A close aide to Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi on Wednesday dismissed mounting international pressure over alleged abuses of Rohingya Muslims as "biased and unfair", despite UN evidence of murder, rape and torture by security forces. The United Nations has said Myanmar troops and police may have committed crimes against humanity during a four-month crackdown on the stateless minority.
Rights envoy Yanghee Lee is expected to turn up the heat next week by calling a formal 'commission of inquiry' into alleged abuses that have seen more than 70,000 Rohingya flee to Bangladesh.
Army clearance operations cut through remote villages in northern Rakhine State in retaliation for attacks by militants on police border posts in October.
Escapees have given the UN chilling accounts of babies being stabbed to death, people being burnt alive in and widespread gang rape during those operations.
The crisis has piled unprecedented pressure on Myanmar's elected government, led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, as it tries to emerge from the shadow of oppressive military rule. If the UN backs a commission and its investigators find evidence that Myanmar's military has committed crimes against humanity, it could once again see Myanmar branded an international pariah.
"What Yanghee Lee is doing is not fair. It's biased," Win Htein, a close aide of Suu Kyi, told AFP. "We do not care about this kind of unfair report. Because we do not care, we do not worry."