It has now been made clear this Dao Din student is ONLY being bailed enough time to sit his final law exams. Did Bangkok intervene to prevent bail being granted for longer, as the original Khon Khaen court seemed to allow ?
Soe Win Han has eloquently deconstructed the “context” of liberal universalism, thus removing the western notion of human rights from his discursive treatment of the Rohingya “genocide” now taking place under the watchful eye of The Lady.
So I am asking whether there is a local set of values that might endanger myself and my family if we were to visit.
It would appear that minus the “universal” values referred to as “human rights”, there is nothing stopping the local Buddhists from raping, killing and burning the homes of the Rohingya on the understanding that they are not Burmese.
Spot on analysis. Really first rate. The lilly-livered gallery of Indonesia experts (based outside Indonesia) will agonise over this and counsel everyone patronisingky of the benefits of pluralism and moderation. Conservative Islamist groups have ascended the political main stage. We all need to comprehend this first and then think about what to do.
It is hardly surprising. Every other major source of power – TNI/POLRI, political party elites, and the market dominant ethnic Chinese minority – have denied people opportunity and equity. It took a vigilante group on the political fringes to energise them. None of those other sources could mobilise a million people on their own (ditto the ‘SBY=Mastermind’ thesis, which belongs on the scrapheap).
Btw, Ketua Umum PP Muhammadiyah Haedar Nashir said the day after Aksi Bela Islam (cf. Aksi Super Damai, the govt title):
“Aksi 212 tersebut patut diapresiasi tinggi, karena menunjukkan kematangan sikap dan keluhuran budi umat Islam Indonesia.”
indeed , decline does appear to be wishful thinking …………..
Buddhist monks lead protest against Najib in Yangon
December 5, 2016
snipped from ………………
Meanwhile, a letter sent to Myanmar Times by U Wirathu, a prominent monk who is a member of Buddhist nationalist organisation, Ma Ba Tha, also lashed out at “Muslim countries” for bullying Myanmar.
“The unfair fact is Muslim countries are using a lot of money and unfair techniques and bullying Myanmar to make the world become a Muslim world,” Wirathu wrote from his base in Mandalay, according to the Myanmar Times.
What is ominous is that Aung San Suu Kyi has started using terminologies such as “Bengali” and “Muslims of Rakhine State” to describe Rohingyas. The government has given into the slogan of Ma Ba Tha, the extremely racist organisation led by the bigoted Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu.
Sāsanavaṃsapāla…protector of Buddha’s dispensation and followers. Reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated.
Simply repeating ‘declining’ and ‘waning’ over and over again does not actually create evidence out of nothing. In reality, Ma Ba Tha continues to enjoy extremely widespread support in Myanmar.
The misfortunes of illegal migrants are not likely to be of much interest to Western governments in the future, nor is there likely to be much objection to Burmese nationalism. So Ma Ba Tha’s future looks bright.
From this comment, I guess the writer tagline would be ” leave the killing of Muslims to Muslims, others – butt out”
The OIC and other Islamic organisations are doing such a great job in stopping killings in Islamic countries…
“Do I as a white westerner have to worry that if I were to travel to Burma with my Thai family that we might be raped and killed because we are not Burmese?”
Now in Bangladesh, Rohingya describe rape, murder in Myanmar
following snipped from a much more comprehensive report :
But Begum says she has no need to exaggerate what happened in Caira Fara.
She said that after the four leaders were killed, violence churned through the village in chaotic scenes of horror. Begum’s husband, a poor, illiterate farm laborer, was beaten and then murdered by having his throat slit, along with an unknown number of other villagers, she said. Their bodies were eventually driven away in a truck.
She said attackers knocked her young son knocked from her grasp, then raped her.
Finally, when the soldiers weren’t paying attention, she grabbed her son and ran into the nearby hills. After hiding for two days, her brother gave her enough money – about $38 – to pay smugglers to get her and her son into Bangladesh.
