A stone’s throw from Budapest’s majestic Gothic revival parliament building, Freedom Square teems with monuments attesting to Hungary’s turbulent 20th century. Dominating the north side of the plaza is a giant obelisk constructed by the Soviet Union and dedicated to the city’s Red Army liberators. A few paces south one finds a statue of Imre Nagy, the executed hero of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet revolt, standing on a bridge looking forlornly on parliament. At the southern end of the square, outside a Calvinist church, stares a bust of Admiral Miklós Horthy, the authoritarian regent under whose reign Hungary passed the first anti-Semitic law of 20th-century Europe in 1920, allied with the Axis powers, and deported some half-million Jews to Auschwitz in the largest and swiftest mass transfer of the Final Solution. In the middle of it all, a bronzed Ronald Reagan walks briskly toward the nearby U.S. embassy. With its abundant memorials, this one plaza commemorates the grand sweep of Europe’s most influential 20th-century ideologies: communism, nationalism, fascism, and democracy. On the Sunday morning of July 20, 2014, police cordoned off Freedom Square while construction workers put the finishing touches on an addition to this urban tableau already brimming with historical tributes: the Memorial to the Victims of the German Occupation. From the moment its construction was announced, following an opaque artistic competition lacking public consultation, it had been the subject of heated dispute. Beginning with its very title, which labels the unimpeded movement of German soldiers onto friendly territory an “occupation,” the memorial absolves Hungarians of complicity in the Holocaust. Depicting the Archangel Gabriel (described in the plans as “the man of God, symbol of Hungary”) under attack from a sharp-clawed German imperial eagle, it portrays the Hungarian nation as a collective victim of Nazi predation. This distortion of history obscures both the specifically anti-Jewish nature of the Holocaust and the Hungarian state’s active collaboration in mass murder. Randolph Braham, professor emeritus at the City University of New York and himself a Hungarian Holocaust survivor, writes about the role played by Hungarian authorities in the crime: “With Horthy still at the helm and providing the symbol of national sovereignty, the approximately 200,000 Hungarian policemen, gendarmes, civil servants, and ‘patriotic’ volunteers had collaborated in the anti-Jewish drive with a routine and efficiency that impressed even the relatively few SS who had served as ‘advisers.’ ” So able and willing were the Nazis’ Hungarian accomplices that Adolf Eichmann, the SS official in charge of deporting the country’s Jews to the death camps, managed to oversee the gruesome task with just 200 Germans at his command. Had the nationalist government of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán not spent the previous four years conducting a campaign of historical distortion regarding the country’s Holocaust history, one might be more charitable about its motives for constructing this monument. Through a set of government-sponsored historical institutes, publicly funded documentaries, revisions to school curricula, bestowal of state honors to extreme right-wing figures, and erections of public monuments and museum exhibitions, the Orbán administration has disseminated a narrative that minimizes Hungarian culpability in the extermination of some half-million Jews and rehabilitates Horthy’s reputation from that of opportunistic Nazi ally to selfless defender of national independence. Opposition to this revisionist crusade reached a critical phase in January 2014, around the same time that plans for the occupation memorial were unveiled. After the director of a government-subsidized historical center phlegmatically referred to the 1941 deportations of Jews living under Hungarian authority as a “police action against aliens,” outraged leaders of the Hungarian Jewish community announced they would cease cooperation with the government on activities marking the 70th-anniversary Holocaust Remembrance Year. Orbán decided to postpone work on the monument until after national elections in April, at which point consultations on its design would resume. But just two days after his party, Fidesz, secured a landslide victory, Orbán reneged on his promise and workers returned to the construction site, which by then had to be patrolled by police to keep protesters at bay. In an open letter to Orbán, 30 members of the U.S. Congress stated that while “Hungary is an important ally and partner of the United States,” it should “build an appropriate memorial that tells the entire Hungarian story of the Nazi Occupation, not one that whitewashes the truth.” Orbán was unmoved. The Hungarian government completed its controversial memorial in the dead of night, slipping the bronze angel and eagle into the square disguised in metal foil. Budapest’s Memorial to the Victims of the German Occupation is distinguished not only by its revisionist message but also its vulgar design. Holocaust memorials tend to be solemn and subtly allegorical. Around the corner from the iconic Brandenburg Gate, Berlin’s more accurately named Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe—2,711 black concrete stelae arranged in a mazelike pattern on a sloping plaza—immediately unsettles visitors with its figurative representation of the Holocaust’s unfathomable depth. Elsewhere in Budapest, “Shoes on the Danube Bank” displays 60 pairs of iron footwear fastened to the river’s stone embankment, marking the last standing place of Jews who, every day during the 1944-1945 winter, were ordered to take off their shoes before being shot by Arrow Cross militiamen, the Nazis’ Hungarian accomplices. When a noted Hungarian art historian wrote a letter to Orbán questioning the occupation memorial’s meaning and artistic merit, the prime minister replied, “Didactic historical works of art, which were the norm in my youth, have more of a depressive impression on me.” This was a strange defense of the memorial, for it is nothing if not didactic. Indeed, it’s striking how a monument built by a government that claims for itself the exclusive legacy of Hungarian anticommunist resistance so much resembles a work of socialist realism. By obscuring Jewish victimhood entirely and ascribing total innocence to Hungarians and total evil to Germans, the memorial is as factually deceptive and politically exploitative as any Stalinist icon. Just as communists downplayed or ignored the anti-Semitic intent of the Holocaust in order to claim the Nazis’ victims as martyrs to the cause of “antifascism,” the Hungarian right asserts that all Hungarians were equal victims of a foreign-imposed tyranny. Characterizing opposition to the memorial as deriving from “the pub counter of cheap political pushing and shoving that is practically unavoidable these days,” Orbán implied that complaints about historical truth are in actuality fig leaves for domestic political opponents intent on delegitimizing his government abroad. After lecturing his correspondent that the “invaders” of Hungary were not “Nazis” but “Germans,” whose collective and eternal guilt the memorial appears to endorse through its symbolic use of the eagle that today appears on the German federal government escutcheon, Orbán avoided drawing a similar conclusion about Hungarian blameworthiness, stating that “it can hardly be disputed that Germany bears responsibility for what happened in Hungary after March 19, 1944. … We cannot bear a responsibility that is not ours to bear.” If such a highly subjective claim as one insisting that Germany bears all responsibility for the Hungarian Holocaust can “hardly be disputed” in Hungary, it’s only because the government has consecrated it in law. One of the first things Fidesz did after winning a parliamentary supermajority in 2010 was to rewrite the constitution. Today, the Preamble of the Fundamental Law of Hungary states: We date the restoration of our country’s self-determination, lost on the 19th day of March 1944, from the second day of May 1990, when