OIC Keen to Send Mission to Myanmar on Rohingya Muslims

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (NNN-Bernama) -- The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will ask the Myanmar Government to allow an OIC fact-finding mission to be sent to Myanmar, said OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu.

He made the remarks in an OIC statement at the conclusion of the Executive Committee meeting to discuss the Muslim Rohingya issue at the Permanent Representative level at the OIC headquarters in Jeddah over the weekend.

Ihsanoglu has expressed disappointment over the failure of the international community to stop the tyranny and discrimination by the Myanmar Government against the Rohingya Muslims in Arakan, formerly known as Rakhine state.

He suggested looking into the possibility of considering the formation of an Islamic fact-finding committee to seek the best solution to the issue among all parties, including the Myanmar Government, as well as international and regional organisations.

The secretary-general said the indifference of the international community to the rights of the Rohingya people, and fragmentation of the 25 Rohingya organisations, had motivated the largest Muslim organisation to make efforts to unite the organisations at the OIC headquarters in May last year.

“OIC has directed its offices at the United Nations in New York to work in coordination with the Member States that are also non-permanent members in the UN Security Council, namely, Azerbaijan, Morocco, Pakistan and Togo, to urge the

Council to look into the suffering of the Rohingya Muslims,” he added.

He also urged the OIC Permanent and Independent Human Rights Commission to study the crisis of Myanmar Muslims and its human rights implications during its next session in Turkey at the end of this month.

Meanwhile, Ihsanoglu hoped that Bangladesh could review its position on the Rohingya Muslims, although he understood Bangladesh's position and the sensitivity of the issue.

Violence, which erupted in June, this year, in the Rakhine state between Buddhists and Rohingya, left about 80 people dead on both sides, official figures showed.

Reports said the Myanmar Government’s restrictions on humanitarian access to the Rohingya community had left many of the over 100,000 people displaced and in dire need of food, shelter, and medical care. --- NNN-BERNAMA