Speaking in a rare televised address to the public, Suu Kyi outlined the priorities in implementing the commitments her government has made regarding the Rakhine issue naming them as repatriation, resettlement and development.

“In the Rakhine State, there are so many things to be done. If we are to take stock and prioritize, there are three main tasks,” she said.”First, repatriation of those who have crossed over to Bangladesh and providing humanitarian assistance effectively. Secondly, resettlement and rehabilitation. Third, bringing development to the region and establishing durable peace.”

Suu Kyi’s remarks came a day after the United Nations accused Myanmar’s military of deliberately driving out the Rohingya Muslims from the country with a plan to permanently keep them across the border.

A U.N. report released by a team of three experts mandated by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights Wednesday said that Myanmar’s military operations in Rakhine State aim not only to drive the Rohingya Muslims from the country but prevent their return.

The report said more than 500,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh as a result of the “well-organized, coordinated, and systematic” military operations following militant attacks on about 30 police posts and a regimental headquarters on Aug 25.

Myanmar authorities have said military operations are aimed at combating the threat of “terrorism” and restoring stability in Rakhine.

Suu Kyi in her address said Myanmar and Bangladesh already have had a successful experience with repatriation in the past and expressed her optimism for this time too.

“Since our independence, we have twice, successfully negotiated with Bangladesh on the issue. Based on these successful traditions, we are now negotiating for the third time,” Suu Kyi added.

Similar but smaller scale conflicts in Rakhine State in the late 1970s and in early 1990s have triggered repatriation processes between the two countries. The state counselor said she will also form a new body named called the Union Enterprise for Humanitarian Assistance, Resettlement and Development in Rakhine State, aiming to serve as a mechanism to implement projects in all sectors, for the development of Rakhine State. The new body, which would be chaired by Suu Kyi herself, would allow all the stakeholders, both local and international organizations, to work together in cooperation in all sectors and all strata of society to bring development in Rakhine State, she said.

“We will use this program to show practical and progressive results as we work towards the emergence of a peaceful and developed Rakhine State,” Suu Kyi added.

“You leave my country in 24 hours. All of you,” Duterte said in a speech during the inauguration of the newly-renovated press briefing room in Malacañang.“Just like that you tell us: ‘You will be excluded in the UN’. Son of … go ahead,” Duterte told reporters, adding European nations were taking advantage of the Philippines being poor.

“You give us money then you start to orchestrate what things should be done and which should not happen in our country. You bullshit. We are past the colonization stage. Don’t f… with us.”

Duterte said he was prepared to kick European ambassadors out of the country if their governments tried to expel the Philippines.“You think we are a bunch of morons here. You are the one. Now the ambassadors of those countries listening now, tell me, because we can have the diplomatic channel cut tomorrow. You leave my country in 24 hours, all, all of you.”

The EU had no statement calling for the Philippines’ removal from the UN but a seven-member delegation from the Progressive Alliance and the Party of European Socialists visited the country and called on the Duterte administration to stop killing suspected drug addicts and silencing its critics.

It was the New York-based Human Rights Watch that warned the Philippines would be at risk of being removed from the UN Human Rights Council because of alleged human rights violation in the country.

In a statement, the EU said it never called for the ouster of the Philippines from the UN.

“The recent visit of the delegation of the ‘International Delegates of the Progressive Alliance’ to the Philippines on 8-9 October was not a ‘European Union mission,’ as falsely reported by some media outlets,” the EU said.

The EU said it “was not part of the organization or planning of that visit – neither the Delegation of the European Union in the Philippines nor the European Union institutions in Brussels.”

“The statements made by the Progressive Alliance during its visit to the Philippines were made solely on behalf of the Progressive Alliance and do not represent the position of the European Union,” it said.

The EU and the Philippines, it said, both “work constructively and productively together in a close partnership in many contexts and areas, including, of course, in the UN context.”“The cooperation covers a very wide range of subjects, including trade, where this year the Philippines made extraordinary progress on its exports to the EU,” it said.

Sought for comment, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said there was no instruction from the President yet as of posting time.

