Mr. Chair, I think a resident office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has not yet been established in Myanmar, but, as I said, the new government has been set up and running only for three weeks, essentially. The previous government was very resistant to having that office established. I think it is fair to say that they felt there was too much international scrutiny of the human rights situation in Myanmar. There had been some difficulties with particular international NGOs. The sense was that these were focused exclusively on the Rohingya, leaving aside all the other minorities—ethnic and religious groups—including in states other than Rakhine. That had created a bit of a challenge.
As I mentioned before the session began, I think the situation was quite tense in 2012, after the violence broke out in Rakhine. It took enormous efforts on the part of the then Burmese government and the NGO community in Burma/Myanmar, as well as the UN agencies, to calm that situation down. Frankly, since 2012, there has not been an upsurge of violence on that scale in Rakhine State.
I think what we witnessed in 2015 was an upsurge of anti-Muslim sentiment, generally, in Myanmar in the lead-up to the elections in November 2015. To some extent, the question of adherence to the Muslim faith, and the particular issue in Rakhine State involving Rohingya, became very highly politicized, such that I think the international community had initially imagined that the four laws on religion that I mentioned would have prejudiced particularly Muslims, obviously including Rohingya.
There had been an anticipation that those would not pass the legislature, or if they did pass they would be so watered-down that they would have little impact. It was somewhat of a surprise, I think, to the international community when all four laws actually passed. I think there was a dynamic in the run-up to the November elections that probably explains that fact. It is very unfortunate, because now we have laws on the books that will be very prejudicial to the Muslim community. Whether or not they are implemented obviously remains to be seen. As I said, it is three weeks into the new government.
As I mentioned, when Minister Dion was in Yangon and Naypyitaw, two weeks ago now, these were issues that he certainly raised with the Aung San Suu Kyi and the president.