The demand to recognise the Rohingya as an ethnic group and tp provide them with basic rights and Myanmar citizenship was made yesterday at a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand.

The event was strictly monitored by police because authorities were concerned it might affect the Thai-Myanmar relationship and the country’s stability.

Rohingya Thailand Group secretary-general Haji Ismail told the gathering that his group had given up on expectations that the new democratic government would secure their citizenship, as Suu Kyiherself chooses to deny the identity of Rohingya.

“Our democratic state leaders are now denying our identity and citizenship just to appease their co-religionists and extremists in Rakhine State,” Ismail said. “All our hopes in the leadership of democratic statesmen have faded. Indeed, we did not hope [for] this sort of harsh and negative political stance and undemocratic rhetoric from our Nobel peace laureate.

“We are highly frustrated. About 1.5 million Rohingya are in strict confinement in Rakhine State for the last four years. Their future is nothing but degenerative uncertainty. So, our appeal to the world community is to rescue us from the clutches of Myanmar’s racist tyrants – old and new.”

The president of the Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand, Maung Kyaw Nu, also expressed disappointment over Suu Kyi‘s stance on the issue and said he could not offer any suggestions to a government which denied Rohingya citizenship.

“Many people call her ‘Mother Suu’ and the Rohingya people also call her that, but this mother doesn’t like to feed milk to her Rohingya people. She would like to throw us away. With this kind of leader, we don’t like to send any recommendation to her because we will not get anything,” he said.

The Coalition for the Rights of Refugees and Stateless Persons coordinator, Siwawong Suktavee, read an open letter at the press conference offering recommendations to Suu Kyi, who is also the foreign minister, how to deal with the Rohingya refugee human-rights crisis.

Siwawong urged the Myanmar government to revise the citizenship law and give Myanmar nationality to Rohingya to address their statelessness issue.