UK stresses Sundarbans’ protection, assures support over Rohingya repatriation

Financial Express

FE Online Report 

Published: April 14, 2021

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, British state minister for Foreign Affairs for South Asia and the Commonwealth, has underscored the importance of protecting the Sundarbans, the world’s largest mangrove forest, from the adverse impacts of climate change.

He made the observation during a discussion with Bangladesh State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md. Shahriar Alam, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday.

Indonesia says UK backs ASEAN push for Myanmar crisis resolution

REUTERS
Reuters Staff
APRIL 7, 2021

JAKARTA (Reuters) - The United Kingdom will support Southeast Asian countries in efforts to resolve the crisis in Myanmar, Indonesia’s foreign minister said Wednesday, after talks with her visiting British counterpart.

FILE PHOTO: Indonesia’s Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi delivers her speech during a press briefing with Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi in Jakarta, Indonesia, January 10, 2020. REUTERS/Ajeng Dinar Ulfiana/File Photo

Indonesia is among several countries leading a push for high-level talks between leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on Myanmar, where nearly 600 people have been killed in a crackdown on demonstrators opposing a Feb. 1 coup.

“We discussed... how the international community, including the UK could support the ASEAN effort to help Myanmar in resolving this situation,” Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said in a news briefing after talks with Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab.

U.S. and Britain blacklist Myanmar military-controlled companies

Brinkwire

JONATHAN EDWARDS 

MARCH 29, 2021

WASHINGTON, March 25 – The United States and Britain imposed sanctions on conglomerates controlled by Myanmar’s military on Thursday, following the generals’ Feb. 1 coup and deadly crackdown, with Washington calling it a response to “abhorrent violence and abuses.”

The U.S. Treasury department said its sanctions targeted Myanma Economic Holdings Public Company Ltd (MEHL) and Myanmar Economic Corporation Ltd (MEC).

Britain imposed similar sanctions on MEHL, citing the Myanmar military’s serious human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims.

US and UK ratchet up sanctions on Myanmar's military

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BBC News

Tim McDonald

26 March 2021

The US and UK have imposed sanctions on Myanmar's two military conglomerates in a move that significantly ratchets up pressure on the country's leadership.

Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC) and Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd (MEHL) control significant portions of Myanmar's economy, with interests across many of the country's major industries.

The US Treasury has now added the two companies to a blacklist, freezing any assets they have in the US and banning US individuals and businesses from trading with them.

The UK has imposed sanctions on MEHL.

"These actions will specifically target those who led the coup, the economic interests of the military, and the funding streams supporting the Burmese military's brutal repression," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. "They are not directed at the people of Burma.

U.S. and Britain blacklist Myanmar military-controlled companies

REUTERS
Reuters Staff

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States and Britain imposed sanctions on conglomerates controlled by Myanmar’s military on Thursday, following the generals’ Feb. 1 coup and deadly crackdown, with Washington calling it a response to “abhorrent violence and abuses.”

FILE PHOTO: Firecrackers explode as protestors take cover behind a barricade during a demonstration against the military coup in Mandalay, Myanmar March 21, 2021. REUTERS/Stringer

The U.S. Treasury department said its sanctions targeted Myanma Economic Holdings Public Company Ltd (MEHL) and Myanmar Economic Corporation Ltd (MEC).

Britain imposed similar sanctions on MEHL, citing the Myanmar military’s serious human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims.

US, EU, Britain Impose Sanctions on Chinese Officials Over Uyghurs

VOA News
Updated March 22, 2021

European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell speaks to media before a EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels, on March 22, 2021.

The United States, the European Union and Britain have imposed sanctions on several Chinese officials for human rights abuses against the Muslim Uyghur minority in China’s Xinjiang province.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. sanctions were taken in solidary with U.S. allies.

“As part of their actions today, our partners also sanctioned human rights abusers in connection with the atrocities occurring in Xinjiang and other countries,” Blinken said in a statement Monday.

UK announces further sanctions against Myanmar generals

StarTribune
Associated Press
FEBRUARY 25, 2021

LONDON — Britain announced further sanctions Thursday against members of Myanmar's military for their part in the coup that ousted the country's elected government.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said six more top generals face sanctions for serious human rights violations, in addition to 19 others previously listed by the U.K.

