REMARKS BY FAREED KHAN -- Director of Advocacy and Media Relations, Rohingya Human Rights Network

Delivered in Ottawa on Parliament Hill for Rohingya Genocide Remembrance Day -- August 25, 2019

We are gathered today to mark the 2nd Rohingya Genocide Remembrance Day.  We’re joining other Canadians across the country holding similar events in cities from Halifax to Vancouver, to ask where is the Canadian government’s often stated commitment to the international rule of law and upholding human rights.  Where is Canada when it comes to defending the rights of the Rohingya, a people that the Canadian Parliament has acknowledged are victims of genocide in two unanimously supported motions last September and October?  Where is the commitment to that often repeated phrase “never again” which Canadian politicians like to invoke annually on occasions to remember victims of genocide?

Where are Canada and the other nations of the world that claim to be defenders of human rights when it comes to a people the United Nations has called the most persecuted minority in the world?

Since the fall of 2017 the Rohingya Human Rights Network has been working with human rights advocates and allied organizations to speak on behalf of the Rohingya in Canada, and convince the Canadian government that to be a nation that values human rights and basic humanity our leaders have to do more that issue media releases and statements condemning atrocities committed against innocent and helpless people.  Rather we as a nation need to take action to stop a program of genocide against the Rohingya that has been in progress for decades by the government of Myanmar, and continues today.

It’s been two years since atrocities against the Rohingya were first reported in western media and we learned of the horrors of what happened in Myanmar.

It’s two years after the start of the exodus of Rohingya from Myanmar that forced more than 720,000 refugees into Bangladesh to live in stateless limbo in the largest refugee camp in the world.

It’s two years after the beginning of an orchestrated campaign of gang rape by the Myanmar army and state supported Buddhist groups that victimized over 80,000 Rohingya women and girls, some as young as 10 years old.

It’s two years since the Rohingya were targeted and murdered in the tens of thousands – men, women and children (including babies) were killed with orders coming from the highest offices in Myanmar.  The exact number of dead is unknown because the government of Aung San Suu Kyi won’t let investigators into the region where the atrocities occurred.

And it’s two years since Myanmar began the process of systematically destroying Rohingya communities, wiping almost 400 Rohingya villages off the map at last count.

Three days ago the United Nations reminded us about the brutal genocide agenda of the Myanmar government when the International Fact Finding Commission on Myanmar released its latest report.  In that report they said, and I quote, “Myanmar routinely and systematically employed gang rape against women, girls, boys, men and transgender people.  It was so widespread and severe that it demonstrates intent to commit genocide which warrants prosecution."

The Rohingya were targeted for extermination simply because of who they are, and this has been going on for decades without any nation doing anything to stop it.

After World War 2 when the Allies learned that 12 million people had been murdered in a systematic fashion in Nazi concentration camps, we heard the phrase “never again”.  Never again should a nation be allowed to murder its own citizens with impunity.  It’s a phrase with a very distinct meaning and is invoked every year at memorial events for victims of genocide by politicians.  But those words are meaningless and an insult to past victims of genocide if we don’t act today when a genocide is happening in front of us.

In response to the horrors the Nazis committed Canada, along with the other members of the United Nations, drafted the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.  Canada is one among 148 nations that signed that treaty, as did Myanmar.

Since Canada is a party to the Genocide Convention, we and Canadians across the country are calling on Canada to fulfill its legal obligations under that treaty by invoking the Genocide Convention against Myanmar by filing a case at the International Court of Justice, especially since Canada has accepted that Myanmar committed genocide!

We are here as brother and sisters to those suffering in Myanmar.  We speak for a people without power whose land has been stolen, whose homes and livelihoods have been destroyed, and whose lives have been snuffed out.  We speak as human beings, to our leaders who claim to be defenders of human rights. 

For the umpteenth time the Rohingya Human Rights Network is calling on Canada’s leaders to act for the sake of the persecuted and the innocent in Myanmar who are facing death and extermination by a government that evokes evil no different than the Nazis. 

We are calling on our leaders and our prime minister to show Canada’s humanity in the face of the brutality and inhumanity that has been rained down on a people whose only crime was to be born Rohingya in Myanmar.  We call on Canada to show that being Canadian means living up to our treaty obligations under the Genocide Convention, and to file a case against Myanmar so that the process of seeking justice can begin, and to give hope for justice to Rohingya genocide survivors.

The time for words is long over.  Two years of waiting for the persecuted and suffering Rohingya is far too long.  Almost 40 years of being victims of a genocide agenda out of sight of the world is unacceptable.  It’s well past time for action.

When Canadian leaders use the words “never again” at future genocide memorial events they should truly mean never again.  Because to do otherwise is to insult the memory of the millions of victims of genocide of decades past, and shows a level of hypocrisy that is unforgivable!

In September 2017, as we heard news about what was happening to the Rohingya, the prime minister spoke at the dedication of Canada’s Holocaust Monument to remember the more than 6 million Jewish victims of the Nazis.  At that dedication he said, “This monument is a reminder of the devastating cost of allowing hatred and tyranny to overcome openness, inclusion, and freedom.  Today we reaffirm our unshakeable commitment to fight racism, xenophobia, and discrimination in all its forms."

Mr. Prime Minister, a commitment to opposing genocide, racism and xenophobia takes more than words.  It means taking action against genocide when it is happening, and prosecuting states that commit the ultimate crime.  So I ask, how committed are you to the words you spoke on that day?  If you truly believe what you said then it’s time for Canada to show its humanity and commitment as a nation to defending the cause of justice and peace by invoking the Genocide Convention against Myanmar.  Because like those who were victims of the Nazis the Rohingya deserve justice and a real hope for peace.  To do any less is to abandon our legal and moral responsibility as humans and as a nation.

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