Abe Urges Suu Kyi to Guarantee Panel Probe on Rohingya

October 10, 2018

Tokyo- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe urged Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday to guarantee the activities of an independent panel investigating the human rights situation of Muslim minority group Rohingya in Rakhine State.

At a meeting in Tokyo, Abe also asked Suu Kyi to create an environment for the return of displaced Rohingya people from Bangladesh, where they fled following persecution.

In reply, Suu Kyi stressed the importance of the Independent Commission of Enquiry, a Myanmar research team also including international experts, carrying out correct and appropriate activities, adding that Myanmar's government has granted it broad-ranging and considerable authority to achieve that goal.

At a news conference after their talks, Abe expressed his government's readiness to support the Myanmar government in efforts to resolve the Rohingya issue. Japan will offer assistance to build infrastructure including roads, power lines and water supply in Rakhine to assist in the resettlement of Rohingya people who returned from Bangladesh, according to Abe.

In 2016, Abe pledged to provide Myanmar with a five-year comprehensive assistance package worth some 800 billion yen from the public and private sectors in Japan.

He told Suu Kyi that as part of the package, projects to ease congestion and expand sewage facilities in Yangon, the Southeast Asian country's biggest city, to improve residents' daily lives have been decided.

On Myanmar's one-year visa-free program for Japanese tourists, which kicked off this month, both leaders expressed hopes for an expansion of human exchanges between the two countries. Jiji Press