The new round of sanctions targets Myanmar's State Administration Council, which was set up following the coup to exercise state functions. The measures immediately ban the generals, including Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing, from traveling to Britain and will prevent U.K. businesses and institutions from dealing with their funds or economic resources in Britain.

Myanmar coup latest: UK slaps new sanctions on Min Aung Hlaing

NIKKEI ASIA

Nikkei staff writers
February 22, 2021

Military supporters confront residents in Yangon; ASEAN eyes 'informal' talks

A protester in Mandalay holds a placard with the face of Myanmar's military commander in chief, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing. © AP

YANGON/BANGKOK -- On Feb. 1, Myanmar's military detained State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint in the country's first coup since 1988, bringing an end to a decade of civilian rule.

The Suu Kyi-led National League for Democracy had won a landslide in a general election last November. But the military has claimed the election was marred by fraud.

For all our coverage, visit our Myanmar Coup page.

Rohingya family living in UK: 'We have to hold the military accountable for its atrocities'

Asian Image
Muhammad Khan
@MUHASSANKHAN

13th February 2021

Rohingya family living in UK: 'We have to hold the military accountable for its atrocities'

A Rohingya family now living in the UK have spoken of their experiences and the atrocities carried out by the Burmese military. They also told of life in a refugee camp.

Sirazul Islam, 21, was born in a camp in Kutupalong, Bangladesh and lived there till the age of eight before coming to the UK. He currently lives with his family in Bradford.

The world’s largest refugee camp in Cox’s bazaar in Bangladesh is home to one million Muslim Rohingya people. The Rohingya are commonly referred to as the most persecuted minority in the world.

UK stands by Bangladesh on Rohingya issue: envoy

The Daily Star 

City Desk
January 29, 2021

IUB holds daylong event

A daylong event titled "Rohingya: City on the Hill" was held at the Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB) on its Bashundhara campus in Dhaka on Wednesday.

Global Studies and Governance Program of the School of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at IUB organised the programme that highlighted humanitarian and repatriation challenges in Bangladesh since Rohingyas influx, said a press release.

British High Commissioner to Bangladesh Robert Chatterton Dickson was the chief guest at the inaugural session. He said the UK remains beside Bangladesh in addressing Rohingya-related challenges.

The UK should join the ICJ case against the Myanmar genocide

ARAB NEWS

Dr. Azeem Ibrahim
December 31, 2020

Rohingya refugees fleeing genocide in Myanmar cross into Bangladesh on September 10, 2017. (Shutterstock image)

The ongoing case on behalf of the Rohingya people at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against Myanmar for genocide has been initiated and championed by the small nation of The Gambia and has broken new ground in international law for being the first case of its kind brought by one UN country against another. In truth, all signatories to the UN Genocide Convention have the ability, and indeed the moral responsibility, to prosecute the crime of genocide wherever it may occur. And the UK should lend its full backing to the action by The Gambia.

This step seems to have become more likely with over 100 members of parliament signing a letter addressed to the government that the UK should be joining the legal action led by The Gambia. Among the signatories is the former UK Foreign Secretary, Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP, which lends further weight to this initiative.

Rights groups urge UK to join Rohingya case at ICJ

AA

Büşra Nur Bilgiç Çakmak

ANKARA

12.12.2020

Human rights bodies ask UK to follow Canada and Netherlands to join genocide case against Myanmar at ICJ 

FILE PHOTO - Source: official website of the ICJ

 

International human rights organizations on Friday urged the UK to support the genocide case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.

“In September, the Netherlands and Canada said they were planning to make a formal intervention in the case. We now urge the British government to also throw its weight behind the case,” said the statement issued by the human rights groups including the European Rohingya Council and Free Rohingya Coalition.

The groups added that it was becoming clear that the Myanmar government has no intention to follow the provisional measures set out by the court.

World briefs: Rohingyas shipped to lone island; EU, U.K. trade deal talks are ‘paused’; Saudis: End to Qatar boycott ‘in reach’; Bus goes off bridge in Brazil, killing 14

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 

COMPILED FROM NEWS SERVICES
Decenber 5,2020

Authorities in Bangladesh on Friday sent the first group of more than 1,500 Rohingya refugees to an isolated island despite protests by human rights groups.

