YANGON - Hundreds of demonstrators protested outside an
airport in restive western Myanmar on Thursday against a human rights visit by
a United Nations envoy, police told AFP. Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Myanmar, flew into Sittwe, the capital of Rakhine state, on Thursday evening and was greeted by crowds of chanting, placard-waving protesters.
The state has seen spates of deadly religious violence between local ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and the Muslim Rohingya minority in recent years.
In August 2013 a previous UN rights envoy was forced to
abandon plans to visit Rohingya displaced by a spate of anti-Muslim violence in
the town of Meiktila, central Myanmar, when his convoy came under attack by an
angry mob. Lee's visit comes days after the UN adopted a resolution urging Myanmar to grant citizenship to the minority group, viewed by the state as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants with restrictions placed on their movement, marriages and economic opportunities.
Police said around 1,000 people, including 100 monks, had gathered at the airport.
Some chanted "Yanghee Lee Get Out".
Source: AsiaOne...More...
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