“I was informed that as far as our relevant offices are concerned, at this time, DFA has not received any instructions on the matter,” DFA spokesman Robespierre Bolivar said.

President’s expression of outrage

In a statement, presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella clarified Duterte’s remarks.

“The President’s expression of outrage is in reaction to statements by a 7-member delegation of the International Delegates of the Progressive Alliance which has falsely portrayed itself as an EU mission,” Abella said.

He said the “delegation’s irresponsible statements protesting the alleged killings under the Duterte administration demean our status as a sovereign nation.”

“The call of the President for EU ambassadors to leave the country in 24 hours must be taken in this light,” he said.

“For so long has our President tolerated these undue interferences in our domestic affairs, and he has decided that these must stop if only to preserve the integrity and dignity of our State as a sovereign nation,” he added.

Myanmar’s western Rakhine state has been torn apart by communal bloodshed, sending more than 520,000 Rohingya racing over to neighbouring Bangladesh since late August.The leader of the world’s Catholics will visit both nations on a highly charged trip in late November — although there are currently no plans to stop in strife-torn Rakhine or the refugee camps in Bangladesh.

“We don’t know yet what will be in his speech… but he is coming for the sake of the country and he will be talking about peace,” Father Mariano Soe Naing, a spokesman for the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Myanmar, told AFP.

“There won’t be any interfaith meetings (in Myanmar) because of the lack of time,” he added.

He will talk with de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel peace prize laureate who has sparked international dismay for her perceived lack of sympathy towards the Rohingya and unwillingness to condemn alleged atrocities by the army.

The UN has accused Myanmar’s military of using a crackdown on Rohingya militants to violently expel the entire Muslim minority — a persecuted group the Pope has previously called “brothers and sisters”.

Authorities have denied that charge and accused Rohingya insurgents of terrorising ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Hindus in Rakhine.

Any further comments from the Pope seen as expressing support for the Rohingya could provoke a backlash from the Buddhist-majority public, who loathe the Muslim minority and have railed against global support for the group.

Some 200,000 people are expected to attend a mass led by Francis in Kyaikkasan Grounds, a stadium in Yangon, Father Mariano added.

After Myanmar the Pope will head to Bangladesh, which has had to absorb more than half a million Rohingya refugees in squalid border camps, putting a significant strain on the two countries’ ties.

– ‘Good and peaceful people’ –

Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s first civilian leader in decades, addressed the Rakhine crisis in a televised speech Thursday evening, calling for “humanitarian aid” to be distributed in the state.She has so far been unsucessful in parrying global outcry over the crisis, despite efforts in recent days by her government to push its credentials as a uniting force across religious lines.

Myanmar has a small roughly half a million Catholic population, mainly in the remote north.

The Southeast Asian nation and the Vatican only established full diplomatic relations in May, shortly after Suu Kyi met Pope Francis during a European tour.

That visit was overshadowed by her country’s treatment of the Rohingya, who are denied citizenship and have previously been displaced in huge numbers by communal violence and army campaigns.

Only weeks before the meeting Francis described the Muslim minority as “brothers and sisters” who were being tortured and killed for their faith.

He added they were “good and peaceful people who have suffered for years”.

That puts Francis at odds with many inside Myanmar, where anti-Rohingya hatred has festered for years.

Many, including the army and government officials, refuse to use the term Rohingya and instead insist the group are illegal “Bengali” immigrants.

“This is a Buddhist country so I don’t understand why the Pope should come here,” Maung Thway Chon, the founder of a newly-formed ultra-nationalist political party, told AFP.

“People are very angry about what he said about Bengalis,” he added.

Others in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, welcomed the pontiff as a potential ally.

“Christians and Buddhists are the same, we are peaceful, not like the Muslims,” said a Yangon taxi driver who only gave his name as Pani.

Suu Kyi, who lacks control over the powerful army, is desperate to stop religious bloodshed from erupting in other parts of the diverse country.

Earlier this week her party held an interfaith rally.

But her calls for unity have been met with outrage from detractors who accuse her glossing over the Rohingya’s suffering.//AFP