Pakistan approves $5m for Rohingyas, but wants UN, OIC to take notice of migrant's plight

Senate passes resolution against Rohingya 'genocide', urges government to take up matter with UN Secretary General

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has proposed the establishment of a high-powered committee comprising foreign ministers of the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC) to ask Myanmar “restore fundamental rights of the battered Rohingya Muslim community,” in addition to approving $5 million for providing relief goods to Rohingyas.

The foreign ministers will travel to Myanmar with a view to press the government there to restore fundamental rights of the battered community such that they could live peacefully and without any fear of persecution in their home country.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday approved recommendations of the ministerial committee constituted on the issue of Rohingya Muslims.

According to the recommendation, the prime minister will write a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and United Nations Security Council president to highlight the humanitarian crisis and ask for intensification of diplomatic and moral pressure on the Myanmar government to grant adequate citizenship rights to the community in accordance with international humanitarian laws.

Read: PM formed special committee on relief efforts for Rohingya Muslims: Nisar

Adviser to the Prime Minister on National Security Sartaj Aziz would also address another letter to OIC secretary general and propose the creation of a Special OIC Fund to provide food and other assistance to Rohingya Muslims who left Myanmar, and also those who are leading miserable life in the country. The first letter was sent on May 20.

The committee also decided a special grant of $5 million to provide food to Roghingya's through the World Food Programme at camps in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

In line with the recommendations, Pakistan will also intensify efforts at all levels to highlight the plight of the battered community.

Interior Minister Chaudhary Nisar had on June 6 had vehemently pleaded the case of Rohingya Muslims, raising the grave humanitarian issue twice during the last two cabinet meetings.

Senate passes resolution against Rohingya 'genocide'

Meanwhile, the Senate on Tuesday unanimously passed a resolution saying the Myanmar government was violating human rights and urged the government to immediately take up the matter with United Nations secretary general.

Read: Persecution of Muslims: Pakistan to mobilise OIC and UN over Rohingya plight

Moved by Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed from the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-N), the resolution urged the government to consider dispatching relief provisions and financial support.

“Taking cognisance of the crimes against humanity being systemically committed against the Rohingya Muslims at the behest of Myanmar government, which is aided and abetted in this heinous campaign by religious extremists in that country, Senate of Pakistan strongly condemns these crimes and killings which tantamount to a genocide against a peaceful community, who are being persecuted on grounds of race and religion,” said the resolution.

The resolution added Rohingya Muslims were literally being pushed into the sea, their houses burnt and demolished, their women being raped, their children, women and men butchered as part of an organized campaign of ethnic cleansing. It demanded the international community to take firm and urgent notice of such unprecedented violations of human rights.