Another Burmese Scholar Succumbed to Muslim Terrorist Conspiracy Theory

My heart just sank as I watched him expound his Muslim terrorist conspiracy, deny that the genocide is taking place and Suu Kyi is complicit. (Maung Zarni)

Why have nearly 600,000 Rohingyas fled?

This is a deeply sad day for me.

Another life-long Burmese dissident who spent 16 years in jail just succumbed to "Muslim Conspiracy"

U Thein Than Oo is one of Myanmar's best known Human Rights Lawyers. He emerged as a defender of Muslim victims, as well as land confiscation victims, Burmese farmers.

He came to the Mormon's Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah (USA) for a conference on Religious Freedom and the Rule of Law.

He gave this interview to the VOA Burmese on 14 Oct 2017.

https://burmese.voanews.com/a/4069575.html

I was an admirer of his, and we had numerous drinking and discussion sessions about the Rohingyas and the military's use of Islamophobia as  rallying tool for popular support for its stay in power, over the last 2 or 3 years.

My heart just sank as I watched him expound his Muslim terrorist conspiracy, deny that the genocide is taking place and Suu Kyi is complicit.

Here is the gist of the interview:

1) ARSA attacked 30 border guard posts in order to provoke Myanmar military to launch this scorched earth attacks on Rohingya - in order to gain "world's sympathy and support for them";

2) Rohingyas may have fled for 3 reasons: A) out of fear for their lives; B) coerced by the ARSA; and C) lured with the promise of going to (better) Third Countries;

3) rape and mass slaughter are NOT an act of military's policy towards Rohingyas; a few bad apples among the troops may have committed them; they should be punished in accord with the law;

4) ARSA's leader was trained by ISIS, we know;

5) I spent my prison years with the old RSO (Rohingya Solidarity Organization) - they called themselves "Mujahideens"; but ARSA is a new group, with conspiratorial support coming from outside;

6) Aung San Suu Kyi has nothing to do with the violence against Rohingyas; she is only indirectly responsible for it by virtue of the fact that she is the de facto head of state;

7) it is not fair for the international community to put the blame on her;

8) we need to make sure Muslims do NOT swallow Buddhists in Rakhine and we need to ensure that Rakhine doesn't lose its predominantly Buddhist character;

9) we need to make sure that we strike the balance between the need to retain that Buddhist character of the state and respect for humanitarian law;

and:

10) we need to resolve this issue by sorting out those Rohingyas eligible for citizenship under 1982 Citizenship Act from those who are NOT eligible and therefore need to be shipped out to third countries that will take them.