UK’s Johnson Meets Myanmar’s Suu Kyi on Rohingya Crisis

Britain’s foreign minister Boris Johnson met with Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar’s capital on Sunday to press for action on the Rohingya crisis, as the country faces mounting pressure to punish troops accused of atrocities against the Muslim minority.

Johnson spoke with the embattled Myanmar leader, whose reputation among the international community has plunged over her handling of the crisis, in Naypyidaw while on a four-day tour in Asia, AFP reported.

The meeting followed Johnson’s visit to a refugee camp in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district, where nearly 700,000 Rohingya have sought sanctuary in squalid settlements since a Myanmar army crackdown in northern Rakhine last August.

The UN has accused Myanmar of driving the Muslim minority across the border in an ethnic cleansing campaign. Doctors Without Borders estimates at least 6,700 Rohingya died in the first month of violence.

But Myanmar has staunchly denied the charges and blocked UN investigators from the conflict zone, souring relations with a host of western allies.

On Sunday Johnson and Suu Kyi “discussed in an open and friendly manner the latest developments in Rakhine State, including planning for the reception of returnees who fled”, Myanmar’s foreign ministry said in a Facebook post alongside photos of the pair meeting.

Ahead of the talks the UK’s foreign office said Johnson would press for an “end to the suffering in Rakhine and the safe and voluntary return of the refugees”.

Johnson is scheduled to visit Rakhine later on Sunday.

Myanmar and Bangladesh have inked a deal to bring refugees back to northern Rakhine, but repatriation has yet to begin.

Many Rohingya do not feel safe returning to a country where they have faced violent persecution and decades of discrimination at the hands of a state that has denied them citizenship.