MYANMAR will refuse entry to the UN mission investigating abuse of Rohingya Muslims, The Guardian reported today.

Kyaw Zeya, permanent secretary at the Foreign Affairs Ministry in Naypyidaw, said Myanmar’s missions worldwide have been “advised accordingly” not to issue the UN investigators or their representatives visas to enter Myanmar.

“If they are going to send someone with regards to the fact-finding mission, then there’s no reason for us to let them come,” said Kyaw Zeya today.

He said the UN probe was “unwarranted pressure”, insisting that the domestic investigation headed by former lieutenant general and vice-president Myint Swe was sufficient for the situation in Rakhine.

“Why do they try to use unwarranted pressure when the domestic mechanisms have not been exhausted?” said Kyaw Zeya. “It will not contribute to our efforts to solve the issues in a holistic manner.”

The investigation follows a UN report in February that said Myanmar’s treatment of minority group could amount to ethnic cleansing, which Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has denied is happening in the country.

“I don’t think there is ethnic cleansing going on,” she said earlier this year.

During a visit to Sweden early this month, the Nobel laureate said the mission “would have created greater hostility between the different communities”.

The UN mission was to probe allegations of killings, rape and torture  of Rohingya Muslims by Myanmar security forces.

Although she does not oversee the military, Aung San Suu Kyi has been criticised for failing to stand up for the more than one million stateless Rohingya Muslims in the western state of Rakhine.

A minority in the Buddhist-majority country, many of the Rohingya have fled to Malaysia, Indonesia, Bangladesh and other countries in Southeast Asia to escape persecution.

Reports say about 200,000 unregistered Rohingya refugees are living in Bangladesh, on top of 32,000 registered ones living in two camps there.

In the southeastern district of Cox’s Bazar, AFP reported in May 2015 that another 200,000 unregistered Rohingya refugees were living in Bangladesh, most of them near the two official camps.

As of May, there are 58,600 Rohingya in Malaysia, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. – June 30, 2017.