the first freely elected organ of popular representation was formed. We shall consider this date to be the beginning of our country’s new democracy and constitutional order. By affirming that Hungary lost its “self-determination” the day German soldiers entered Budapest, the constitution pardons Hungarians and Hungarian institutions for what transpired over the proceeding 45 years. According to Hungarian historian Eva Balogh, Germany’s “occupation” of Hungary is better understood as “a troop movement within the territories of military allies” because Germany initially allowed Horthy to remain as head of state and left nearly all government functions in the control of Hungarian authorities. With no notable acts of official resistance and scarcely any German officers to oversee them, Hungarian police and gendarmerie rounded up hundreds of thousands of their fellow Jewish citizens and deported them to Auschwitz. Denying that the Hungarian state bears responsibility for this crime, Orbán admits only that individual officials—and not the Hungarian government—“collaborated,” a word choice implying that Hungary was an enemy, not an ally, of Nazi Germany. Orbán’s defense of the occupation memorial was also notable for studiously dodging the fact that the main victims of the Nazis in Hungary, as everywhere else in Europe, were Jews. “The victims,” he wrote, “whether Orthodox, Christian, or without faith, became the victims of a dictatorship that embodied an anti-Christian school of thought”—essentially claiming that Christians were as much victims of the Nazis as were Jews, a word his letter does not use even once. Memorializing amorphous “victims of the German occupation” in this style, Braham writes, is a way to “generalize the Holocaust by homogenizing the losses of Jewry with those incurred by the military forces and the civilian population during the war. The equation of the martyrdom of armed soldiers, who died as heroes in the service of their country, and of Christian civilians, who were killed in the wake of the hostilities, with that of the Jews, who were murdered irrespective of their age or sex, is clearly politically motivated.” Orbán concluded his missive with this considered opinion: “From a moral perspective and with regard to the historical content of its system of allegories, this work of art is accurate and flawless,” a curious way to describe a morally and aesthetically repulsive piece of propaganda. Immediately after the occupation memorial was finished—and presented to the public, unusually, without any public ceremony—a counter-display known as the “Living Memorial” sprang up just steps away along the opposite sidewalk. Flowers, candles, suitcases, and other personal items now cover the pavement in honor of Hungarian Holocaust victims. Black-and-white photographs of relatives lost at Auschwitz and laminated placards affixed to the metal bars of the guardrail alert passersby to the politicized abuse of history before them. It was here, in the summer of 2015, that the celebrated Hungarian conductor Adam Fischer led 1,000 people in singing the German and French national anthems, followed by those of Hungary and Slovakia—“coupling the anthems of peoples who for generations were pitted against each other as enemies, but today in the European Union live together in peace and cooperation.” When I visited Freedom Square one Friday evening about a month after Fischer’s recital, an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor sat directly opposite the memorial addressing a small group of people. A rotating crew of citizens stood watch over the Living Memorial to prevent its defacement by neo-Nazis. I asked that evening’s attendant, a man who appeared to be in his late 50s, a gentile, why he was spending a beautiful Budapest summer night in what seemed like lonely, futile protest. “History is more complicated than this falsifying, simplifying monument,” he answered. Second to Russia, no European country is manipulating its history for political purposes more egregiously than Hungary. In both places, rewriting the past is done with an eye to the future, as governments inculcate their citizenries with nationalism, irredentism, and intolerance and then marshal these attitudes in service of the state. The clashing historical narratives embodied by the dueling memorials of Freedom Square have engaged the wider public in a debate reaching far beyond the usual esoteric academic circles. As Hungary creeps further into authoritarianism, its revisionism has worrisome implications for Europe’s future. *** Why does it matter if a country consciously lies about its past? Inculcating in future generations a litany of myths about national innocence, perpetual victimhood, and lost honor grants license to irresponsible and dangerous behavior. Today’s fight over memory politics in Hungary echoes the mid-1980s German Historikerstreit, or historians’ controversy. That dispute centered on whether the crimes of Nazi Germany were singular evils or comparable to other mass atrocities, in particular, those of Stalinism. The intellectual combatants of the Historikerstreit brought no new facts to bear but only argued over how to interpret what was already widely known. In the words of the German essayist Peter Schneider, so heated was the argumentation, so deeply did it impinge on Germany’s understanding of itself, that the fusillade of polemics in the feuilletons attracted “a level of curiosity among the general public normally aroused by photos of the British royal family in swimsuits.” The opening salvo was an essay by the historian Ernst Nolte in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung titled “The Past That Will Not Pass: A Speech That Could Be Written but Not Delivered.” Citing the Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann’s entreaty to world Jewry that it support Britain in its war effort against Nazi Germany, Nolte argued that “Hitler had good reasons to be convinced of his enemies’ determination to annihilate him much earlier than when the first information about Auschwitz came to the knowledge of the world.” In light of this “reaction born out of the anxiety of the annihilating occurrences of the Russian revolution,” Nolte contended, Auschwitz should be viewed primarily as a preemptive defense against Soviet “Asiatic barbarism,” rather than the culmination of centuries of anti-Semitism. Furthermore, other than the “sole exception of the technical process of gassing,” there was nothing unique about the Nazi mass murder. “Was not the ‘Gulag Archipelago,’” he asked, “more original than Auschwitz? Was not the ‘class murder’ by the Bolsheviks logically and factually prior to the ‘racial murder’ of the National Socialists?” Far from being sui generis, Nolte argued, the Holocaust was best understood as a defensive reaction to Bolshevism. Nolte’s provocation intended to contextualize Nazism within the broad array of national crimes perpetrated throughout history. Nearly every major power, he argued, has gone through something like a “Hitler era.” Nolte’s error was to begin with a political goal (the assuagement of German guilt) and work backward from his conclusion. He hoped to restore national pride by popularizing a version of German history that sees nothing uniquely evil or exceptional about the Holocaust. Though he later insisted he wasn’t defending the Holocaust as a defensive response to Stalinist terror, he undermined his argument repeatedly with assertions such as his claim that Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union was a “preventive war.” After much back and forth, Nolte and his confrères were soundly refuted in the court of German public opinion. Among Germans today, it is a consensus view that the Holocaust was a singular event and that Germany has a duty to preserve the memory of the Holocaust and impart it to future generations. Germans have so thoroughly imbibed the awful lessons of their history that their country is one of the more immune in Europe to far-right populism. Hungary, by contrast, has undertaken no such reckoning. In the same way that Ernst Nolte wanted ordinary Germans to feel a straightforward patriotism, uncomplicated