An influential Myanmar Buddhist monk famous for his firebrand anti-Muslim speeches has said he will push to get “descendants of foreigners” banned from standing in elections ahead of a Nov. 8 poll that has been billed as a key test of the country’s reforms.

Ashin Wirathu, who has been accused of stoking anti-Muslim tensions that have erupted into deadly riots in recent years, told the Myanmar Times Wednesday that allowing “non-national citizens who are descendants of foreigners” into parliament is “dangerous”.

His comments come after Muslim MPs were blocked from running in the upcoming poll on the grounds that their parents were not citizens, a claim they deny. Earlier this year hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims were also barred from voting, sparking an outcry from rights groups.

Wirathu warned that the people of Myanmar were too “dim-witted” to prevent foreign interests from taking control of parliament, the report said.

November’s election is set to be the first to be contested by the pro-democracy opposition in the country for 25 years, but critics say it is unlikely to be fully free and fair.

Myanmar officially regards its roughly one million Rohingya Muslims as “Bengalis” -- interlopers from neighboring Bangladesh -- and the government has acquiesced to demands from hardliners to exclude them from a nationwide census and withdraw the documents that granted them voting rights.

In 2010, the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party actively courted the Rohingya vote and allowed Rohingya candidates to run under its banner.

Since then hate speech against Muslims, including non-Rohingya with full citizenship, has escalated as restrictions on freedom of expression have eased.

Ashin Wirathu has spearheaded the anti-Muslim movement, preaching that Buddhism, the majority religion, is under threat from foreign Muslims.

He is a prominent leader in Ma Ba Tha, an ultra-nationalist group that recently succeeded in pushing a series of controversial laws through parliament aimed at “protecting” Buddhism.

“Our national people are dim-witted. When the descendants of foreigners who are sharp-witted enter parliament they will push through laws that benefit the interests of their people,” he told the Myanmar Times.

He added: “We, Ma Ba Tha and some political parties, plan to help by amending the candidate selection requirements in the constitution.”

He said he wanted to replace the word “citizen” in the charter with the phrase “national ethnics” -- Myanmar officially recognizes 135 ethnic groups, but the list does not include the Rohingya.

Tens of thousands from the group have fled persecution by boat since being targeted in mob violence in 2012.

The exodus recently erupted into a regional crisis when human traffickers abandoned thousands of people at sea following a crackdown by Thai authorities.

A Rohingya member of Myanmar's parliament barred from contesting Nov. 8 elections on the basis that his parents were not Myanmar citizens at the time of his birth said on Monday he would appeal the decision and hoped to stand in the vote.

The move to deny Shwe Maung, an MP from the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), a chance to run despite being a serving member of government raises concerns about the disenfranchisement of the Rohingya Muslim minority.

Most of Myanmar's 1.1 million Rohingya, an ethnic minority living in the country's western Rakhine State, are stateless and live in apartheid-like conditions. Almost 140,000 were displaced in deadly clashes in Rakhine in 2012.

Shwe Maung, who planned to run as an independent after not being nominated by the USDP, said that he was informed by state officials on Saturday that his application had been turned down.

"It's ridiculous for me," Shwe Maung said. "I was elected in 2010. Now I'm working."

According to Shwe Maung, both of his parents were citizens prior to his birth in 1965 and his father served as a member of the Myanmar Police Force.

Rakhine State election officials could not be reached for comment on Monday.

Shwe Maung has represented the majority-Muslim Buthidaung constituency located in Northern Rakhine State near the country's border with Bangladesh since being elected as an MP in 2010.

Since 2012, when violence swept across Rakhine, he has been an outspoken advocate for the Rohingya and called for greater citizenship rights for the group.

Even if he is able to stand in November's election - seen as a test of the country's reforms process - he faces an uphill battle for re-election.

Many of the people who voted for Shwe Maung in 2010 held temporary citizenship documents, more commonly known as white cards. But the white cards were nullified by President Thein Sein under pressure from hardline Buddhists in February. The majority of white card holders were Rohingya. Some former white card holders have been offered new citizenship documents.

But earlier this month, Yanghee Lee, the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, said that she was informed by the country's election commission chair that those who received these new documents would be banned from the vote.

Lee said that the decision was of "serious concern".

YANGON, Myanmar — As an elected lawmaker and member of Myanmar’s governing party, U Shwe Maung attended dinners with the president and made speeches from the floor of Parliament. But this weekend, the country’s election commission ruled that despite more than four years in office, he was not a citizen and thus was ineligible to run for re-election in landmark voting in November.

“I was approved and considered a full citizen in 2010,” he said in an interview on Saturday. “Now, after five years, how could I not be eligible?”

Mr. Shwe Maung’s plight is but one example of what appears to be the mass disenfranchisement of the Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim minority who number around one million in Myanmar.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who cast votes in elections five years ago have been struck from the electoral rolls, election commission officials have confirmed, although without providing a precise number.

The final list of eligible voters is due by the end of August, but it is unlikely that any Rohingya will be added given anti-Muslim feelings in the country, Rohingya leaders say.

