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Myanmar doing too little to ensure displaced Rohingya return

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Thousands of Rohingya refugees are living in Hakimpara refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. OCHA/Vincent Tremeau

UN agencies together with the Bangladesh authorities have appealed for $877 million to support hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, where conditions are still not conducive for their safe return, UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi said on Tuesday.

Speaking on the sidelines of the 2020 Joint Response Plan (JRP) launch for 855,000 ethnic Rohingya, and the more than 444,000 vulnerable Bangladeshis in host communities, Mr. Grandi urged Myanmar to take quicker action to help the displaced to return home.

“The solution continues to be in Myanmar”, said the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). “The problem is that things that need to be done there, to create conditions for refugees to return from Bangladesh into Myanmar, are too slow or not happening yet.”

In August 2017, a military operation in Myanmar’s Rakhine state in response to separatist violence prompted hundreds of thousands of ethnic Rohingya to flee.

At the time, then High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, likened the episode to a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing”.

Reporting to the Human Rights Council, he also cited reports of Myanmar authorities laying landmines along the border with Bangladesh and requiring returnees to provide “proof of nationality” – an impossibility, given that successive Myanmar governments have, since 1962, progressively stripped the Rohingya population of their political and civil rights, including citizenship rights.

Longstanding discrimination

At the current Human Rights Council session in Geneva, Zeid’s successor, Michelle Bachelet, noted that for over half a century, the policies of Myanmar had discriminated against religious and ethnic minorities.

Addressing Member States last week, she also said that the Government of Myanmar now had an historic opportunity to counteract systematic violations “by bringing its people together, as one”.

Listing the specific requirements of returning Rohingya refugees, Mr Grandi explained that they needed “freedom of movement, return of internally displaced people that are in camps in Rakhine state, respect of housing, land, property”.

Rohingya want ‘clarity’

They also needed “clarity on the pathway to citizenship that various commissions have indicated as being the fundamental step that needs to be taken”, the High Commissioner for Refugees insisted, in reference to recommendations by UN-appointed panels of experts.

Standing alongside the head of the UN migration agency (IOM) António Vitorino, Mr Grandi added: “There needs to be clarity in the minds of the refugees of what that means, in order for them not to be discriminated and to get eventually full integration in their own country, in their own society.”

In the months and years that followed the exodus from Rakhine state, Bangladesh has continued to host Rohingya refugees in a series of refugee camps in the south-east of the country, in an area known as Cox’s Bazar, along with host communities.

Highlighting the need for continued international assistance for Bangladesh, Shahriar Alam from the Bangladesh Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that in the first 17 days alone after the exodus began, almost half a million Rohingya crossed into Bangladesh.

“We expect the UN Member countries to do more and work with me and do everything possible to put pressure on Myanmar to take their citizenship back…repatriation that is safe, voluntary and dignified,” he said.

Appeal provides for host communities too

According to UNHCR, IOM and the Bangladesh authorities, the 2020 appeal places stronger emphasis on supporting host communities that have taken in Rohingya refugees and fostering their well-being.

They need help with public service infrastructure – in particular, to reduce the impact of seasonal monsoon flooding – and access to sustainable livelihoods, along with initiatives to rehabilitate the environment linked to sustainable energy initiatives.

All Rohingya refugee households now use Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) for cooking, which has led to a staggering 80 per cent drop in demand for firewood, the UN agencies said in a statement.

Some 30,000 local Bangladeshi families are also included in the initiative.

The introduction of LPG, together with reforestation measures, has resulted in a remarkable “re-greening” of the areas in Cox’s Bazar District where the Rohingya refugees are living, the appeal organisers maintained. 

The appeal’s other objectives include strengthening protection for refugee women, men, girls and boys; delivering life-saving assistance to those in need and working towards sustainable solutions in Myanmar in line with the internationally agreed Sustainable Development Goals agenda.

Latest UN data shows that the 2019 Joint Response Plan was just over 70 per cent funded, meaning that donors provided $650 million against the $921 million requested.

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ABC news: Xi signals strength in Russia-China alliance

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Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, image by the Presidential Press and Information Office

Chinese President Xi Jinping departed Moscow on Wednesday after two days of highly symbolic meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in which the two presented a united front and an alternative vision for global leadership, notes ABCnews.