The protests are very damaging to Indonesia’s nascent democracy and indicates that Islamic extremism, often infantile and delusional, is a threat to Indonesia and any hope of multicultural tolerance. One protestor is one too many. President Jokowi has tried to play all instruments rather than focusing on the one he plays best. He is more afraid of Prabowo, SBY and Habib than he is supportive of Ahok. This is a moral relapse and one that will reverberate for years to come.
Bro, I agree with pretty much everything you have to say on the issue of the “universality” of human rights being just another form of western imperialism.
I also agree that Asian societies have their own value systems and have not made a habit of claiming “universality” for them and then using that dubious bit of metaphysical flim-flam to justify shooting up other nations and peoples in the name of some righteous principle.
And hypocrisy? Well, bro, you don’t know the half of it, not having been born and raised with this “liberal universalism” being shoved down your throat as an article of unquestioning faith that at the same time includes a clause on freedom of conscience and belief. Talk about painful.
But in regard to the violence being visited upon the Rohingya by Burman Buddhists, one could simply ask “Is it an expression of the local value system?”
Outside the context of western liberal universalism, do Burmese Buddhists believe that mass rape, murder, arson and various other activities undertaken against certain people because of their religion and/or their ethnicity are acceptable behaviors?
Do I as a white westerner have to worry that if I were to travel to Burma with my Thai family that we might be raped and killed because we are not Burmese? And that Burmese people would find it acceptable if that were to happen because, hey, they are not subject to the strictures of western universalist human rights discourse?
Peter, thanks for your comment. Just a couple of points: In the 40s, so-called ‘Indian Tamils’ in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) were disenfranchised, i.e. their citizenship was taken away from them unilaterally. Since India did not accept them either, they became stateless, though they had lived in Ceylon for at least three generations. Nobody in the world bothered, because it was assumed that a country could determine independently who it would and would not accept as citizens. Subsequently, these ‘stateless’ people were ill-treated, attacked, deported and eventually killed, again with nobody except a few academics bothering. Not talk about ‘most persecuted’. Finally India and Sri Lanka came to a series of agreements in which these Tamils were ‘distributed’ between India and Sri Lanka. In India they live in the Nilgiris, until today sometimes under precarious circumstances. Mind you: I am talking about ‘Indian Tamils’, not about Sri Lankan Tamils where genocide has definitely occurred, complete with mass graves, again with few people bothering, because the country is, after all, a ‘model democracy’.
Cut to the Rohingyas: certainly they are treated badly, but if we go by the Sri Lankan case: does Myanmar not have the right to determine who are and who are not its citizens? And why cannot Bangladesh contract an agreement similar to that between India and Sri Lanka? Certainly, as Jacques Leider has shown, the bulk of the Rohingyas came to the Rakhine after WWII, otherwise, how do you explain a 90% increase from then? That cannot be ‘natural increase’.
Certainly no group must be attacked, violated, killed or anything just because they are thought not to be legal citizens. But please, differentiate these two issues and stop talking about ‘most persecuted’. I could name you quite a few candidates more qualified for the label.
In the author’s Beltway ‘filter-bubble’, America stands for liberty, democracy and human rights. In my version of reality there are no such thing as ‘Rohingya’ and the US simply wants Myanmar’s oil and airbases.
“China has a vested interest in keeping a weak, dependent, autocratic leader in power.” I really likethis kind of statements –
As in the USA keeping Marcos in power for decades? As in the USA pouring billions into Pakistan for Zia Ul haq who did a coup on Bhutto, as in….??
There will be continuity. The late king was at his palace in Hua Hin and later in hospital. The new king will be in Munich most of the time. In other words, the best king for Thailand since the last ten or twenty years is someone away from Bangkok, as this allows:
1. no interference into affairs of the elite;
2. to project whatever kind of image into the far removed person.
Mapim gathering proof on atrocities against Rohingya
By Intan Baha
New Straits Times Online
December 3, 2016
IPOH: Majlis Perundingan Pertubuhan Islam Malaysia (Mapim) is gathering proof of Myanmar cruelty towards the Rohingya community to bring Myanmar to the International Crime Court (ICC) soonest possible.