Persecution of the Rohingya has escalated in recent years with the rise of a shadowy Buddhist nationalist movement that has demonized Muslims and encouraged the eviction of Rohingya from the country. Although many Rohingya have lived in Myanmar for generations, hatred has built up against them and they are referred to as Bengalis by the government, a name that implies they belong in neighboring Bangladesh.

Yet until now, they have never lost the right to vote.

The Rohingya have taken part in every election since Myanmar became independent from Britain in 1948, including one-candidate elections during the rule of the military dictator Ne Win.

“All other fundamental rights have been taken away by the authorities,” said Wai Wai Nu, a Rohingya activist who met with President Obama at the White House in June and warned of mass disenfranchisement. “If we lose the right to vote, we will be zero.”

Mr. Shwe Maung, who left the governing party earlier this month to run as an independent, was informed by fax on Saturday that he had been disqualified for re-election. The election commission said his parents were not citizens at the time of his birth, an assertion that he calls absurd: His father was a career-long officer in the national police force. Mr. Shwe Maung is appealing the disqualification.

The election on Nov. 8 has been described by Western governments and human rights organizations as a major test of Myanmar’s nascent democracy because it is the first time since military rule that democratic forces, led by the Nobel Peace laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, will be vying in a general election against the military-backed governing party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party.

David Scott Mathieson, a Myanmar expert with Human Rights Watch, called the exclusion of the Rohingya “a dark cloud over the democratic integrity of the elections over all.”

“This is the government really stripping them of their last right,” Mr. Mathieson said. “It suits the government’s long-term plan of compelling them to leave.”

Voter registration lists released by the election commission in June showed that more than 500,000 Rohingya had vanished from the rolls, Rohingya activists say.

U Kyaw Min, a former schoolteacher who is president of the Democracy and Human Rights Party, a Rohingya party, says the number of eligible voters in a single district, Buthidaung, fell to 27,000 from more than 150,000 in 2010.

Mr. Kyaw Min, who is Ms. Wai Wai Nu’s father, says one of his earliest memories is of accompanying his mother to vote in Buthidaung in the 1956 election.

“This is a grand discrimination against a minority,” Mr. Kyaw Min said of the removal of Rohingya voters from the rolls. “There were only two other places where this happened — in South Africa and Hitler’s Germany.”

The election commission says it cannot allow Rohingya to register to vote because they do not have proof of citizenship. Earlier this year, President Thein Sein, acting under pressure from Buddhist nationalists, decreed that the special identity cards held by the Rohingya, known as white cards, would no longer be valid and that Rohingya would have to undergo a citizenship test in order to obtain new cards.

Tens of thousands of white cards were surrendered to the government. Other Rohingya lost all their possessions when they were chased from their homes by Buddhist mobs in a series of deadly pogroms that began in 2012.

More than 140,000 Rohingya remain in government camps in Rakhine State on Myanmar’s western coast. Thousands more have fled the country by sea this year, leading to a regionwide migrant crisis.

The election commission says it cannot bend from its position: People must prove their citizenship before being able to vote.

“If the immigration officers cannot issue the cards in time, they cannot vote,” said Thant Zin Aung, assistant director of the election commission.

The widespread hatred toward Rohingya in Myanmar stems partly from resentment held over from colonial times, when the British brought Indians into the country, then known as Burma, as laborers and civil servants. Today, Buddhist nationalists warn of a threat of the Islamization of Burmese society and point to the swollen population of Bangladesh next door.

U Thar Pwint, a lawyer in Rakhine State who describes himself as moderate, says Muslim culture is not compatible with Buddhist society.

“Their culture does not allow living together with other cultures,” he said.

He proposes a radical solution for the Rohingya that is heard often among Buddhists in Myanmar.

“Even though they are noncitizens, we cannot kill them,” he said. “Our wish is that they be put in another country.”

NEW DELHI: This week, Myanmar’s Union Parliament approved two bills that placed restrictions on religious conversion and polygamy. They were the last of four controversial bills concerning race and religion to have sped through the legislature since late last year. 

The bills, concerning religious conversion and monogamy, were the last of four bills that made up a legislative package known as the “Race and Religion Protection bills,” which were first put forth by the powerful Buddhist nationalist group Ma Ba Tha in mid-2013 and reached Parliament late last year. The two pieces of legislation restricting interfaith marriage and allowing local government to impose birth-rate limits had already been signed into law, drawing harsh criticism from the international community. Critics claimed the laws could violate women’s rights and risk being used to target minorities. 

Now, with parliament approving the final two bills, without amendments as reported by Burmese-language paper “The Mirror”, the process is close to completion, needing only President Thein Sein’s final approval. 

The bills were not passed without opposition, with Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy voting against it. "The bills were approved by parliament. We are just minority party, so things do not always happen like we suggest," National League for Democracy MP Win Myint told AFP. 

Details are still sketchy but the passing of the bills has drawn sharp criticism, especially as the legislation has been driven through by radical monks who claim that their religion is under threat, with violence against minority communities in the country increasing. 

