‘Correction within Myanmar Buddhists needed to end Rohingya sufferings’
UNB
Though everybody knows Buddhists as peace-loving people, Iranian scholar Dr S Javad Mazloumi has said a new definition of Buddhism, seen in Myanmar, is one of many reasons why Rohingyas are suffering there and that definition needs to be corrected.
“Everybody knows them as peaceful and peace-loving people. What we see in Myanmar is a new definition of Buddhism,” he told UNB in an interview expressing displeasure over the words used by some of their leaders in Myanmar referring to Muslims.
Dr Mazloumi, Deputy for Cultural Affairs, said he had many meetings with Buddhists, Buddhist monks and great scholars in different countries. “Most of them believe they should correct this problem.”
Sharing his understanding with fellow scholars on extremist view in Myanmar, the Iranian scholar said one group is trying to translate the Buddhism in a different way which it is not the common in other countries.
“If you ask them (Rohingyas) why don’t they have the identity of Myanmar, they will answer, they had it but was taken away,” he said as he completed his fourth visit to Rohingya camps in Cox’s Bazar district.
Myanmar’s Religious Affairs and Culture Minister Thura Aung Ko recently said Rohingyas living in Bangladesh are being “brainwashed” and Bangladesh is not allowing them to return, according to international media.
Earlier on November 27, the Myanmar minister talked about the birth rates among the people of an unnamed religion apparently referring to Muslims.
He said while Buddhists practise monogamy and they have only one or two children but an “extreme religion” encourages having three or four wives and giving birth to 15 to 20 children, international media quoted him as saying in a video published by Radio Free Asia.