Its president Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid said this is an effort with the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) in London, to file the Rohingya case to the ICC.
“We are gathering proof of murder, rape and genocide and will work together with the IHRC to file the case to the ICC as soon as possible.
“We are collecting testimonies of killings; proof is being compiled and we have documents fingering the responsible party.
“IHRC is waiting for Mapim to send reports with Rohingya representatives to fulfil the report standard,” he told a press conference after the launch of the Solidarity Rohingya Fund and ‘Solidariti Rohingya dan Kepedulian Ummah’ at Sultan Azlan Shah Mosque here today.
Mapim would file the case under the crime towards humanity committed by Myanmar troops and it has not been done by any party before, Mohd Azmi added.
He said Mapim also has agreed with several international non-governmental organisations to urge Asean, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and United Nations to pressure the Myanmar government to stop its oppression against the Rohingya.
Meanwhile, Mohd Azmi said Mapim has warned Myanmar to stop the massacre within seven days before Mapim begins an international boycott of the country.
“Any activity such as trade and sporting events will be boycotted if the killing are not halted.
“Myanmar still has four days and if the killings still continue, we will launch the boycott in Kuala Lumpur and expose the atrocities to the world so that economic sanctions would be re-imposed on Myanmar,” he said.
I suspect that the Thai monarchy will continue to exist with or without Taksin or his sister. It would be interesting to see if some sort of an alliance between the two could be reached.
I’m not sure how safe Taksin would be if he returned, after all a bullet found its way into the head of Rama VIII (the Lord of Life no less ) while he lay in the comfort of his own bed.
I’m also not certain as to what Rama X would get out of an alliance with Taksin. The wealth at the Kings command makes the Taksin fortune look like my childhood piggy bank.
Also, I don’t think the King has shown ” disdain ” for the Generals. It’s true that he seems to have made a point of showing that ,like his father, he will not be their puppet. However, I don’t think this should be interpreted as an insult to the junta, It was merely a calculated demonstration of the new monarch’s authority.
I have little doubt that Rama X is very aware of just how powerful and dangerous those men can be. If he ever forgets this fact he will truly have become the fool that many of his detractors have painted him as being.
A couple of points. “Mass graves” if you describe graves where 10,15,20 or whatever number of deceased people are buried have also been found in the forests of Southern Thailand. However, if we take the 1948 Convention on Genocide as the basis for describing whether or not genocide has occurred or is occurring then it is not necessary to uncover mass graves. Perhaps it might be better to describe what is happening to the Rohingya as ethnocide but whatever term is used it is inexcusable as to what is actually happening to the Rohingya and the democratically elected Government in Myanmar really does need to confront this issue.
No human rights anywhere in the world! I too feel this. But the constitution of all those countries guarantee to some extent free movement, right to education, health care, justice, and to be honored as a human being. I think this may vary from country to country in the extant to which they are given or they are honored. BUT they have some standard rights ensconced in. No government has ever been able to respect them all. I agree. Yet Burma that we saw in 1948 when even people from India came for work and earn has a totally different and diabolical picture now. With the introduction of burmese road to socialism, which actually is no socialism at all, and the constitution that they gave, Myanmar is nosediving towards its greatest fall in history, hated by the entire world as well as people within, you agree or not. If the Tatmadaw still dreams of building a a superdynasty, they are living in a fool’s paradise.
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Henry VIII of Thailand
It has now been made clear this Dao Din student is ONLY being bailed enough time to sit his final law exams. Did Bangkok intervene to prevent bail being granted for longer, as the original Khon Khaen court seemed to allow ?
Why Rakhine people should embrace human rights
Ohn:
It should be fairly obvious what the context is.
Soe Win Han has eloquently deconstructed the “context” of liberal universalism, thus removing the western notion of human rights from his discursive treatment of the Rohingya “genocide” now taking place under the watchful eye of The Lady.
So I am asking whether there is a local set of values that might endanger myself and my family if we were to visit.