by guilt over the Nazi past, Viktor Orbán and Mária Schmidt wish to muddy the distinctions between victim and perpetrator in order to present a simplistic view of Hungarian history. Nolte’s complaint that preoccupation with the Holocaust served “the interests of the persecuted and their descendants in a permanent, privileged status” sounds indistinguishable from Schmidt’s allegation that the progeny of the victims of Hungarian fascism “would like to consider their ancestors’ tragic fate an inheritable and advantageous privilege.” It is inconceivable that a German chancellor today would express a desire to “preserve Germany for the Germans.” Yet this is precisely the sort of language, redolent of the 1930s, that Viktor Orbán uses today about Hungary. Convinced that Hungarians are perennial victims of global machinations—abetted by his “evil” domestic opponents—and unencumbered by comprehension of, or a sense of humility about, where heedless nationalism has taken his country in the past, Orbán feels emboldened to advance a chauvinist political agenda. High in the Buda hills, a collection of Soviet-era monuments stares down on the capital below. Memento Park, as it’s called, is an open-air museum of communism’s sculptural detritus. Opened to the public in 1993, it features a collection of towering busts, sculptures, and memorials that once graced the streets and squares of Budapest. A giant bronze re-creation of Stalin’s boots—the only remaining part of a statue cut down by protestors during the 1956 uprising—sit atop the grandstand where party apparatchiks reviewed May Day parades. Spread out across the park stand a variety of works crafted in the highly expressive styles of socialist realism: elongated profiles of Marx and Engels that resemble stone heads from Easter Island; bas-relief Stakhanovites reaching joyously into the air; two giant, muscular comrades holding hands and staring confidently (and not a little homoerotically) into each other’s eyes. Sterling specimens of brutalist political kitsch, these monuments are also painful reminders of the historical mendacity and punishing ideological conformity compelled by the communist dictatorship. One day, we may hope, the Memorial to the Victims of the German Occupation will be uprooted from Freedom Square and transported to Memento Park, where it belongs. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Tablet

Searching for the Truth. With the future of the Khmer Rouge Tribunal limited to a small number of high profile leaders, and a modern Cambodian population of which some 70% of the population was born after the worst of the Khmer Rouge genocide, Cambodia is facing a turning point. On the one hand, Cambodians run a real risk of losing a firm grip on understanding, memorializing and ultimately accepting a difficult past. On the other hand, a rapidly globalizing Cambodia must take on new challenges of sustainable growth, democratic integrity and human rights. Affiliations: The Cambodia Tribunal Monitor (CTM) www.cambodiatribunal.org The Sleuk Rith Institute (SRI) www.cambodiasri.org Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) www.zaha-hadid.com

Starting with Dr Helen Jarvis, formerly of the Khmer Rouge Tribubal, delivering the Closing Statement by the Panel of Jury on behalf of the Panel Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 2 SESSION 2 Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 2 SESSION 1 Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 1 SESSION 4 Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 1 SESSION 3 Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 1 SESSION 2 Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal Myanmar state crimes against Rohingya Day 1 SESSION 1 _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 the Peoples Tribunal on Myanmar

A year after the U.S. Congress and State Department declared that ISIS was committing genocide against Christians and other religious minorities, the Knights of Columbus is continuing its humanitarian support for persecuted Christian communities in the region by contributing nearly $2 million in new assistance. Knights of Columbus CEO Carl Anderson announced the organization's $1.9 million in new assistance, noting: "A year ago, our country declared with one voice that genocide was occurring to Christians and other religious minority communities, but words are not enough." He added: "Those targeted for genocide continue to need our assistance, especially since many have received no funding from the U.S. government or from the United Nations. The new administration should rectify the policies it found in place, and stop the de facto discrimination that is continuing to endanger these communities targeted by ISIS for genocide." The Knights of Columbus donation includes support for: Medical clinics in Iraq Easter food baskets for displaced Christians under the care of the Archdiocese of Erbil General relief for the Christians of Aleppo, Syria, via the city's Melkite Archdiocese Support for the Christian refugee relief programs of the Syriac Catholic patriarch The K of C has raised more than $12 million for Christian refugee relief since 2014. The Knights also spearheaded the campaign that led to last year's March 17 genocide declaration by the State Department. As part of the effort, the organization and its partners prepared a nearly 300-page report on the genocide being carried out against Christians by ISIS and other extremist groups. The State Department's declaration was only the second instance in which the U.S. government declared an ongoing situation to be genocide. Anderson has said 2017 may be "the decisive year in determining whether many Christian communities throughout the Middle East will continue to exist," and has called for aid from the U.S. government and the international community. He has also urged prayer for "those who are being persecuted and killed for their faith," and announced that the K of C will lead a Novena of Grace and Solidarity that will be prayed by the Knights and others for nine straight days from March 12 to 20. Donations to support Christian refugees can be made at www.christiansatrisk.org and donations are tax deductible to the extent allowed by law. Knights of Columbus Charities, Inc. is recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as a charitable organization under section 501(c)3 of the Internal Revenue Code, and 100 percent of all donations will be used to assist Christians and other religious minorities, primarily from Iraq and Syria. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 RP Newswire

Last year was a deadly one for transgender people in the US, with at least 27 known murders -- more than any other year, according to LGBT advocates. The worrisome trend appears to be continuing this year, which has already seen the murder of at least seven transgender Americans: Mesha Caldwell, 41, was the first recorded transgender victim of 2017. A hairstylist and makeup artist, she was found on Jan. 6 after having been shot several times in Canton, Mississippi. Jamie Lee Wounded Arrow, 28 was found murdered in her apartment in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on Jan. 6. At the time of her death, she had been studying nursing and social work. JoJo Striker, 23, an advocate for transgender women, was found dead in an empty garage in Toledo, Ohio, on Feb. 8. Jaquarrius Holland, 18, died from a gunshot wound to the head after a verbal altercation in Money, Louisiana, on Feb. 19. Chyna Doll Dupree, 31, died after being shot multiple times outside a shopping center in New Orleans on Feb. 25. A beloved drag performer, she had come from California to visit her family for Mardi Gras. Ciara McElven, 25, was stabbed to death in New Orleans on Feb. 27. Her friends remembered her as a fun-loving person. KeKe Collier, 24, also known as Tiara Richmond, was killed when a man she was riding in a car with began shooting. All of the victims were trans women of color, who are at particular risk of deadly violence. According to a report by Mic, at least 111 transgender and gender-nonconforming Americans were murdered because of their gender identity