ASEAN: CHIANG MAI – Asean foreign ministers pledge vital role in Rohingya crisis

CHIANG MAI: Foreign ministers of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreed at an informal meeting on Friday for the bloc to play a vital role in solving the Rohingya refugee crisis while taking note of “concerns” over territorial conflicts in the South China Sea.

In the chairman’s final press statement released after the Asean Foreign Ministers’ Retreat in Chiang Mai, the ministers endorsed a proposal to send a humanitarian needs-assessment mission to Myanmar’s Rakhine state to facilitate the repatriation process.

However, Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai told a press conference that a timeline to send the team was not fixed, saying it will be subject to conditions on the ground.

The statement stressed the need to find a “comprehensive and permanent” solution to the plight of the Rohingya.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who also serves as foreign minister, did not attend the retreat. International Cooperation Minister Kyaw Tin attended in her place.

More than 720,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled from Rakhine since the military launched a harsh crackdown there in August 2017 in the wake of attacks on security posts by militants of the minority ethnic group.

Their repatriation from sprawling camps in neighbouring Bangladesh has been delayed as they are not confident in their safety after returning home.

Some of the ministers called for the refugees, who are considered stateless people in Myanmar, to be given Myanmar citizenship, but the Myanmar minister rejected the proposal, according to sources.

One of the options is to invite Rohingya representatives from the camps to see that Rakhine state is now safe for them, Mr Don said Thursday night after the ministers’ working dinner. Another is to ask people who live peacefully in Rakhine to assure their fellow Rohingya that it is now safe to return, he added. Both were raised and discussed among the ministers but no decision was reached.

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According to Asean diplomats at the retreat, although the grouping has a policy of non-interference in members’ internal affairs, Myanmar has expressed willingness to receive humanitarian assistance from Asean.

The Needs Assessment Team, however, cannot be sent immediately due to ongoing fighting between an ethnic armed group and government troops in some areas.

On the South China Sea situation, the statement said the ministers “took note of some concerns on the land reclamations and activities in the area,” which had been removed from a previous draft.

An Asean source said Vietnam pushed to have the text restored. Both Vietnam and the Philippines were said to have briefly expressed their concerns over land reclamation in the South China Sea.

The Thai foreign minister reiterated that Asean will in 2019 finish the first reading of single draft negotiating text on forging a code of conduct among the claimants in the sea, with the next meeting on the text to be held in Myanmar late February.

Asean and China last year agreed on the text, which will form the basis of future code of conduct negotiations.

China claims rights to nearly the entire South China Sea and has erected artificial islands with military infrastructure in the waters.

Among Asean, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam also have territorial claims in that sea.

Regarding the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, a proposed free trade group encompassing 16 Asia-Pacific countries, Mr Don said that the foreign ministers only voiced their support for the negotiations for the China-backed trade pact to move ahead..