On Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi expressed concern over continued discrimination and violence against Muslims in Myanmar that has resulted in the killing and forced displacement of thousands of Rohingyas.
In March, a UN expert commission said in its report that crimes against humanity, including ethnic cleansing, were very likely to have been committed against Rohingya people in Myanmar's state of Rakhine. Myanmar declined to acknowledge the findings of the report as sufficient evidence. In late June, Myanmar's authorities did not let the UN Human Rights Council's team investigating alleged ethnic cleansing into the country.
Representatives of the indigenous nationalities of Myanmar consider Rohingya people, which have been relocated to Rakhine from Bengal by UK colonial authorities in the 19th century, illegal migrants from Bangladesh. The nationalist organizations of Myanmar's indigenous peoples demand that all "illegal migrants," especially Muslims, should be expelled from Myanmar. Radical organizations have previously initiated riots, as a result of which several villages and towns of Rohingya have been completely burned in recent years.
In Myanmar's neighboring countries, including Bangladesh, there are refugee camps for the Rohingya people, who fled Myanmar because of ethno-religious clashes with the indigenous population of the state.