Despite statements saying that “China-Russia relations are not the kind of military-political alliance during the Cold War,” China and Russia made clear they wanted to “advance the trend toward a multi-polar world.”

“This highly publicized summit may reflect a shift towards a new and more active role for China, as it seizes the opportunity to convey diplomatic – and possibly tangible – support for Russia and any other state that wishes to defy the West,” – Michael Butler, associate professor of political science at Clark University, told ABC News.

Joint animosity towards the U.S.-led world order has kept Russia and China close despite Putin’s war in Ukraine and western sanctions against Russia has made China their biggest customer and economic lifeline.

Beijing increasingly sees Russia as necessary ally as China and United States continue to fallout over numerous fronts not limited to Taiwan and access to semiconductors. It was further exasperated by the spy balloon episode earlier this year.

Beijing had initially hoped that the spiraling tensions with the U.S. would abate in the wake of Xi’s meeting with President Joe Biden in Bali last November, but as they continued to crater, Xi seems to have re-prioritized Russian relationship. He even aimed a rare direct slight at the United States earlier this month, blaming the Americans for “containment and suppression” as the reasons for China’s economic challenges.

Xi highlighted on numerous occasions over the two days of meetings that Russia and China are each other’s largest neighbors and that their partnership is “consistent with historical logic and a strategic choice of China.”

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Petr Pavl: “Ukraine must adjust to dwindling Western support”

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Image source: twitter @prezidentpavel

“We must consider war weariness”, says Czech President Petr Pavl. According to Czech President Petr Pavl, Ukraine must adjust to dwindling Western support. “We have to consider war weariness and what that means for support from Western states. This will pass with time,” Pavel told the ‘Süddeutsche Zeitung’.

He also mentioned the 2024 US presidential election and the concentration on domestic politics that could then be expected: “If US support decreases, support for a number of European countries will also decrease. Ukraine should take this into account.”

Thus, in 2024, Ukraine will probably no longer be able to start any large and complex operations, the new Czech president said. “This year is decisive for the development of the war.”

The former general was wary of the prospects of Ukraine joining NATO in the foreseeable future. “Ukraine’s path to Europe should run through a faster rapprochement with the European Union and only then with law enforcement agencies,” the President said. “I think that’s the right order.”

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WP: The real lesson from the showy Xi-Putin meeting

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Photo: Grigoriy Sisoev, RIA Novosti

Pentagon strategists have always divided the world into East and West, with U.S. regional forces under European Command or Indo-Pacific Command. But looking at the embrace of Presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin this week, you wonder whether we may need a single “Eurasian Command” to handle an integrated threat, writes ‘The Washington Post’ in a comment.

Xi’s rescue strategy for Russia seems to center on a peace plan that would stanch the bleeding in Ukraine. From what we know, Xi proposes a cease-fire agreement… By playing the peacemaker, Xi can position himself better to take other, harsher rescue measures if Ukraine rejects a cease-fire. He could offer ammunition for Russia, arguing he’s only leveling the playing field.

He could try to mobilize nations of the Global South, such as India, South Africa and Brazil, to pressure Ukraine to end the fighting. Xi wants to keep the high ground, invoking the sanctity of the United Nations charter even as he affirms his support for the Russian leader who shattered that charter’s norms. It’s a shameless approach, but smart diplomacy.

Xi’s emerging role as the leader of a Eurasian bloc presents dilemmas for U.S. strategists.

For a generation, separating China from Russia was a central goal of U.S. foreign policy. Driving that wedge was a major reason for the historic visit to China in 1972 by President Richard M. Nixon and national security adviser Henry Kissinger.

The Biden administration initially hoped it could try that strategy in reverse — warming relations with Moscow in the June 2021 summit in Geneva in part to concentrate on the Chinese challenge. That didn’t work out as the White House hoped, to put it mildly.

Now it’s Xi who is the triangulator. He is playing off the bitter split between the United States and Russia, helping Putin.

Xi similarly used China’s close relations with Iran to make the diplomatic breakthrough between Riyadh and Tehran that the United States could never achieve, writes WP.

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