YANGON – Social media giant Facebook has suspended several pages tied to Myanmar’s army chief General Min Aung Hlaing and the country’s military.
The development came after a United Nations probe called for him to be prosecuted for genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.
“We are banning 20 Burmese individuals and organizations from Facebook – including Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, commander-in-chief of the armed forces,” the California-based company said in a statement on its site, adding that it wants to prevent them from using the service to “further inflame ethnic and religious tensions”.
“We’re removing a total of 18 Facebook accounts, one Instagram account and 52 Facebook Pages, followed by almost 12 million people,” the statement further reads.
Earlier today, the investigators from United Nations called for an international probe and action against top leadership of Myanmar’s army including its chief for genocide against the country’s Rohingya minority.
https://en.dailypakistan.com.pk/world/un-report-stresses-prosecution-of-myanmar-army-chief-over-rohingya-genocide/
“Myanmar’s top military generals, including Commander-in-Chief Senior-General Min Aung Hlaing, must be investigated and prosecuted for genocide in the north of Rakhine State, as well as for crimes against humanity and war crimes in Rakhine, Kachin and Shan States,” a UN-backed fact-finding mission said.
Thousands of Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims fled to Bangladesh following a campaign of arson and killings by the army in the Buddhist-majority last year.
The investigative report of UN mission says that the army tactics had been “consistently and grossly disproportionate to actual security threats.”
The Rohingya are one of many ethnic minorities in Myanmar and make up the largest percentage of the country’s Muslims. The government, however, sees them as illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh and denies them citizenship.
The military launched its latest crackdown after militants from Arsa attacked police posts in August 2017, killing several policemen.
According to the medical charity MSF, at least 6,700 Rohingya, including at least 730 children under the age of five, were killed in the first month after the violence broke out.
