Burmese Military Says US Rohingya Genocide Declaration ‘Politically Motivated’

Burma's military ruler Min Aung Hlaing presides over an army parade on Armed Forces Day in Naypyitaw, Burma, on March 27, 2021. Stringer/Reuters

Burma’s military junta said Tuesday that it “vehemently rejects” the United States’ declaration that the military committed genocide against the Rohingya minority, claiming that the declaration was “politically motivated.”

The Ministry of Information said in a statement that the Min Aung Hlaing-led military harbored no genocidal intent to destroy any minority groups and denied that genocide had even occurred in Burma, also known as Myanmar.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s declaration that the military junta committed genocide against the Rohingya was based on “false allegations” and amounted to political interference with the internal affairs of a sovereign state, the ministry added.

Blinken declared Monday that the Burmese military committed genocide against the Rohingya in a “widespread and systematic” manner, saying there was clear evidence of intent to destroy the minority group in whole or in part.

Ten Rohingya Muslim men with their hands bound kneel as members of the Myanmar security forces stand guard in Inn Din village Sept. 2, 2017. Handout via Reuters

The Rohingya have been denied citizenship in the country since a Burmese citizenship law was enacted in 1982. The United Nations said that more than 700,000 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh due to a military clampdown in 2017.

Citing a 2018 State Department report that surveyed more than 1,000 Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh, Blinken said that the findings demonstrate that the Burmese military’s violence against the Rohingya “were not isolated cases.”

Three-quarters of those surveyed claimed to have witnessed the military kill someone and more than half witnessed acts of sexual violence. One in five witnessed a mass-casualty event, killing or injuring more than 100 people in a single incident.

The National Unity Government (NUG), which considers itself as the legitimate civilian-led government of Burma, welcomed the U.S. determination.

NUG’s acting president Duwa Lashi La said the group acknowledges that “discriminatory practices and rhetoric against the Rohingya also laid the ground for the atrocities” in Burma.

“The impunity enjoyed by the military’s leadership has since enabled their direction of countrywide crimes at the helm of an illegal military junta. Those crimes against the Myanmar people continue until today by the military,” Duwa said in a statement.

John Sifton, Human Rights Watch’s Asia advocacy director, also backed the United States’ declaration but said that its condemnation against the Burmese military regime should come with action.

“For too long, the U.S. and other countries have allowed Myanmar’s generals to commit atrocities with few real consequences,” Sifton said in a statement.

The same military junta ousted an elected civilian government led by Aung San Suu Kyi in February last year, sparking widespread anti-coup protests in Burma. At least 1,600 people have been killed and more than 12,500 people detained since the military seized power, according to the United Nations.

The U.N. on March 15 urged the international community to take “immediate measures” to stop the Burmese military junta’s systematic human rights violations, which it said amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.