Myanmar's parliament is “playing with fire” by passing a bill regulating the right of women from the country's Buddhist majority to marry men from outside their religion, an international human rights group said Wednesday according to a report by ABC on 8 July.
Phil Robertson of New York-based Human Rights Watch linked the bill to a campaign by extremist Buddhist groups that have incited anti-Muslim hatred.
The Buddhist Women's Special Marriage Bill passed on 7 July mandates that Buddhist women register their intent to marry outside their faith, and allows them to be stopped if there are objections.
“It's shocking that Burma's parliament has passed yet another incredibly dangerous law, this time legislating clearly discriminatory provisions targeting the rights of religious minority men and Buddhist women to marry who they wish without interference,” said Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch's Asia division.
He suggested that the leaders of the Buddhist nationalist groups that pushed for the laws “be investigated and prosecuted for hate speech rather than feted in the halls of parliament.”