between 2010 and 2016, and almost three-quarters of them were Black trans women and gender-nonconforming femmes. Living in the South appears to be another risk factor for transgender women. According to data from the Human Rights Campaign, of the 53 known trans murder victims in the US between 2013 and 2015 alone, over a third were killed in the South -- more than any other region in the country. Of the seven trans murders that occurred this year, three took place in Louisiana, which has been a hotspot for transgender homicides for the past several years. Speaking about the murders of McElven and Dupree, which occurred within 48 hours of each other, New Orleans Police Cmdr. Doug Eckert said that if investigators discovered they were hate crimes they would pursue the charges. But that could be complicated by state law. Louisiana and the rest of the 13 Southern states do not include gender identity in their hate crime laws. Minnesota became the first state to do so in 1993. Since then, 16 other states have expanded their hate crime statutes to cover gender identity, but none are in the South. Louisiana did expand its hate crime statute last year but only added police officers. Hate crime laws in Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Tennessee and Texas include sexual orientation but not gender identity, while those in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, Mississippi, West Virginia and Virginia cover neither. Arkansas and South Carolina don't have any hate crime laws at all. Of the seven trans women murdered so far this year, Collier was the only one who lived in a state with a hate crime law that covers gender identity. Illinois updated its statute last year. Meanwhile, transgender rights advocates in some Southern states now find themselves fighting anti-trans legislation that unfairly link transgender people with predatory behavior and that many worry is fomenting transphobic violence. Last year the North Carolina legislature passed House Bill 2, which among other things requires transgender people to use public restrooms that conform to the gender on their birth certificate. The so-called "bathroom bill" has become the target of an ongoing economic boycott, and the legislature is now considering several repeal measures. This year 12 other states are considering similar bills, including Alabama, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. The legislation has already failed in Virginia. In Texas last week, the Senate Committee on State Affairs voted to recommend Senate Bill 6 to the full chamber. The measure has drawn widespread criticism from trans rights advocates who point out that it targets vulnerable students who are already at risk of bullying and other violence because of their gender identity. Parents of transgender children joined with Equality Texas and other advocates last week for a rally against the bill. "We are not fighting about bathrooms," said Chelsa Morrison, one of the mothers who spoke at the event. "We are fighting for our children's lives." (c) Facing South 2017

The Federal government is confident that the Myanmar government, under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, is doing all it can in addressing the concerns of the global community over the treatment of Rohingyas in Rakhine state. Stating that the Myanmar government should be given the chance to take appropriate measures, Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Reezal Merican Naina Merican said the democratically elected government was already making efforts to ensure stability in the area. "This is a work in progress. The government is barely a year old. "Reforms cannot be carried out in a day. Rome was not built in a day. "The atrocities against the Rohingya community has been going on for many years. The Aung San Suu Kyi leadership is already taking action," he told the Dewan Rakyat today. Reezal (BN-Kepala Batas) was responding to a supplementary question by Datuk Kamarudin Jaafar (PKR-Tumpat) on political measures and efforts to compel Suu Kyi to take more effective measures to help the community. Reezal also said that the United Nations will issue a conclusive report on present developments concerning the Rohingyas in Rakhine State this evening. The report will provide a clearer picture of what is going on in Rakhine. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Straits Times

Statement by Ms. Yanghee LEE, Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Myanmar at the 34th session of the Human Rights Council Agenda item 4 Geneva, 13 March 2017 Mr. President, distinguished representatives, ladies and gentlemen, I am honoured to present today my third report to this Council in my capacity as the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar. I am conscious that this Government is only now nearing its first anniversary in power and that not only has it inherited formidable human rights challenges from the previous Government, it also has to meet with exceedingly high expectations from its people as well as the international community. As I have conveyed to the Government of Myanmar, and to members of this Council, my approach to this mandate has always been as a friend to Myanmar. I have no agenda other than the realization of human rights in the country; the only bias and partiality is towards the promotion and protection of the rights of all people in Myanmar. Mr. President, I have conducted two visits to Myanmar in the past year, in June 2016 and January 2017. I thank the Government of Myanmar for these invitations and its cooperation with my mandate, attempts at better engagement especially by the Permanent Mission here, and particularly in respecting my request to meet community members in Rakhine State without close monitoring of officials and security personnel during my most recent visit. Nevertheless, I regret that I was again unable to visit several areas I had requested in Kachin state and that these refusals were given at the last minute, preventing full optimization of the limited time I had available. I must confess that there were times that I had seriously questioned the nature of the cooperation. The government has also yet to agree on the proposed joint benchmarks, which were called for by the last Council resolution, and which were shared with them several times before and during my recent visit. ​​ Excellencies, One of the key tasks facing Myanmar will be reform and modernization of all three branches of government. The judiciary – vital arbiters of justice – need continuing strengthening and improvements to the appointments system. In the executive branch, administrative reform including on local levels will be vital. On legislative side, I remain of the view that legislative process requires further streamlining and increased transparency, and suggest a law on law-making be enacted similar to those adopted by several countries in the region. I have also welcomed the repeal of several outdated laws but dozens of problematic laws remain on the books and continue to be used. The 1982 Citizenship Law in particular appears to have a similar standing as the Constitution as to the sensitivity surrounding its possible reform despite its clearly discriminatory provisions. Currently, a citizenship verification exercise under this discriminatory law is underway and despite understandings that the process should be voluntary, I receive continuing reports of Rohingya being coerced into undergoing the process as otherwise they are not allowed fishing licences, to carry out work as a national staff member of an international organization, sit for matriculation exams in schools or even receive food assistance. As mentioned, Constitutional reform seems a distant goal at this time. And made even more onerous with the brutal killing of one of Myanmar’s known Constitutional lawyers, U Ko Ni, as he was holding his grandchild. Despite this unexpected and seemingly insurmountable hurdle, I urge for progress towards Constitutional reform through potentially the establishment of a preparatory committee to study possible revision processes. Until the Constitution is reformed to provide for a truly civilian