Aung San Suu Kyi is losing her awards due to her support of the governmental actions in Rakhine. Edinburgh has revoked a freedom of the city award, too, Aljazeera reported.
Suu Kyi’s Freedom of Edinburgh award is set to be stripped off for her political position. Her refusal to condemn the violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar cost her a lot, that award will be the seventh honour that the former Nobel peace prize winner has been stripped of over the past year.
In last year, Oxford, Glasgow and Newcastle have revoked Suu Kyi’s Freedom of the City awards, Edinburgh follows them. More than decade ago, Suu Kyi was even compared to Nelson Mandela, according to Lord Provost. That pro-active woman was given the award in 2005 to honour her role in championing peace and democracy in Burma, where she was living under house arrest.
In 2017, ‘a symbol of peaceful resistance in the face of oppression’ lost her luster after she defended her government’s actions in Rakhine.
Aung San Suu Kyi has defended her government’s actions in Rakhine
The past year has seen Suu Kyi’s international reputation as a beacon of hope tarnished by what many see as her complicity or apathy towards the crimes committed in Rahkine. She has repeatedly refused to call the Rohingya by their name- which is seen as an acceptance of their belonging in Myanmar- and in a speech in Singapore yesterday, she described them simply as the “displaced persons from northern Rakhine.”
Speaking at a lecture in Singapore in which she reviewed her first two years in power, Aung San Suu Kyi refused to recognise the atrocities committed by the Myanmar military and instead justified her government’s campaign against the beleaguered Muslim community.
“We, who are living through the transition in Myanmar, view it differently than those who observe it from the outside and who will remain untouched by its outcome,”
she said, in an apparent response to criticism of how her government has handled the plight of the Rohingya.
