MYANMAR-ELECTION/RAKHINE-AUNG SAN SUU KYI Aung San Suu Kyi campaigns in western Myanmar, to avoid trouble spot

Record ID: 135212

  • Title: MYANMAR-ELECTION/RAKHINE-AUNG SAN SUU KYI Aung San Suu Kyi campaigns in western Myanmar, to avoid trouble spot
  • Date: 16th October 2015
  • Summary: TOUNGUP TOWNSHIP, RAKHINE, MYANMAR (OCTOBER 16, 2015) (REUTERS) CROWDS GATHERING IN TOUNGUP TOWNSHIP, RAKHINE STATE PEOPLE SITTING AND WAVING NATIONAL LEAGUE AND DEMOCRACY (NLD) FLAGS PEOPLE DANCING WITH NLD CAMPAIGN SONG RAKHINE WOMEN SINGING AND WAVING NLD FLAGS NLD FLAGS PEOPLE WAVING NLD FLAGS AND HOLDING UP POSTER WITH PICTURE OF AUNG SAN SUU KYI, READING (Burmese) "W
  • Embargoed: 31st October 2015 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Myanmar
  • Country: Myanmar
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAEL54COT1AAGNTMCMSHH4AE6TE
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi urged supporters on Friday (October 16) not to let the issues of race and religion dominate a Nov. 8 parliamentary election, as she fended off questions over the country becoming majority Muslim if her party were to win.
    Hardline monks and nationalists have branded Nobel peace laureate Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) too sympathetic to Muslims and unwilling to protect Buddhism, the majority religion in the country of 51.5 million.
    The issue is particularly sensitive in the town of Toungup in Rakhine State, where Suu Kyi addressed hundreds of people on Friday gathered on a soccer pitch in the town.
    "Most people do not know that using things of religious or racial nature in the political campaigns is against the law. If someone breaks the law, he or she can be prosecuted by law," Suu Kyi told supporters, although under the military-drafted constitution Suu Kyi is barred from being president.
    In June 2012, 10 Muslims pilgrims travelling through the town were pulled from a bus by a mob and murdered, helping set off a wave of religious violence across the western state.
    Suu Kyi said the government had done little to combat the rising use of religion in politics, particularly rumours and accusations targeted at the NLD, and she urged her supporters to "watch out for it carefully."
    The NLD, which is expected to do well in the parliamentary elections, billed as Myanmar's first free and fair ballot in 25 years, does not have any Muslim candidates in its field of more than 1,100 election hopefuls.
    Suu Kyi is on a three-day campaign trip to Rakhine but has decided not to travel to the state capital, Sittwe, and other more northern townships which are home to the majority of Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims.
    In the township of Thandwe, where Suu Kyi also visited, one Muslim Burmese woman expressed her support for the opposition leader.
    "I want Suu Kyi to bring peace among us and stay with us to solve problems (apartheid conflict). I want this for my son, grandsons, great grandsons in the future," said 70-year-old Daw Hla Khin.
    About 140,000 Rohingya were displaced in 2012 by violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine and remain in temporary camps with severe restrictions on their movements.
    This year, temporary citizenship card holders, the majority of whom are Rohingya, were stripped of their right to vote, despite having been able to cast ballots in previous elections.
    Overseas, and in some other parts of the country outside of Rakhine, Suu Kyi has been criticized for saying little about their plight.
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