The European Union is sending a fact-finding mission to Myanmar to look into reports of human rights violations and might, eventually, exclude the county from a duty-free trade initiative, EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom said on Friday.
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th October, 2018) The European Union is sending a fact-finding mission to Myanmar to look into reports of human rights violations and might, eventually, exclude the county from a duty-free trade initiative, EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom said on Friday.
At the moment, Myanmar is a member of Everything But Arms initiative, under which a number of developing countries can trade with the European Union free of duties and quotas. However, Myanmar's status may now be in jeopardy over the allegations made against the country's top military generals.
"We have been looking at the situation in Cambodia and Myanmar. Of course, our trade police is, as you know, value-based. So, these are not just words, we have to act when there are severe violations. So we have notified the Myanmar authorities that a fact-finding mission ... will be arriving in the country, in coming days, to assess the situation on the ground. And this high-level mission is in the framework of the potential withdrawal of Everything But Arms," Malmstrom said, when asked if the European Union was planning to do anything regarding Myanmar's alleged human rights violations.
UN investigators said in a report in August that the Myanmar military was responsible for numerous human rights violations and abuses during the crackdown on Rohingya people. The country's authorities refuted the allegations in the report.
The government forces in Myanmar have been clashing with the Rohingya since 2016. In 2017, police and military units were deployed in the Rakhine state, where many Rohingya live, in response to local insurgents attacking the government's security posts.
