Suu Kyi oversees panel on plight of Rohingyas

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi and former UN chief Kofi Annan yesterday oversaw the first meeting of a panel tasked with bringing peace to a region where violence between Buddhists and minority Rohingya Muslims has cast a pall over the country's democratic transition.

The plight of the Rohingya has raised questions about Suu Kyi's commitment to human rights and represents a politically sensitive issue for her National League for Democracy, which won a landslide election victory last year.

The commission, whose aim is to stop human rights abuses in the northwestern state of Rakhine, was chaired by Annan.

"This is an issue that we have failed to meet squarely and fairly, and to which we have not been able to find the right solution," Suu Kyi said at the meeting in the commercial capital, Yangon.

"We hope that this commission will help us to find solutions to the problem."

More than 100 people were killed in violence in Rakhine in 2012 and some 125,000 Rohingya Muslims took refuge in camps where their movements are severely restricted. Thousands have fled persecution and poverty by boat.

The Rohingya are considered by many in Myanmar to be illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and most do not have citizenship.

Suu Kyi, who is constitutionally barred from being president but leads the government as state counsellor and foreign minister, last month announced the nine-member commission, made up of six Myanmar citizens and three foreigners, to advise her government on the Rohingya issue.