government, Myanmar cannot truly attain a full democracy. Ladies and Gentlemen, The extent that human rights defenders as well as press members are monitored, surveilled, harassed, and intimidated is also a good barometer for measuring democratic space. Considering the number of former political prisoners in the ranks of Myanmar’s Cabinet and Parliament, it is disappointing to see the continued misuse of laws such as section 505 of the Penal Code and increasingly section 66(d) of the Telecommunications Act to suppress voices of dissent, including through arrest and imprisonment. Of particular concern are multiple cases of killings of civil society actors for their involvement in human rights work and activism, including several in recent months, as well as cases which remain unresolved even after years of relatives of victims demanding justice. Many of these cases relate to vested commercial interests or the military. Myanmar has rich natural resources, but it is important that efforts to extract this bounty benefit all. I am concerned that individuals who have lived on land for generations continue to face evictions without proper safeguards and that communities continue to face severe health impacts and livelihood difficulties from environmental degradation associated with large scale mineral extraction. It is important that, the recent Environmental Impact Assessment Procedures, are systematically implemented and enforced, and that full advantage is taken of the welcome decision to suspend the issuance of jade mining licenses, to reform the legislative and policy framework governing the mining industry to ensure strong protections against environmental and human rights abuses. Mr. President, I am extremely concerned by the escalation in conflict in Kachin and Shan States which is having a dramatic impact on civilians in these areas. Just a week ago, fighting broke out in Kokang self-administered zone, reportedly causing over ten thousand people to flee to cross the Chinese border in search of safety. I say “reportedly” as we do not know exact conditions. Since May 2016, the United Nations and other international organizations have been systematically denied authorization to deliver vital and in some cases lifesaving assistance to over 40,000 IDPs including those recently displaced. Even in areas controlled by the government access is becoming more difficult – additional layers of approvals have recently been required – including from the military. I also continue to receive reports of serious human rights violations committed by all parties to the conflict, including torture, inhumane and degrading treatment, sexual- and gender-based violence, arbitrary killings, and abductions, all of which frequently go uninvestigated. There has also been a worrying trend of reportedly indiscriminate attacks in or near civilian area. I condemn the apparent total disregard for civilian lives in the strongest terms and emphasize the need for all parties to take immediate steps to protect civilians, respect international human rights and humanitarian law and end the violence and for investigations into allegations to be conducted. Peace will be vital to the future development of Myanmar, and the peace process represents an opportunity to transform the country. To have this transformative effect, discussions need to be inclusive and to address complex issues related to underlying root causes. I welcome the increasing representation of women in the discussions, but hope the level of representation will reach a minimum of 30% across all groups, in the next conference. Civil society organizations must also be seen as vital partners to the process. Unfortunately the peace process at the moment appears to be at a stalemate – I call on all parties to increase efforts to advance the process. Distinguished Representatives, You may be aware that one of my main concerns during my visit to Myanmar in January was reprisals. I raised concerns earlier of voices of dissent being suppressed including through arrest and imprisonment. And never have I felt more anxiety over potential acts of retaliation and reprisals than in Rakhine State during my visit. Myself and my predecessors have long raised concerns about Rakhine State, particularly the institutionalised discrimination faced by the Rohingya population and the inter-communal violence in 2012, as well as the general underdevelopment of the state and lack of opportunities for all communities. As you are all likely aware the situation in the state took on new dimensions on 9 October, when three Border Guard Police facilities were reportedly attacked, by groups of armed men in a coordinated manner, killing 9 members of the Myanmar Police Force. In response three townships were declared closed off with the launch of a security operation, with no access to independent media, and humanitarian programmes suspended. Following the launch of the security or clearance operations, reports began surfacing, increasingly and persistently regarding serious human rights violations, allegedly committed by the security forces. Reprisals was the main reason why I had asked to make a visit to Bangladesh where tens of thousands of the Rohingya population have fled from Rakhine State, and where they might feel less threatened to give me their accounts of what had happened during the clearance operations. In Cox’s Bazar, I met around 140 people from several villages in the north of Rakhine. I heard from them harrowing account after harrowing account. In my statement at the end of my mission to Bangladesh, I spoke about having been especially affected by a mother who repeatedly expressed regret for mistakenly thinking that her son had been brought out from their burning house. She heard him screaming for her and managed to save his life but burn scars have been seared onto him - scars which I saw with my own eyes. I wanted to share what I saw with you today. I heard allegation after allegation of horrific events like these – slitting of throats, indiscriminate shootings, setting alight houses with people tied up inside and throwing very young children into the fire, as well as gang rapes and other sexual violence. Even men, young and old, broke down and cried in front of me telling me about what they went through and their losses. Putting these experiences together with the institutionalized discrimination and long-standing persecution of the Rohingya population which I have reported on previously, as well as the continuing action by the authorities to make their lives even more difficult – even as the clearance operations are taking place – which include by dismantling their homes and conducting a household survey where those absent may be struck of the list that could be the only legal proof of their status in Myanmar - indicates the government may be trying to expel the Rohingya population from the country altogether. I sincerely hope that that is not the case. Excellencies, Myanmar has established several commissions to review the situation in Rakhine State, however I believe they have yet to discharge their investigative obligations. In the case of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, chaired by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the alleged human rights violations are outside the scope of their mandate. For other commissions, there are questions about the extent to which their investigations are “prompt, thorough, independent and impartial”. In particular, for investigations to be truly independent – members should be independent of any institution or agency that may be the subject of the inquiry. However, the Maungdaw Investigation Commission, whose members I was able to meet during my January visit, includes former members of the military and the currently serving Chief of the Myanmar Police Force. The commission also does not appear to have a robust methodology or policies in place to address key issues such as witness protection or documentation of evidence. The truth about whether all, or some, or any of these allegations are correct needs to be established. There is a need for a new set of investigations which are “prompt, thorough, independent