MANILA – President Rodrigo Duterte on Friday made a public apology to Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi for labelling the military crackdown on Rohingya minority a “genocide”.
“I will address to Madame Aung Kyi. I will apologize to you but if you have noticed my statement was almost a satire,” Duterte said in a pre-dawn press conference after arriving from a three-day trip to China at the Davao International Airport.
Duterte issued the apology a week after he compared his war on drugs to the Rohingya problem amid the Europeans’ criticisms on the drug personalities killed in his campaign against illegal drugs.
“I said, Well, there is (problem) in Burma. There are a lot of human rights violation. So what are you doing?” Duterte said.
He said he was asking the Europeans if they have provided sanctuary for the victims of war.
“They keep on criticizing us, Aung (San Suu) Ki, and others,” Duterter said. “I was just using because I said, ‘if you are willing, you guys in Europe, to receive, provide sanctuary or in the meantime allow the Rohingyas to stay with your country, I will also do it.”
Duterte admitted his comment on Rohingya crisis was very sarcastic but admitted that he is “not ready to intervene” in Myanmar’s problem.
“I was just adapting their findings that there a lot of violations in your country,” Duterte said.
He challenged Myanmar’s critics to provide relief to Rohingya people instead of talking too much.
“I said, ‘You talk too much. There are a lot of people with nowhere to go. Why don’t you provide any relief?” the Filipino leader said. (PNA)
