教宗被批閉口不提羅興亞人問題
Pope Francis has arrived in Bangladesh after a four-day visit to neighboring Myanmar, a trip marked by his refusal to publicly address the Muslim Rohingya refugee crisis.
The pontiff departed Myanmar Thursday after celebrating a final Mass for young Catholics in Yangon, the country's largest city and its former capital.
Francis has been criticized by human rights activists for not specifically mentioning the Rohingyas, a minority ethnic group that has been denied basic rights for decades in the majority Buddhist-majority Myanmar, which views them as immigrants from Bangladesh, despite the fact that many families have lived in Myanmar for generations.
Their situation has worsened since august, when the military launched a scorched earth campaign against Rohingya villages in northern Rakhine state in response to attacks on Myanmar police outposts on Rohingya militants. The brutal campaign, including reports of mass rapes and indiscriminate killings, triggered a mass exodus of more than 620,000 Rohingyas into Bangladesh, which the United Nations has described as "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing."
The pope has denounced the treatment of the Rohingyas in previous public remarks, but his advisers counseled him not to speak about the issue while in Myanmar, for fear of a backlash against the 650,000 Catholics in the country.
Myanmar Bishop John Hsane Hgyi went even further Wednesday, casting doubt about the reported atrocities against the Rohingyas, and urging critics of the Myanmar government to go to the scene "to study the reality and history" of the issue and learn the truth.
A Vatican spokesman said Wednesday that Pope Francis has not lost his "moral authority" on the issue, and suggested he may have been far more direct during his private talks with de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi and powerful military chief Min Aung Hlaing.
Pope Francis is expected to meet with a group of Rohingya refugees during his stay in Bangladesh.羅馬天主教宗方濟各訪問緬甸4天后抵達孟加拉國訪問。教宗此次出訪一直沒有公開提到羅興亞穆斯林難民危機的問題，引起注意。
教宗方濟各在緬甸最大城市、曾經是首都的仰光爲年輕的天主教徒主持了彌撒後，星期四離開緬甸。
人權活動人士批評教宗方濟各沒有專門提到羅興亞人的問題。緬甸人口以佛教徒爲主，羅興亞人是緬甸的一個少數族裔，數十年來一直被剝奪基本權利。緬甸政府將他們視爲來自孟加拉國的難民，儘管很多羅興亞家庭已經在緬甸生活了好幾代。
今年8月，緬甸警察在若開邦的哨卡受到羅興亞激進分子的攻擊後，緬甸政府軍開始對羅興亞村莊進行焦土攻擊，羅興亞人的處境更加糟糕。政府軍的殘酷攻擊，以及大規模強姦和肆意殺戮的消息導致62萬多羅興亞人逃到孟加拉國。聯合國稱之爲典型的種族清洗。
教宗方濟各以前在公開講話中譴責了羅興亞人受到的對待，但是他的顧問建議他在緬甸不要提這個問題，擔心會對緬甸的65萬天主教徒造成不利影響。
緬甸主教若望·盛赫基星期三對羅興亞人遭受殺戮的說法提出質疑，呼籲批評緬甸政府的人到現場去研究有關問題的現實和歷史，瞭解真相。
梵蒂岡發言人星期三說，教宗方濟各在這個問題上沒有失去他的道德權威，並說教宗在與緬甸實際領導人昂山素季和大權在握的軍方首腦敏昂蘭將軍的不公開會談中可能更直接地談到這個問題。
預計教宗方濟各在孟加拉訪問期間會與一些羅興亞難民見面。