The 1,642 refugees boarded seven Bangladeshi naval vessels in the port of Chittagong for the trip to Bhashan Char, according to an official.

After about a three-hour trip, they arrived at the island, which was once regularly submerged by monsoon rains but now has flood protection embankments, houses, hospitals and mosques built at a cost of more than $112 million by the Bangladesh navy.

UK Pledges to Support 860,000 Rohingya Refugees Amid Controversial Policies at Home

Global Citizen 

By James Hitchings-Hales 

Nov. 3, 2020 

While UK aid is doing tremendous good abroad, refugee policies at home need work.

In recent months, there have been UK government proposals to build a floating wall in the English Channel to keep out migrant dinghies, install water cannons that create waves to push away refugee boats, and create offshore detention camps on islands thousands of miles away.

The UK has hardly thrown its arms open to refugees in 2020. Indeed, asylum seekers are perhaps more likely to be met with war ships than welcome banners. It’s led to Global Citizen launching a campaign urging people to write to their MP, asking them to offer safe passage.

British sanctions against Myanmar military are ‘toothless’, says UK-based pressure group

Myanmar Now
Published on Oct 20, 2020

  

None of the 16 people subject to sanctions in the UK have had any assets frozen there, says Burma Campaign UK 

A member of the border guard force seen in Buthidaung township, Rakhine early last year. (Aye Chan Khaing/Myanmar Now) 

Senior members of Myanmar’s military and security services have been completely unscathed by “toothless” British sanctions imposed in response to the mass killing of Rohingya in Rakhine state, a rights group said.

A recent annual review from the British Treasury showed that none of the 16 individuals, including commander-in chief Min Aung Hlaing, have had any of their assets frozen as a result of measures.

IOM, UK Emergency Medical Team Continue COVID-19 Health Support for Refugees, Locals in Cox’s Bazar

IOM UN Migration
Date:10/13/20

Cox’s Bazar – From the outset of the COVID-19 health crisis in Bangladesh, humanitarian agencies in Cox's Bazar have worked around the clock to prepare to effectively respond to the outbreak in the district, which hosts one of the largest refugee settlements in the world.

Key to this enormous effort includes enhancing existing partnerships and seeking new collaborative opportunities to address the lack of technical expertise and strained human resources in an already complex refugee crisis.

UK for keeping Rohingya issue alive on UNSC agenda

NEWAGE

Diplomatic Correspondent 

Oct 01,2020 

The United Kingdom on Wednesday stressed the need for keeping the Rohingya issues alive on the international platforms including the UN Security Council for mounting pressure on Myanmar for ensuring repatriation of the members of the community to Rakhine.

‘Myanmar must remain on the agenda’ of the UNSC and likeminded countries would require to work together on the matter, British high commissioner Robert Chatterton Dickson said in a talk held on a web platform with Diplomatic Correspondents Association, Bangladesh in Dhaka.

Joint Statement on Myanmar oint Statement on Myanmar

GOV.UK

Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and Jonathan Allen
Published 11 September 2020

Joint statement by the UK, Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Tunisia, and the United States after Security Council consultations on Myanmar

UK accuses China of 'gross' human rights abuses against Uighurs

B B C

19 July 2020 

 China's ambassador Liu Xiaoming: "There is no such concentration camp in Xinjiang"

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has accused China of "gross and egregious" human rights abuses against its Uighur population and said sanctions against those responsible cannot be ruled out.

Reports of forced sterilisation and wider persecution of the Muslim group were "reminiscent of something not seen for a long time", he told the BBC.

UK imposes sanctions against human rights abusers

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6 July 2020
Killing of Jamal Khashoggi

Image copyright Reuters

The UK is imposing sanctions on 49 people and organisations behind the most "notorious" human rights abuses of recent years.

Individuals implicated in the death of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in 2009 will have their UK assets frozen and banned from entering the country.

And Saudi Arabian officials involved in the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi are also being targeted.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said the move sent a "clear message".