Philippines wants to be viewed by Myanmar as a friendly neighbor

November 27, 2017

The Philippines does not want to antagonize its relationship with Myanmar when it voted "No" on a United Nations' draft resolution calling on Myanmar authorities to end a military campaign against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said on Monday.

In a press briefing in Davao City, Roque reiterated that the Philippines did not want Myanmar to go back and become an "isolationist state" again.

"And to me, that of course makes a lot of sense because not too long ago, Myanmar, as an isolationist country, completely shut off from the rest of the world. We were, in fact, one of the few countries that continued to have close relations with Myanmar to the point that we were amongst those that first pressured the military junta to accord the rights to opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi," he explained.

"Now, so that’s the kind of relationship that we have with Myanmar. We always want to be viewed by Myanmar as a friendly neighbor country so that we can continue to engage with the government of Myanmar," he added.

During the Philippine hosting of the 31st Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit and Related Summits, the chairman's statement did not contain strong words against the situation of the Rohingya in Rakhine.

Roque said there was no ASEAN declaration made on the issue.

"But I think many countries expressed concern. And Myanmar, in fact, addressed the concerns by raising three points: It is in the process of implementing the Kofi Annan report; it will allow delivery of humanitarian assistance; and it will allow the return of refugees from Bangladesh after it had executed an MOU (memorandum of understanding) with Bangladesh," he noted.

Some 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have been forced to flee the country to Bangladesh due to the violence allegedly perpetrated by the state forces. Celerina Monte/DMS