The bill also comes as Myanmar prepares for crucial elections in November this year, that are being seen as a key test of its democratic transition after decades of military rule. 

David Mathieson of watchdog Human Rights Watch said the legislation "champions an ultra-nationalist agenda" and could fuel religious instability. "This could be used in the lead up and after the election to crack down on religious minorities," he said as quoted by AFP. 

AFP also quoted monk Wirathu who welcomed the decision, saying, All citizens are safe if we have these laws. They are very important for peace and national security.” 

Wirathu has gained notoriety over the last few years for his firebranch speeches, including one in which he called UN rights envoy Yanghee Lee a "whore" because of her position on Rohingya muslims -- one of the most persecuted groups in Myanmar who have borne the brunt of the country’s rising anti-Muslim sentiment. 

Rohingyas have been termed one of the most persecuted minorities in the world by the UN, and their position is in part linked to the denial of rights entrenched in Myanmar’s legal system, which these new laws will only exacerbate. The system’s context lies in the 1982 Citizenship Act, which supersedes all citizenship regimes in Myanmar. The Act created three classes of citizens - full, associate, and naturalised. Full citizenship is reserved for those whose ancestors settled in Myanmar before the year 1823 or who are members of one of Myanmar’s 135 recognized national ethnic groups - which, according to the recent census, continues to exclude the Rohingya. Associate citizenship applies to those who have been conferred citizenship under a previous 1948 law, which requires an awareness of the law and a level of proof that few Rohingyas possess. Naturalised citizenship is applicable to those who have resided in Myanmar on or before 1948, and here too, the Rohingya are denied citizenship as the government of Myanmar retains the discretion to deny citizenship even when criteria are adequately met. 

It is under the legal system and the denial of recognition that the Rohingya continue to remain a stateless people. Myanmar, which as a member nation of the UN is obligated to promote “universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction,” fails to do so for the Rohingyas who are subjected to policies and practises that constitute violations of their fundamental rights and freedoms. They face restrictions on movement, forced labour, land confiscation, forced evictions, extortions and arbitrary taxations, restrictions on marriage, employment, healthcare and education. 

There is an element of political opportunism in reference to the Rohingya in Myanmar. In 1990, Rohingya were permitted to form political parties and vote in multiparty elections. Myanmar even accepted about 250,000 repatriated Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh in 1992 and 1994 issuing Temporary Resident Cards to some. Rohingyas were permitted to vote in the 2008 constitutional referendum and 2010 elections. In fact, in the 2010 elections the voting rights were tied to the promise of citizenship if the Rohingya voted for the military regime’s representatives. However, Rohingyas are yet to be included as a part of any reconciliation programme involving ethnic groups, with Myanmar’s President Thein Sein, in the wake of the 2012 violence, stating that the Rohingya could not and would not be accepted as citizens or residents of Myanmar, going as far as to asking the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to consider placing the Rohingya in camps outside of the country and resettling them to others. While it is true that Thein Sein and other Myanmar officials have had to moderate their position since due to external international pressure, Myanmar continues to violate UN convention by rendering the Rohingya stateless. A relevant convention is the Convention of the Reduction of Statelessness which obligates states to prevent, reduce, and avoid statelessness by granting “its nationality to a person born in its territory who would otherwise be stateless.” The Myanmar government is in clear violation of this convention, with hundreds of thousands of Rohingya having been displaced in the last 25 years. 

It is this system that has perpetuated violence against the Rohingyas in Myanmar, with violent clashes between the country’s majority Buddhist population and the Rohingyas leading to deaths and displacement of the minority muslim community in 2012, 2009, 2001, 1978 and 1992, amongst other instances. In the most recent case of widespread violence in 2012, hundred of Rohingya villages and settlements were destroyed, tens of thousands of homes razed, and at least 115,000 Rohingyas displaced in camps in Myanmar, across the Bangladesh border, or further afield on boats. 

The UN has termed the Rohingyas one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, a condition aggravated by the role of countries such as Bangladesh and Thailand that have turned back genuine refugees, with Thailand’s military being accused in 2009-10 of towing hundreds of Rohingya out to sea in poorly equipped boats and scant food and water after they tried to flee Myanmar. Although Thailand “categorically denies” the charge, the accusations have some merit as about 650 Rohingya were rescued off India and Indonesia, some saying that they had been beaten by Thai soldiers. 

It is under these circumstance that rights groups have alleged that the Myanmar government is supporting a policy of “ethnic cleansing” of the Rohingya, with William Schabas, a member of the International Association of Genocide Scholars saying that “the Rohingya are the prima facie victims of the crime against humanity of persecution,” consisting of “the severe deprivation of fundamental rights on discriminatory grounds.” 

The Rohingyas miserable plight is attributable to a combination of the actions of the Rakhine Buddhist majority and the inaction of the Myanmar government, within the context of a legal system that ratifies, condones, and perpetuates the systematic discrimination of the Rohingya in Myanmar.