{"id":103393,"date":"2017-12-18T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2017-12-18T12:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=103393"},"modified":"2017-12-12T15:09:51","modified_gmt":"2017-12-12T15:09:51","slug":"the-rohingya-crisis-shames-the-global-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2017\/12\/the-rohingya-crisis-shames-the-global-community\/","title":{"rendered":"The Rohingya Crisis Shames the Global Community"},"content":{"rendered":"

11 Dec 2017 – <\/em>The international response to the Rohingya crisis has been high on emotion, but depressingly low on action. As the Myanmar military began its latest \u201cclearance operations<\/a>\u201d against the long-oppressed<\/a>\u00a0 Muslim minority in Myanmar\u2019s Rakhine state in August \u2013 pillaging villages, burning crops, and shooting civilians on sight \u2013 global media responded in admirable fashion. Within days, witness accounts and heart-wrenching photographs were relayed around the world.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

People take part in a rally in support of Myanmar’s stateless Rohingya minority in the Chechen capital of Grozny, Russia,on September 4, 2017. PHOTO: Reuters<\/p><\/div>\n

But any hope that elevating the Rohingya\u2019s plight into the public consciousness would lead to decisive action soon faded. By early September, as the death toll and the number of displaced persons rose, it became clear that the only reaction the international community could muster was condemnation \u2013 yet again, a damning indictment of our global institutional architecture.<\/p>\n

Politicians quite rightly criticized the Myanmar military, known as the Tatmadaw. But that only precipitated a rush to express concern, and register anger. The media were far more interested in the Hollywood-esque story that human-rights icon Aung San Suu Kyi \u2013 who failed to act \u2013 had fallen from grace<\/a>. And while attention was focused on waiting for Myanmar\u2019s de facto leader to do something<\/a>, policy prescriptions and in-depth insights on ending, or managing, the crisis were relegated to non-governmental organizations\u2019 blogs, as politicians and diplomats bumbled on.<\/p>\n

Indeed, public discourse is often a barometer for what\u2019s happening at the policy level. And the necessary early push toward solutions was hijacked by the world\u2019s collective outrage. Much energy was directed toward whether Suu Kyi should have her Nobel Peace Prize revoked<\/a>, asking why she wasn\u2019t acting, or pussyfooting over whether the Tatmadaw\u2019s actions constituted genocide or ethnic cleansing.<\/p>\n

Platitudes, anger, and pontification wasted valuable time. It took until September 19 \u2013 four weeks after the atrocities began \u2013 for the UK Ministry of Defense simply to\u00a0announce<\/a> it would stop training and supporting the Tatmadaw. And it was not until 500,000 Rohingya had fled for Bangladesh that the United Nations Security Council held its first public meeting<\/a> on the situation. It was only at the end of September when the world began to realize that Suu Kyi, willingly or unwillingly, had her hands tied.<\/p>\n

While humanitarian support for the displaced Rohingya in Bangladesh grew, Rakhine remained on lockdown. And any action that did take place was bilateral.<\/p>\n

A weak understanding of the nation\u2019s politics meant considerable time was wasted on waiting for Suu Kyi to act. Sanctions may now only bring the largely anti-Muslim population of Myanmar and the military closely together<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In mid-October, the European Union Council of Foreign Ministers annulled ties and incorporated travel bans for the Myanmar military, as did the United States. Both also began reviewing the possibility of further formal sanctions. Meanwhile the Pope\u2019s late-November visit<\/a> to Myanmar to denounce the violence must have hit home to the Rohingya just how helpless the West had become.<\/p>\n

Of course, solutions to the conflict are not simple, or easy to coordinate. But a weak understanding of the nation\u2019s politics meant considerable time was wasted on waiting for Suu Kyi to act<\/a>. Sanctions may now only bring the largely anti-Muslim population of Myanmar and the military closely together. And with their veto power on the UN Security Council, China, Myanmar\u2019s ally, and Russia have limited the most powerful multilateral institution to words of condemnation. Another world power, India, has meanwhile tacitly supported\u00a0the Myanmar military\u2019s actions<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As such, it has now become \u201cone of the fastest refugee exoduses in modern times and has created the largest refugee camp in the world,\u201d\u00a0according to<\/a>\u00a0the International Crisis Group.\u00a0In reality, boots on the ground to defend the Rohingya are the only things that would have assuaged the military onslaught. And subsequently, support for empowering the government to enact the recommendations of the Kofi Annan-led Advisory Commission on Rakhine State<\/a>\u00a0would be a constructive course. That won\u2019t be easy \u2013 but it is better than defeatism and helplessness.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the crisis underscores how the international community, after decades of experience, still does not have the resources, coordination, and intelligence to act \u2013 partly because\u00a0the UN lacks rapidly decisive, independent, and well-equipped<\/a> institutional teeth. And as such, emotion and national politics \u2013 and crucially, not concerted reason\u00a0<\/a>\u2013tend to define policy in times of conflict.<\/p>\n

We may say \u201cnever again.\u201d But without reform and rethinking how we react, we\u2019re only doomed to keep repeating the same cycle: condemnation, anger, calls for action, insufficient action, and, then, shame.<\/p>\n

_________________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Tej Parikh is a global policy analyst and journalist. He received his master’s degree from Yale University with a focus on state building, political economy, and conflict. He runs<\/em> The Global Prism a centrist international affairs platform.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 atimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

11 Dec 2017 – The international response to the Rohingya crisis has been high on emotion but depressingly low on action regarding the Myanmar military latest \u201cclearance operations\u201d against the Muslim minority \u2013 pillaging villages, burning crops, and shooting civilians on sight. Without reform and rethinking how we react, we\u2019re only doomed to keep repeating the same cycle: condemnation, anger, calls for action, insufficient action, and, then, shame.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":103394,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia-pacific"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}