''India, Bangladesh Should Jointly Pressurize Myanmar'' Says The UN Secretary General On Rohingyas

The United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday, October 2, 2018, opined that India needs to support Bangladesh much more and put pressure on Myanmar to ease the Rohingya crisis. The UNSG, while delivering a public lecture on Global Solutions, Global Challenges in the national capital, while responding to a question on Rohingya refugees, said:

"I have not seen any community as discriminated as the Rohingya. Deep-rooted racism in Buddhist Myanmar society. The way Rohingya is treated by extremism and armed forces was brutal and it is not acceptable. India needs to support Bangladesh much more and put pressure on Myanmar to ease the worst humanitarian crisis I have ever seen."

READ: The US Documents Systematic Violence Against Myanmar Rohingyas

On being asked about the definition of terrorism, Guterres, who is on his maiden visit to India, accepted that the United Nations has not been able to define terrorism.

"There is no agreement on the definition of terrorism. It's not so dramatic because there are a number of tools and instruments working on that. But the problem with the definition of terrorism is that there are several complexities involved. It is true, we never managed to have it and we never managed to have a true convention because of the definition."

During the event, on being questioned about the stand of the United Nations on the issue of terrorism, Guterres said that the organization has created an office of counter-terrorism in the secretariat and also launched a programme not only on counter-terrorism but also on the prevention of violent extremism.

"We have just created an office of counter-terrorism in the secretariat. We have launched a programme not only on counter-terrorism but also on the prevention of violent extremism. We now have a center of coordination where 38 agencies deal with that to be much effective to deal with the member states, and we are putting more and more agenda of terrorism in the Security Council," he said.

Guterres continued;

"It's clear that we are totally committed to it. But it's also clear that today terrorism became a major problem because we have more and more conflicts interlinked, and more and more conflicts linked to terrorism. Then you have a number of situations in which discrimination, unresolved problems facilitates the work of terrorists. India has been in the frontline of supporting this, and we fully support India in this regard."

READ: Rohingya Crisis: ''UN Has 'No Right To Interfere'' Says Myanmar Army Chief Min Aung Hlaing

He also lauded India for its role in working towards multilateral architecture to climate change initiatives, adding that India is an absolutely essential component of a multi-polar world.

"It is essential to create factors of equilibrium to create a multi-polar world and for that, no country is in a better place than India due to its dimension, technological capacity, geo-strategic location. India is an absolutely essential component of the future multipolar world," he said.