and impartial”, and this needs to happen soon, before the evidence is compromised. In Myanmar’s pursuit of a fully democratic society, no stones must be left unturned. The alleged victims, as well as all the people of Myanmar deserve to know the truth. The international community must come together in expressing a strong and single voice in this regard, regardless of varying interests of individual member states. This is why I called for a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the systematic, structural, and institutional discrimination in policy, law and practice, as well long-standing persecution, against the Rohingya and other minorities in Rakhine State. Prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigations are not only needed in Rakhine, but also in conflict affected areas such as Kachin and Shan which are often overlooked and where serious violations, of a similar type to those in Rakhine, have been reported for many years. Yet many of these violations have also gone uninvestigated, with the situation in these areas worsening and still receiving little attention. For this reason, I have repeatedly requested to travel to Laiza and other areas in Kachin and Shan to speak to community members and IDPs but have been repeatedly denied, including during my most recent visit. That is also the reason why I recommended for this Council to hold a dedicated and urgent discussion to address the human rights violations occurring in other parts of the country including in Kachin and northern Shan. Mr. President, Following my visit to Bangladesh, I was a bit disappointed to hear that the Government of Myanmar has started to claim that I am unfair and biased. But I have to point out that the focus of my Bangladesh visit and related observations was to meet those who had fled from the north of Rakhine subsequent to the conduct of clearance operations there – and all those I met who had fled were Rohingya. Excellencies, I would like to draw some attention to the joint benchmarks I have proposed as well as the suggested areas which remain to be explored for development of technical cooperation programmes. I remain convinced that Myanmar would highly benefit from establishing a fully-fledged OHCHR country office with proper resources and a full mandate to help with the provision of technical advice and assistance on human rights issues to the Government and people of Myanmar. I want to end this statement by emphasizing that I have absolutely no reason whatsoever to present a biased, one-sided report. However, I have every reason to present the situation to reflect the reality, even if some may not like what I have to say. I believe this Council expects me to do exactly that by entrusting me with this mandate. As I have always done, I present myself, and my mandate, as a source for support and assistance towards Myanmar’s aim of becoming a fully functioning democracy and aspiration to be respected in the international fora. Thank you for your attention. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commisioner

Yanghee Lee, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, delivers her report, during the 34th session of the Human Rights Council, at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, Monday, March 13, 2017. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP) (Associated Press) A U.N. expert on Myanmar says she’s “disappointed” at the lack of “appetite” at the Human Rights Council to back her call for the creation of Commission of Inquiry into alleged crimes against the Rohingya minority. Special rapporteur Yanghee Lee, speaking to The Associated Press after addressing the 47-member council in Geneva on Monday, said she’s hearing of a difference of opinion “within even the European Union” about the best path forward in dealing with rights abuses in Myanmar. “I am afraid that I have been a little bit disappointed because I don’t think there is an appetite or a push for a Commission of Inquiry from the normal sponsors of the resolution” and by countries that are the “normal players” in calls for such investigative bodies, Lee said. She said a domestic investigative panel focusing on Rakhine state was “flawed” and another led by former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan didn’t have an all-encompassing mandate. Lee has been denied access to parts of Myanmar that she hoped to visit, and expressed concern about violence affecting civilians in Kachin and Shan states. Based in part on her 12-day trip to Myanmar in January, a 25-page report issued by her office this month cited “continued and escalating violence” in those and other states, and said Lee had been told ‘the situation is currently worse than at any point in the past few years.” Myanmar’s military, under international pressure over alleged abuses against members of the country’s Muslim Rohingya minority, has said official investigations failed to substantiate most accusations. Lee said she’s been “hearing of the discovery of mass graves and things of that nature,” and appealed to the Myanmar government to let investigators like her “leave no stones unturned” “If these allegations are indeed exaggerated allegations, everyone needs to know,” she told the AP. “If these allegations are true, I think Myanmar needs to know because this will be the obstacle to them fully reforming and transforming into a fully democratic society.” The estimated 1 million Rohingya in Buddhist-majority Myanmar face official and social discrimination, and are mostly seen as immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh living illegally in the country. Many fled their homes during communal violence in 2012, and over 100,000 live in refugee camps. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Associated Press

March 13, 2017 President Donald J. Trump The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Northwest Washington, DC 20003 Cc: Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, National Security Advisor Dear President Trump, We, the undersigned, represent a diverse group of organizations who work to end violence against women and girls globally. We are writing specifically as organizations engaged in the work to end violence against women and girls globally to express our serious concerns with the Executive Order Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States. On March 6, 2017, you signed this Executive Order, which blocks nationals from six Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen) from entering the United States. It also continues the suspension of the refugee resettlement program in the United States for 120 days, “pending a review of our procedures, for screening and vetting refugees.” The Executive Order maintains the reduction of the maximum number of refugees whom the United States will resettle from 110,000 to 50,000 if and when resettlement is restarted. In this Executive Order, violence against women is included as a focus of data collection related to the need for the travel ban and the refugee program suspension and to ensure that the United States “implement more effectively policies and practices that serve the national interest.” Per this order, the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Attorney General, shall collect and make publicly available: Sec. 11 (iii) information regarding the number and types of acts of gender-based violence against women, including so-called “honor killings,” in the United States by foreign nationals Violence against women and girls is a global crisis, and we support the U.S. government working with other governments, with civil society, and within the U.S. government to help end such violence in all its forms. The United States playing a leadership role in ending gender-based violence is both a reflection of American values and helps make America and its allies more prosperous and secure as it has been established that violence against women and girls undermines the productivity, health, and stability of communities worldwide. Specifically because of our commitment to end violence against women and girls globally, we are deeply concerned about the 120-day suspension