It would appear that minus the “universal” values referred to as “human rights”, there is nothing stopping the local Buddhists from raping, killing and burning the homes of the Rohingya on the understanding that they are not Burmese.
Well, neither am I.
Has Jokowi handed a strategic victory to radicals?
Spot on analysis. Really first rate. The lilly-livered gallery of Indonesia experts (based outside Indonesia) will agonise over this and counsel everyone patronisingky of the benefits of pluralism and moderation. Conservative Islamist groups have ascended the political main stage. We all need to comprehend this first and then think about what to do.
It is hardly surprising. Every other major source of power – TNI/POLRI, political party elites, and the market dominant ethnic Chinese minority – have denied people opportunity and equity. It took a vigilante group on the political fringes to energise them. None of those other sources could mobilise a million people on their own (ditto the ‘SBY=Mastermind’ thesis, which belongs on the scrapheap).
Btw, Ketua Umum PP Muhammadiyah Haedar Nashir said the day after Aksi Bela Islam (cf. Aksi Super Damai, the govt title):
“Aksi 212 tersebut patut diapresiasi tinggi, karena menunjukkan kematangan sikap dan keluhuran budi umat Islam Indonesia.”
Managing a declining threat
indeed , decline does appear to be wishful thinking …………..
Buddhist monks lead protest against Najib in Yangon
December 5, 2016
snipped from ………………
Meanwhile, a letter sent to Myanmar Times by U Wirathu, a prominent monk who is a member of Buddhist nationalist organisation, Ma Ba Tha, also lashed out at “Muslim countries” for bullying Myanmar.
“The unfair fact is Muslim countries are using a lot of money and unfair techniques and bullying Myanmar to make the world become a Muslim world,” Wirathu wrote from his base in Mandalay, according to the Myanmar Times.
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2016/12/05/buddhist-monks-lead-protest-against-najib-in-yangon/
………………………………..
Keep the pressure on Myanmar
December 05, 2016
What is ominous is that Aung San Suu Kyi has started using terminologies such as “Bengali” and “Muslims of Rakhine State” to describe Rohingyas. The government has given into the slogan of Ma Ba Tha, the extremely racist organisation led by the bigoted Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu.
http://www.thedailystar.net/opinion/bystander/keep-the-pressure-myanmar-1325260
Managing a declining threat
Sāsanavaṃsapāla…protector of Buddha’s dispensation and followers. Reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated.
Simply repeating ‘declining’ and ‘waning’ over and over again does not actually create evidence out of nothing. In reality, Ma Ba Tha continues to enjoy extremely widespread support in Myanmar.
The misfortunes of illegal migrants are not likely to be of much interest to Western governments in the future, nor is there likely to be much objection to Burmese nationalism. So Ma Ba Tha’s future looks bright.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
From this comment, I guess the writer tagline would be ” leave the killing of Muslims to Muslims, others – butt out”
The OIC and other Islamic organisations are doing such a great job in stopping killings in Islamic countries…
Why Rakhine people should embrace human rights
“Do I as a white westerner have to worry that if I were to travel to Burma with my Thai family that we might be raped and killed because we are not Burmese?”
And the context was…?
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
Now in Bangladesh, Rohingya describe rape, murder in Myanmar
following snipped from a much more comprehensive report :
But Begum says she has no need to exaggerate what happened in Caira Fara.
She said that after the four leaders were killed, violence churned through the village in chaotic scenes of horror. Begum’s husband, a poor, illiterate farm laborer, was beaten and then murdered by having his throat slit, along with an unknown number of other villagers, she said. Their bodies were eventually driven away in a truck.
She said attackers knocked her young son knocked from her grasp, then raped her.
Finally, when the soldiers weren’t paying attention, she grabbed her son and ran into the nearby hills. After hiding for two days, her brother gave her enough money – about $38 – to pay smugglers to get her and her son into Bangladesh.
http://www.rohingyablogger.com/2016/12/now-in-bangladesh-rohingya-describe.html
Has Jokowi handed a strategic victory to radicals?
