingyas. Suu Kyi is the leader and is the one with the primary responsibility to lead, and lead with courage, humanity and compassion.”
Delving into her past, the New Yorker mentioned a short essay she wrote titled ‘Let’s Visit Burma’ in which Suu Kyi described the “colourful and diverse origins and customs” of her compatriots. Rakhine state, in the west of Myanmar, was something of a “mystery” in this respect, she wrote. Its population had originated from “Mongolian and Aryan peoples who had come over from India.” Owing to its geographical position, Bengal had also “played a major part” in its history and culture. Among the state’s numerous ethnic groups -Arakanese, Thek, Dainet, Myo, Mramagyi, and Kaman-others displayed “the influence of Bengali.”
The New Yorker magazine has called Aung San Suu Kyi “the ignoble laurate” after the Nobel Peace Prize winner remained silent and unmoved by a crisis described by the UN as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”
The famed American publication also said that Suu Kyi’s champions were now ‘contemplating her fall from grace, and appalled’ that she kept mum over the atrocities carried out by the security forces on Rohingyas in Rakhine state.
“There have been widespread calls for the Nobel Committee to strip her of the prize. But there is no statutory procedure for doing so, nor is it clear how this would end the murder, rape, and mass exodus of the Rohingya at the hands of Myanmar’s Army,” the magazine added.
It said, the most urgent and powerful appeals to Aung San Suu Kyi came from her fellow Nobel laureates. The Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai, who won the prize for her advocacy of girls’ education, condemned the “tragic and shameful treatment” of the Rohingya.
“I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same.”
Addressing a letter to his “dear sister,” the anti-apartheid activist Desmond Tutu wrote of his “profound sadness” and called on Aung San Suu Kyi to end the military-led operations.
“If the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep,” he wrote.
The Dalai Lama subsequently urged her
to find a peaceful solution to the humanitarian crisis, saying that Buddha would have “definitely helped those poor Muslims.”
This is not the first time that laureates have spoken of their displeasure with Aung San Suu Kyi, the New Yorker said adding “in December last year, when the military conducted another brutal offensive against the Rohingya, thirteen Nobel winners, including Muhammad Yunus, Shirin Ebadi, and Leymah Gbowee, signed an open letter deploring the Army’s use of helicopter gunships, arbitrary arrests, and the rape of women.”
“Despite repeated appeals to Aung San Suu Kyi,” they concluded, using her honorific, “we are frustrated that she has not taken any initiative to ensure full and equal citizenship rights of the Rohingyas. Suu Kyi is the leader and is the one with the primary responsibility to lead, and lead with courage, humanity and compassion.”
Delving into her past, the New Yorker mentioned a short essay she wrote titled ‘Let’s Visit Burma’ in which Suu Kyi described the “colourful and diverse origins and customs” of her compatriots. Rakhine state, in the west of Myanmar, was something of a “mystery” in this respect, she wrote. Its population had originated from “Mongolian and Aryan peoples who had come over from India.” Owing to its geographical position, Bengal had also “played a major part” in its history and culture. Among the state’s numerous ethnic groups -Arakanese, Thek, Dainet, Myo, Mramagyi, and Kaman-others displayed “the influence of Bengali.”
