China has taken an initiative to sit with Bangladesh and Myanmar at the sideline of UN General Assembly to discuss Rohingya crisis.
The tripartite meeting will be held on September 27 in New York where Foreign Ministers of Bangladesh AH Mahmood Ali and China Wang Yi, and Myanmar Union Minister Tint Swe will sit together to discuss about the Rohingyas who fled Rakhine to save themselves from the Myanmar military.
Mahmood Ali at a press briefing on Thursday, “I will have a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister in New York. It is expected that the Myanmar minister will also be present there.”
A senior government official seeking anonymity said, “This Chinese initiative is part of their plan to solve the crisis bilaterally and start the repatriation under any circumstances.’
We had several meetings with the Chinese side and they always proposed us to solve the crisis bilaterally and not to drag the Rohingya case in the international arena, he said.
Another official seeking anonymity said, “Human rights violation, fear of radicalisation and social disparity in Rakhine is not a bilateral issue, rather a regional and global issue.”
The Myanmar military killed thousands of Rohingyas with genocide intention and the United Nations report revealed it, he said.
The international community will raise its concern whenever it finds human rights violation and Rakhine is not an exception, he said.
China is trying to help Myanmar as it has huge stake in Myanmar, he said.
Subscribing the same view, former Bangladesh defence attaché to Maynmar Md Shahidul Haque said, “Beijing has built 1,200 kilometre long gas and oil pipeline from Rakhine to Kunming.”
Not only that China agreed to invest over $3 billion to set up a 6,000 megawatt power plant in Myanmar with a condition that it would import half of the electricity, but in 2010 Nay Pyi Daw scrapped it, he said.
“After 8 years, after the Rohingya crisis started, Myanmar agreed to revive the project,” he added.
“Beijing is Dhaka’s friend, development partner and one of the biggest investors, but as far as Rohingya issue is concerned, China has taken the side of Myanmar,” Shahidul said.
The Myanmar military on Aug 25 last year launched a crackdown on Rohingyas who fled to Bangladesh to save their lives and in the attack over 25,000 are estimated to be killed by the military.