The protests are very damaging to Indonesia’s nascent democracy and indicates that Islamic extremism, often infantile and delusional, is a threat to Indonesia and any hope of multicultural tolerance. One protestor is one too many. President Jokowi has tried to play all instruments rather than focusing on the one he plays best. He is more afraid of Prabowo, SBY and Habib than he is supportive of Ahok. This is a moral relapse and one that will reverberate for years to come.
Why Rakhine people should embrace human rights
Soe Win Han:
Bro, I agree with pretty much everything you have to say on the issue of the “universality” of human rights being just another form of western imperialism.
I also agree that Asian societies have their own value systems and have not made a habit of claiming “universality” for them and then using that dubious bit of metaphysical flim-flam to justify shooting up other nations and peoples in the name of some righteous principle.
And hypocrisy? Well, bro, you don’t know the half of it, not having been born and raised with this “liberal universalism” being shoved down your throat as an article of unquestioning faith that at the same time includes a clause on freedom of conscience and belief. Talk about painful.
But in regard to the violence being visited upon the Rohingya by Burman Buddhists, one could simply ask “Is it an expression of the local value system?”
Outside the context of western liberal universalism, do Burmese Buddhists believe that mass rape, murder, arson and various other activities undertaken against certain people because of their religion and/or their ethnicity are acceptable behaviors?
Do I as a white westerner have to worry that if I were to travel to Burma with my Thai family that we might be raped and killed because we are not Burmese? And that Burmese people would find it acceptable if that were to happen because, hey, they are not subject to the strictures of western universalist human rights discourse?
Inquiring non-Burmese minds want to know.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
Peter, thanks for your comment. Just a couple of points: In the 40s, so-called ‘Indian Tamils’ in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) were disenfranchised, i.e. their citizenship was taken away from them unilaterally. Since India did not accept them either, they became stateless, though they had lived in Ceylon for at least three generations. Nobody in the world bothered, because it was assumed that a country could determine independently who it would and would not accept as citizens. Subsequently, these ‘stateless’ people were ill-treated, attacked, deported and eventually killed, again with nobody except a few academics bothering. Not talk about ‘most persecuted’. Finally India and Sri Lanka came to a series of agreements in which these Tamils were ‘distributed’ between India and Sri Lanka. In India they live in the Nilgiris, until today sometimes under precarious circumstances. Mind you: I am talking about ‘Indian Tamils’, not about Sri Lankan Tamils where genocide has definitely occurred, complete with mass graves, again with few people bothering, because the country is, after all, a ‘model democracy’.
Cut to the Rohingyas: certainly they are treated badly, but if we go by the Sri Lankan case: does Myanmar not have the right to determine who are and who are not its citizens? And why cannot Bangladesh contract an agreement similar to that between India and Sri Lanka? Certainly, as Jacques Leider has shown, the bulk of the Rohingyas came to the Rakhine after WWII, otherwise, how do you explain a 90% increase from then? That cannot be ‘natural increase’.
Certainly no group must be attacked, violated, killed or anything just because they are thought not to be legal citizens. But please, differentiate these two issues and stop talking about ‘most persecuted’. I could name you quite a few candidates more qualified for the label.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
In the author’s Beltway ‘filter-bubble’, America stands for liberty, democracy and human rights. In my version of reality there are no such thing as ‘Rohingya’ and the US simply wants Myanmar’s oil and airbases.
Najib’s fear campaign
“China has a vested interest in keeping a weak, dependent, autocratic leader in power.” I really likethis kind of statements –
As in the USA keeping Marcos in power for decades? As in the USA pouring billions into Pakistan for Zia Ul haq who did a coup on Bhutto, as in….??