of the refugee program and the impact of the travel ban on refugees and those seeking asylum from the six countries listed. These actions risk making women and girls more vulnerable to violence rather than less vulnerable. Women and girls who are refugees and asylum seekers are at high risk for gender-based violence; they are extremely vulnerable to sexual assault, including rape, and they frequently face violence, assault, exploitation, and sexual harassment at every stage of their journey to safety. In the home, refugee camps, and shelters, they may lack security and social networks, leaving them vulnerable to violence and abuse. Many asylum seekers themselves are explicitly fleeing gender-based violence. Any shutdown of this program or ban restricting travel does not help make women and girls safer; it makes them more vulnerable, and it further endangers them. As a global crisis, violence against women and girls is not specific to any one country. Connecting “gender-based violence against women and girls” with the travel ban and refugee program suspension is out of sync with the reality that every country, including the United States, suffers from such violence; it falsely suggests that refugees or people from the six Muslim-majority countries banned from entering the United States are somehow more likely to have engaged in violence against women or other persecution. Enacting a travel ban on these countries and suspending the refugee resettlement program does not address the global crisis of violence against women, neither does it offer any solutions to violence against women in the specifically targeted countries. An Executive Order that barred people from entering the United States from places where violence against women is a concern would mean a ban on travelers from every country, including the United States. We are further concerned by the Executive Order’s singling out of so-called "honor killings” as a type of gender-based violence that is more deserving of concern than other types of violence. Gender-based violence occurs in many different forms in countries all around the world, including the United States. Specifically naming this type of violence in connection with the six Muslim-majority countries listed in the Executive Order not only promotes and inflames Islamophobia, but it further feeds into the false narrative that violence against women is specific to non-Western cultures. We have serious concerns with this Executive Order, and we urge you to rescind the travel ban and refugee program suspension and to work with foreign governments, with civil society organizations, and within the U.S. government to seek meaningful solutions to ending violence against women and girls globally. Sincerely, Advocates for Youth Alliance to End Slavery & Trafficking Amara Legal Center Amnesty International USA Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Los Angeles Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence ASISTA CARE USA Casa de Esperanza: National Latin@ Network Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE) Church World Service Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) DC Coalition Against Domestic Violence DC National Organization for Women Emerge USA Equality Now Freedom Network USA Frontera Immigration Law Futures Without Violence Genocide Watch Global Rights for Women Holdenried Law Office Immigration Center for Women and Children International Action Network for Gender Equity & Law (IANGEL) International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) International Rescue Committee International Women's Health Coalition Islamic Society of Boston Islamic Society of North America Jewish Women International (JWI) Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing Legal Aid at Work Los Angeles Center for Law and Justice MADRE Muslim Public Affairs Council National Coalition Against Domestic Violence National Latina/o Psychological Association National Organization for Women Peace X Peace Peaceful Families Project Physicians for Human Rights Poligon Education Fund Population Institute Promundo-US Raksha, Inc Rays of Freedom Sanctuary for Families The Nursing Network on Violence Against Women International (NNVAWI) University of Tulsa College of Law, Tulsa Immigrant Resource Network Women Thrive Alliance Women Watch Afrika, Inc. Women's Action for New Directions Women's Refugee Commission YWCA US

Searching for the Truth.With the future of the Khmer Rouge Tribunal limited to a small number of high profile leaders, and a modern Cambodian population of which some 70% of the population was born after the worst of the Khmer Rouge genocide, Cambodia is facing a turning point. On the one hand, Cambodians run a real risk of losing a firm grip on understanding, memorializing and ultimately accepting a difficult past. On the other hand, a rapidly globalizing Cambodia must take on new challenges of sustainable growth, democratic integrity and human rights. Affiliations: The Cambodia Tribunal Monitor (CTM) www.cambodiatribunal.org The Sleuk Rith Institute (SRI) www.cambodiasri.org Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) www.zaha-hadid.com _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Documentation Center of Cambodia

More evidence has been discovered of a reported massacre in 2014 of up to 600 inmates at Badoush prison near Mosul, Iraqi forces say. The Shia-led Hashd al-Shaabi forces said human remains had been found at the site "with prison uniforms". So-called Islamic State (IS) is alleged to have killed hundreds of inmates, most of them Shia Muslims, when it seized Mosul in 2014. Badoush prison was recaptured earlier this week. A spokesman for the Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitary forces, Karim Nouri, said the bodies had been "lined up in a way that indicates they were shot dead in groups". On Saturday, Iraqi forces said that a "large mass grave" had been found that contained the remains of hundreds of "civilian prisoners who were executed by (IS) gangs after they controlled the prison during their occupation of Mosul". The news follows a 2014 report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) which said that hundreds of male inmates were murdered by IS gunmen at the time. "We are waiting for forensic teams and human rights officials to begin unearthing the grave to uncover the whole story," Mr Nouri said on Sunday. What happened at the prison? After Badoush prison was seized in June 2014, some 1,500 inmates were rounded up and transported by lorry to an isolated stretch of desert about 2km (1.2 miles) away, survivors told HRW. According to the rights group's report, IS gunmen separated the Shia inmates from the Sunnis and Christians and then marched them to a ravine, where they were forced to kneel along its edge. The Shia inmates were shot in the head or back with assault rifles and automatic weapons, according to the survivors, who escaped by pretending to be dead or because they were shielded by the bodies of victims who fell on top of them. The Iraqi army's 9th Armoured Division and allied militiamen recaptured Badoush prison, north-west of Mosul, last week. A statement released by the Iraqi forces did not say whether they found anyone who was being detained by IS. Battle to retake Mosul On Sunday, the Iraqi military said it had retaken two more neighbourhoods in the western district of Mosul from IS. Iraqi security forces said they now control more than a third of west Mosul. Iraq's government launched an operation to retake Mosul in October, and announced that the city's eastern side had been liberated in January. Troops are now continuing their push into the more densely-populated west. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 BBC

