Buddhists protest UN human rights envoy in western Myanmar
http://www.myspiritfm.com/apps/articles/default.asp?blogid=0&view=post&articleid=167654&link=1&fldKeywords=&fldAuthor=&fldTopic=0
Buddhists in Myanmar’s Rakhine state on Wednesday staged a protest against the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar who arrived on a fact-finding trip over alleged abuses by security forces against the Muslim Rohingya minority. Less than 100 protesters from the state's ethnic Rakhine Buddhist community shouted and held signs as UN envoy Yanghee Lee passed in her car in Sittwe, the state capital, calling her unfair and unwanted."We are strongly against the U.N.'s rights envoy visit as her reports never reflect the views of ethnic Rakhines and she is biased on the side of the Bengalis, so people are protesting," said Soe Naing from the Rakhine social network using the term “Bengali” to describe Muslim Rohingya. It is Lee's sixth visit to Myanmar to assess the human rights situation in Rakhine, Shan and Karen states. She will also visit Yangon and Naypyidaw.Lee has criticized the government's treatm...
Buddhists in Myanmar’s Rakhine state on Wednesday staged a protest against the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar who arrived on a fact-finding trip over alleged abuses by security forces against the Muslim Rohingya minority. Less than 100 protesters from the state's ethnic Rakhine Buddhist community shouted and held signs as UN envoy Yanghee Lee passed in her car in Sittwe, the state capital, calling her unfair and unwanted.
"We are strongly against the U.N.'s rights envoy visit as her reports never reflect the views of ethnic Rakhines and she is biased on the side of the Bengalis, so people are protesting," said Soe Naing from the Rakhine social network using the term “Bengali” to describe Muslim Rohingya. It is Lee's sixth visit to Myanmar to assess the human rights situation in Rakhine, Shan and Karen states. She will also visit Yangon and Naypyidaw.
Lee has criticized the government's treatment of the Rohingya minority, who face severe discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. They were the targets of intercommunal violence in 2012 that killed hundreds and drove about 140,000 predominantly Rohingya people from their homes to displacement camps, where most remain.
Last October, the army launched counterinsurgency operations in Rohingya areas after assailants presumed to be Rohingya attacked police outposts along the border with Bangladesh, killing nine officers and seizing weapons and ammunition. U.N. human rights investigators and independent rights organizations charge that soldiers and police killed and raped civilians and burned down more than 1,000 homes during the operations.
Lee is on a 12-day visit to Myanmar at the invitation of the government during which she is to discuss human rights issues with political and community leaders and civil society representatives.
Than Tun, a leader of the Rakhine Buddhist community said that after every visit to Rakhine, Lee has never reported any good thing about either Rakhine people or the Myanmar government. "What Rakhine people think about Yanghee Lee is that she is too one-sided," he said. The U.N. rights envoy will wrap up her visit on July 21 and will submit a report to the Human Rights Council in October.
Lee has been outspoken in her criticism of the government on previous visits, and recommended the establishment of a special U.N. mission primarily to investigate the problems in Rakhine. The U.N. Human Rights Council approved the mission by consensus in March and in May appointed a 3-member team to investigate the alleged abuses. In June, however, Myanmar officials announced that the mission would not be allowed into the country, insisting their own efforts to deal with the problem are adequate.
Full Article
http://www.myspiritfm.com/apps/articles/default.asp?blogid=0&url=10&view=post&articleid=275467&link=1&fldKeywords=&fldAuthor=&fldTopic=0
Pope Francis waves while traveling by boat in Venice, Italy, for a meeting with young people at the Basilica della Madonna della Salute on April 28, 2024. Earlier in the day he met with inmates at a women's prison. / Credit: Daniel Ibañez/CNARome Newsroom, Apr 28, 2024 / 08:00 am (CNA).Pope Francis opened his one-day visit to Venice on Sunday morning with a meeting with female inmates where he reaffirmed the importance of fraternity and human dignity, noting that prison can be a place of new beginnings. "A stay in prison can mark the beginning of something new, through the rediscovery of the unsuspected beauty in us and in others, as symbolized by the artistic event you are hosting and the project to which you actively contribute," the pope said to the female inmates gathered in the intimate courtyard of the Women's Prison on the Island of Giudecca. Pope Francis left the Vatican by helicopter at approximately 6:30 in the mo...
http://www.myspiritfm.com/apps/articles/default.asp?blogid=0&url=10&view=post&articleid=275466&link=1&fldKeywords=&fldAuthor=&fldTopic=0
Pope Francis prays in front of the tomb of St. Mark the Evangelist inside St. Mark's Basilica in Venice on April 28, 2024. / Credit: Daniel Ibañez/CNARome Newsroom, Apr 28, 2024 / 09:35 am (CNA).Pope Francis had a full slate of events Sunday during his day trip to Venice, a trip that tied together a message of unity and fraternity with the artistic patrimony of a city that has been a privileged place of encounter across the centuries. "Faith in Jesus, the bond with him, does not imprison our freedom. On the contrary, it opens us to receive the sap of God's love, which multiplies our joy, takes care of us like a skilled vintner, and brings forth shoots even when the soil of our life becomes arid," the pope said to over 10,000 pilgrims gathered in St. Mark's Square. Framing his homily during the Mass on the theme of unity, one of the central points articulated throughout several audiences spread across the morning, Pope Francis reminded Christians: "Remaining ...
http://www.myspiritfm.com/apps/articles/default.asp?blogid=0&url=10&view=post&articleid=275461&link=1&fldKeywords=&fldAuthor=&fldTopic=0
Prayer house at San Simeone, Italy, September 2012. / Credit: Courtesy of Ricostruttori nella preghieraRome, Italy, Apr 28, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).Across Italy there are houses of prayer run by the Ricostruttori (Reconstructors) community, a Catholic movement dedicated to people who are far from the Church but attracted to spirituality, particularly Eastern meditation and Buddhist practices. The Reconstructors was founded in 1978 by Jesuit Father Gian Vittorio Cappelletto. "During the postconciliar period, the Church was faced with the need for new forms of evangelization and apostolate, to reach out to people who were drifting away," Don Roberto Rondanina, priest and superior of the Ricostruttori, explained to CNA. "It was a time when Eastern meditation, Hinduism, Buddhism, the New Age ... were beginning to spread in Europe." "Father Cappelletto, who lived in Turin, sought to understand the meaning of this 'flight to the East' and felt the need to find new forms of sp...