Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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Question 94: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will report on the position of the Rohingya community in Myanmar; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41927/09]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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As I have stated on many occasions in this House, the situation in Burma/Myanmar has long been one of grave concern to the Government. The Rohingya ethnic group is one of the many ethnic groups which have been severely affected by the brutal policies of the Myanmar military regime. The situation of the Muslim Rohingyas is, however, even more difficult than that of other ethnic groups in Burma/Myanmar, as they tend to be discriminated against by Burma's majority Buddhist population and the regime does not even recognise them as citizens although they have been settled in northern Arakan (or Rakhine) state for more than a thousand years.

The area inhabited by the Rohingya is one of the poorest and most isolated in Burma. Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have reported that they have been subjected to persecution and human rights violations for decades. They report that, over the years, abuses have included summary executions, extrajudicial killings, torture, rape, forced labour, religious persecution, forced eviction, house destruction, land confiscation, arbitrary taxation and restrictions on marriage.

An estimated one million Rohingya are still living in northern Arakan. It is believed that a similar number of Rohingya refugees are based in other countries – the majority in Bangladesh. Conditions for the Rohingya in Bangladesh are also extremely grim. Some have become Bangladeshi citizens over the years, and 28,000 or so of them are recognised officially as refugees and permitted in UN-assisted refugee camps. But most of the rest – numbering more than 200,000 - have to survive outside the camps, without official documentation or employment, and are increasingly subject to crackdowns by the Bangladesh authorities. Others have fled to Thailand, where there are roughly 111,000 refugees housed in nine camps along the Thai-Myanmar border, but where there is also increasing intolerance towards Burmese refugees.

As a result, many Rohingyas have fled Burma over the past two or three years by boat into the Andaman Sea. Some have landed safely in Malaysia, where around 20,000 Rohingya are now believed to be based, some have reached Indonesia and the coast of Thailand, while many are believed to have perished in the Andaman Sea. Earlier this year international news reports highlighted the case of a large group of Rohingya refugees who were being towed out to sea in unsound vessels by the Thai navy, and set adrift without food or water. This incident shocked the world but it is unlikely to be an isolated one. Many of the Rohingya refugees found in such circumstances are simply deported back to Burma where they face an unknown fate.

At the time of the Thai incident, our Government bilaterally, and the EU more broadly, appealed to Thailand, and to Indonesia where some of these boat-people washed up, to adopt a humane approach in relation to these refugees, to comply with their obligations under international humanitarian law, and to support fully the work of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees in assisting them. As reported to this House in February, I am pleased that Ireland has been able to play a practical part in assisting Rohingya refugees. Through our support since 1998 for the UNHCR-led resettlement programme, 82 Burmese Rohingya refugees based in refugee camps in Bangladesh have been welcomed to Ireland for resettlement. I might add that 97 Burmese Karen refugees have also been resettled here.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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Question 95: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will report on the recent human rights reports of the existence of illegal detention centres in China; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41869/09]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Although there have been reports over a number of years of secret prisons operating in China, international interest in such places of detention has greatly increased since the publication on 11 November by Human Rights Watch of a report entitled An Alleyway in Hell, China's Abusive "Black Jails". The report contains allegations that Chinese government officials, security forces, and their agents routinely abduct people off the streets of Beijing and other Chinese cities, strip them of their possessions, and imprison them in what it describes as "black jails". It claims that these "black jails" are often located in state-owned hotels, nursing homes, and psychiatric hospitals and that they are used primarily by local and provincial officials to detain petitioners who come to Beijing and provincial capitals seeking redress for complaints which have not been resolved at lower levels of government. The report alleges that detainees are often physically and psychologically abused in the jails; that many are deprived of food, sleep, and medical care; and that they are subject to theft and extortion by their guards. It suggests that the number of individuals detained in "black jails" each year reaches into the thousands.

As has been reported in this House on many previous occasions, human rights issues in China, including issues relating to prisons and detention centres, are regularly discussed on a bilateral basis with the Chinese Government, both in Beijing and in Dublin. The Government continues to stress at such meetings the great importance attached by Ireland to human rights, fundamental freedoms and the rule of law, and to urge the Chinese authorities to ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

Human rights issues also continue to be a constant and important point of dialogue with the Chinese authorities for the European Union, through the framework of the EU-China Human Rights Dialogue. This broad-ranging dialogue has allowed the EU to engage with China on such issues as freedom of expression, the death penalty, the independence of the judiciary, prison conditions, freedom of religion and minority rights. The next session of the EU-China Human Rights Dialogue will take place on 20 November in Beijing. I note that the Chinese authorities have denied the existence of the "black jails". I am also informed that changes in the law on detention in China are in the pipeline, which will increase the rights of detainees, including provision for compensation and increased penalties for those who abuse detainees.

In the meantime, however, I believe that the allegations made in the Human Rights Watch report are sufficiently serious and documented to warrant further investigation and representations. We will certainly raise them with the Chinese authorities, bilaterally and through the EU.