Myanmar, Rohingya Crisis: could the EU play an important role?

Our Benedetta Fornaciari da Passano in her new policy brief analyses the local situation in Myanmar connected with the discrimination of the Rohingya minority. She also tries to define the position of the EU and its possible engagement in the crisis.

Benedetta Fornaciari da Passano published her new policy brief about the crisis in Myanmar, where the human rights of the local Rohingya minority are beeing violated and they are facing the permanent discrimination. She examines the roots of this conflict and tries to analyse the possible ways how could the EU react. 

Rohingya  were  always  recognised  as  illegal migrants   and   they   have   been   facing   discrimination throughout   the   20thcentury.   Refugee   flows   toward Bangladesh, Pakistan and other countries have been going on  since  World  War  II​.

This minority  has  been  considered  as  foreign  to  the  country because  they  were  part  of  an  internal  migration  since Myanmar  was  part  of  the  British  Empire  as  a  province named Burma. During the time of the British Empire, many Rohingya migrated from the then India and Bangladesh to contemporary  Myanmar,  a  movement  that  was  internal under the British rule.

One  of  the  scenario  to  solve  the  crisis  could  be  to progressively impose restrictive measures against Myanmar as  it  has  been  done  in  other  occasions  by  the  EU  in violations  of  human  rights.  However,  this  is  less  likely  to happen because until now no one has expressed the will to impose sanctions, and even if applied these sanctions would not  contribute  to  a  major  shift  in  constructing  a  durable solution.  Firstly,  the  main  problem  would  be  to  whom impose sanctions: even if it is true that the government is not  ensuring  respect  of  human  rights,  principal  actor  of violations is the army. (...) This  clearly  shows  how  complex  could  be  to address guilty party with sanctions. Moreover, the country is  now  part  of  a  democratization  process  and  sanctions could only worsen the condition of the population spreading more abhor among minorities.

The whole policy brief is available on the right side on the PDF button. 

Foto: © Margot Yemer of RohingyasProject

Benedetta Fornaciari da Passano