The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Tuesday revoked a prestigious human rights award it had given to Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s state counselor, for failing to address or even acknowledge the ethnic cleansing of her country’s Rohingya Muslim minority.
The museum said the political party Aung San Suu Kyi leads, the National League for Democracy, blocked journalists, refused to cooperate with United Nations investigators and promoted hateful rhetoric against the Rohingya Muslim community.
The museum’s website said the Elie Wiesel award would be given annually “to an internationally prominent individual whose actions have advanced the Museum’s vision of a world where people confront hatred, prevent genocide and promote human dignity.”
However, the museum said she had to forfeit the award for failing to live up to its vision.
“We had hoped that you — as someone we and many others have celebrated for your commitment to human dignity and universal human rights — would have done something to condemn and stop the military’s brutal campaign and to express solidarity with the targeted Rohingya population,” the museum said in a letter to Aung San Suu Kyi.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner became only the second person to receive the award in 2012 after enduring 15 years of house arrest for taking on the military dictatorship in Myanmar. The award is named after Holocaust survivor and co-founder of the Holocaust Museum Elie Wiesel.
Many countries have accused Myanmar of ethnic cleansing, but, the Times notes that Aung San Suu Kyi has never denounced the government’s actions or even said the word Rohingya in public.