An effigy of Myanmar's State Counsellor and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who the military see as their 'international flak-catcher'. Ko Ni, a prominent lawyer and adviser to Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD), scooped up his five-year-old grandson and was cradling him at Yangon International Airport's taxi rank after returning from a trip to Indonesia. The assassin's bullet aimed at changing the course of Myanmar's future came from point-blank range, in broad daylight, amid the bustle of the country's biggest airport. © AP Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi arrives to attend a memorial ceremony to mark one month from the killing of Ko Ni and taxi driver Ne Win. "My father was talking to his grandson. Then I heard a gunshot," said Yin Nwe Khine, a doctor, who was standing nearby. "At first I thought it was a car tyre blowing out, then I saw my father lying on the ground." © AP Aung San Suu Kyi remained silent for weeks and was absent from Ko Ni's funeral, prompting criticisms about her inability or unwillingness to speak out on many issues. Ko Ni's family had worried for months as he worked on a plan to amend Myanmar's 2008 Constitution, which he saw as enshrining supreme power for the country's military despite Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD's landslide victory at elections in November 2015. In lectures, forums and newspaper articles, Ko Ni spoke out about how the constitution stacked power in the hands of the military and was inconsistent with democracy. Behind the scenes, the 65-year-old, softly-spoken father of three had also played a key role in creating the office of State Counsellor, a position that allowed Suu Kyi to become de facto leader of the country, bypassing a constitutional clause barring anyone who has foreign relatives from becoming president and solving a major dilemma for the NLD when it took power. The military, which wrote the clause precisely to prevent Suu Kyi leading the country, was deeply unhappy about the new position. Ko Ni, a Muslim in the majority-Buddhist country, had received threats but pushed ahead with his work, often arriving home after midnight and ignoring concerns for his own safety. "He always said that lawyers are forever worrying, and never wanted to pass those worries on to his family," Yin Nwe Khine said. Melissa Crouch, a friend of Ko Ni's from the University of New South Wales and an expert on Myanmar's constitution, remembers him expressing particular concern about the situation in his country in a phone call in August last year. "I had never heard him talk in such pessimistic tones before – he showed concern for people's safety, human rights and security," Crouch says. "He warned that it was not safe for locals to be talking in public forums about constitutional issues but encouraged foreigners to continue to do so." Police claim the plot to kill Ko Ni was hatched in a tea shop in April last year by a group of men who held a personal grudge against him. Whether that is true or not – and many observers doubt the police account – it is clear he was targeted in a brazen and well-planned political assassination on January 29. At least three other co-conspirators are believed to have watched at the airport as Kyi Lin, the 53-year-old gunman, tried to run away after firing a single shot from a Myanmar-made 9-millimetre pistol. What they didn't count on was the bravery of airport taxi drivers, who saw the shooting and gave chase. Kyi Lin, a criminal and former soldier who was reportedly paid the equivalent of $US71,500 ($95,000) to carry out the hit, turned and shot dead one of the pursuing drivers, before others managed to overpower him and hold him for police. On February 26, more than four weeks after the killing, Myanmar's Office of the President distributed a photo of him and announced in a brief statement the killing was ordered by 45-year-old Aung Win Khine, who was still at large. The statement did not mention that Aung Win Khine was a former lieutenant-colonel who retired from Myanmar's army in 2014. Also arrested was another former soldier, Aung Win Khine's 46-year-old brother Aung Win Zaw. The military denies any involvement in the plot. But Myanmar experts sitting on a panel at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand painted a picture of a military leadership with a bunker mentality obsessed with the belief that only generals can rule the country and keep it united, and who had the most to benefit from Ko Ni's death. Larry Jagan, a commentator and analyst living in Myanmar who has been following the country for 40 years, quoted military sources telling him last year that the military saw Ko Ni as its most serious threat because he was leading the push for constitutional change, although he believes the order for the assassination did not come from the military's top ranks. He said as a result of the death those in the NLD who had wanted to move quietly and not push the military on constitutional reform now hold sway. Asked about this, Crouch said she didn't think the reform push had ended but "it may require a change of tactics and patience". Anthony Davis, a security consultant and analyst with defence publisher Jane's, said the military organised a fraudulent constitution in 2008 that allowed it to effectively continue to operate as a state within the state, maintaining its grip despite all the talk of a transformed Myanmar ruled by a democratically elected government. Davis said the military wanted to be seen as moving towards democracy because it had no choice in today's world, but generals always saw it as a "disciplined" or "guided" democracy, where they still dominated all aspects of Burmese society in much the same way they have for more than 50 years. "Even before the 2015 election, but especially in the days after, there has been a facile, childlike enthusiasm for democratic change, a belief the country was being transformed and was on the right track," he said. "But basically if you set that vision of where the military has come from and where it is today, it disappears in a puff of smoke." Analysts say Ko Ni's death is a pivotal point in the history of the country, rekindling deep concerns about its future. "The bullet was not only for Ko Ni. It was for the NLD and the people who want to amend and replace the 2008 Constitution and support the peace process," said Thein Than Oo, a human rights lawyer in Mandalay. The killing stunned the NLD. But for weeks Aung San Suu Kyi remained inexplicably silent. She was absent from Ko Ni's funeral, prompting further criticisms about her inability or unwillingness to speak out on many issues, including military offensives against ethnic armies in border areas and atrocities against Rohingyas in western Rakhine state, which the UN has described as ethnic cleansing and "very likely" crimes against humanity. Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said the military is "more than happy to have Aung San Suu Kyi as their international flak-catcher" while its business conglomerate reaps the rewards of the lifting of economic sanctions by Western nations, which she recommended. Davis, who has deep knowledge of Myanmar's army, believes the country's future is "looking pretty bleak" now that the NLD has lost Ko Ni. He envisages the military, which under the constitution controls the ministries of defence, home and interior, and is automatically allocated 25 per cent of seats in parliament, will want to see Suu Kyi remain in place for years while keeping her powerless on a wide range of issues. He said the Nobel laureate will be 75 at the time of the next elections in 2020 and given the NLD's weak leadership in its first year in office, her party may even struggle to retain office. Crouch said Ko Ni's death was seen as a personal attack on members of the NLD while for lawyers it was seen as an outrageous attack on their profession. "However, I would suggest his death has been felt hardest for Muslims," Crouch said, pointing out that there was an increase in online hate speech against Muslims in the days after the killing. Ashin Wirathu, a radical Buddhist monk, even praised the killers. "As a Muslim, Ko Ni achieved public respect and fame in a way that no other Muslim has achieved in a very long time," Crouch said. "His assassination is a clear message to the Muslim community – intended or otherwise – you are not welcome here, we do not want you to contribute to the future of our country, your safety and life is at risk, leave." __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 MSN News