Foreign ministers of member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will meet on April 14 in Jeddah to discuss deadly violence against Muslims in Myanmar, announced OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu here Saturday.
Addressing a contact group meeting on violence against Myanmar Muslims known as Rohingyas, he said that the OIC was “ready to take all necessary measures and actions to deal with it.”
Ihsanoglu also pressed the government of Myanmar to “put an end to the Buddhist extremists and hate campaigns, as well as ethnic cleansing that they have launched against Muslims in the country.”
“We are calling for possible measures to help Rohingya Muslims to get back their legitimate lands and their rights to citizenship and stop the human rights violations against them,” the secretary-general said.
Ihsanoglu called on the contact group to establish contact channels with the international community to implement the recommendations of the Extraordinary Makkah Islamic Summit held last August.
State media in Myanmar reported Saturday that the death toll from communal violence in the center of the country over the past 10 days has risen to 43 with more than 1,300 homes, mosques and other buildings destroyed.
Ihsanoglu blamed the Myanmar government for being uncooperative with the international community’s requests to end the violence and come up with solutions. “We have knocked on every door to raise awareness and let the international community know about it. Last week I addressed that issue at the Arab League summit,” he said.
On Friday, Myanmar strongly rejected comments by the UN’s special rapporteur on Myanmar human rights, Tomas Ojea Quintana, the previous day that he had “received reports of state involvement in some of the acts of violence.”
Buddhist mobs have marauded through several towns in central Myanmar since religious violence erupted on March 20, prompting the government to impose emergency rule and curfews in some areas. It is the worst sectarian strife since violence between Buddhists and Muslims in the western state of Rakhine last year left at least 180 people dead and more than 110,000 displaced.