Why Rakhine people should embrace human rights
Bravo, bravo.. nail on the head…
Thailand’s long succession
There will be continuity. The late king was at his palace in Hua Hin and later in hospital. The new king will be in Munich most of the time. In other words, the best king for Thailand since the last ten or twenty years is someone away from Bangkok, as this allows:
1. no interference into affairs of the elite;
2. to project whatever kind of image into the far removed person.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
Mapim gathering proof on atrocities against Rohingya
By Intan Baha
New Straits Times Online
December 3, 2016
IPOH: Majlis Perundingan Pertubuhan Islam Malaysia (Mapim) is gathering proof of Myanmar cruelty towards the Rohingya community to bring Myanmar to the International Crime Court (ICC) soonest possible.
Its president Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid said this is an effort with the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) in London, to file the Rohingya case to the ICC.
“We are gathering proof of murder, rape and genocide and will work together with the IHRC to file the case to the ICC as soon as possible.
“We are collecting testimonies of killings; proof is being compiled and we have documents fingering the responsible party.
“IHRC is waiting for Mapim to send reports with Rohingya representatives to fulfil the report standard,” he told a press conference after the launch of the Solidarity Rohingya Fund and ‘Solidariti Rohingya dan Kepedulian Ummah’ at Sultan Azlan Shah Mosque here today.
Mapim would file the case under the crime towards humanity committed by Myanmar troops and it has not been done by any party before, Mohd Azmi added.
He said Mapim also has agreed with several international non-governmental organisations to urge Asean, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and United Nations to pressure the Myanmar government to stop its oppression against the Rohingya.
Meanwhile, Mohd Azmi said Mapim has warned Myanmar to stop the massacre within seven days before Mapim begins an international boycott of the country.
“Any activity such as trade and sporting events will be boycotted if the killing are not halted.
“Myanmar still has four days and if the killings still continue, we will launch the boycott in Kuala Lumpur and expose the atrocities to the world so that economic sanctions would be re-imposed on Myanmar,” he said.
http://www.rohingyablogger.com/2016/12/mapim-gathering-proof-on-atrocities.html
Thailand’s long succession
I suspect that the Thai monarchy will continue to exist with or without Taksin or his sister. It would be interesting to see if some sort of an alliance between the two could be reached.
I’m not sure how safe Taksin would be if he returned, after all a bullet found its way into the head of Rama VIII (the Lord of Life no less ) while he lay in the comfort of his own bed.
I’m also not certain as to what Rama X would get out of an alliance with Taksin. The wealth at the Kings command makes the Taksin fortune look like my childhood piggy bank.
Also, I don’t think the King has shown ” disdain ” for the Generals. It’s true that he seems to have made a point of showing that ,like his father, he will not be their puppet. However, I don’t think this should be interpreted as an insult to the junta, It was merely a calculated demonstration of the new monarch’s authority.
I have little doubt that Rama X is very aware of just how powerful and dangerous those men can be. If he ever forgets this fact he will truly have become the fool that many of his detractors have painted him as being.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
A couple of points. “Mass graves” if you describe graves where 10,15,20 or whatever number of deceased people are buried have also been found in the forests of Southern Thailand. However, if we take the 1948 Convention on Genocide as the basis for describing whether or not genocide has occurred or is occurring then it is not necessary to uncover mass graves. Perhaps it might be better to describe what is happening to the Rohingya as ethnocide but whatever term is used it is inexcusable as to what is actually happening to the Rohingya and the democratically elected Government in Myanmar really does need to confront this issue.
Why Rakhine people should embrace human rights
No human rights anywhere in the world! I too feel this. But the constitution of all those countries guarantee to some extent free movement, right to education, health care, justice, and to be honored as a human being. I think this may vary from country to country in the extant to which they are given or they are honored. BUT they have some standard rights ensconced in. No government has ever been able to respect them all. I agree. Yet Burma that we saw in 1948 when even people from India came for work and earn has a totally different and diabolical picture now. With the introduction of burmese road to socialism, which actually is no socialism at all, and the constitution that they gave, Myanmar is nosediving towards its greatest fall in history, hated by the entire world as well as people within, you agree or not. If the Tatmadaw still dreams of building a a superdynasty, they are living in a fool’s paradise.
Confronting genocide in Myanmar
Your deflection from my simple question gives me your answer.