YANGON: Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has criticised a proposal by nationalist monks to restrict marriages between Buddhist women and men of other faiths, describing it as a violation of human rights, a report said yesterday.
“This is one-sided. Why only women? You cannot treat the women unfairly,” Radio Free Asia quoted the Nobel Peace Laureate as saying in an interview.
Under the proposal — spearheaded by the controversial Mandalay cleric Wirathu — non-Buddhist men wishing to marry a Buddhist woman would have to convert and gain permission from her parents to wed or risk 10 years in jail.
The idea was raised at a recent meeting of more than 200 monks called to discuss a surge in Buddhist-Muslim violence in the former junta-ruled country.
Wirathu said the law was needed “because Buddhist girls have lost freedom of religion when they married Muslim men”.
Suu Kyi has been accused by some international human rights activists of failing to clearly condemn the anti-Muslim violence.
Last month Suu Kyi criticised a controversial ban imposed on Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine having more than two children.
AFP
