K

icking off a week of high-level meetings at the United Nations headquarters in New York, Indonesia is gaining recognition for its quick response to the refugee crisis in Myanmar and Bangladesh.

For its humanitarian diplomacy in Myanmar, Indonesia garnered high praise from the United States, Australia and Sweden during a working lunch on the situation in Rakhine state, hosted by the United Kingdom on Monday.

“As a friendly state and neighbor, Indonesia could not stay silent over the situation unfolding in Myanmar’s Rakhine state,” Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi said during the event, as quoted in a press release received by The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

The Rakhine humanitarian crisis, which has already cost hundreds of lives and displaced almost half a million people, has been touted as one of two big issues to be tabled at this year’s UN General Assembly, the other being North Korea’s ongoing nuclear agenda.

Tensions soared after a military crackdown in the northern Rakhine region on Aug. 25 forced at least 410,000 stateless Rohingya Muslims into overwhelmed Bangladesh. The heavy-handed operation by the Myanmar military was a response to earlier attacks on police posts by Rohingya insurgents that resulted in casualties on both sides.

Monday’s meeting was hosted by UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and attended by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, as well as top diplomats and permanent representatives from several concerned countries. It provided an opportunity for Myanmar’s National Security Advisor, U Thaung Tun, to provide updates on the Rakhine crisis.

In response to the large influx of Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh, Thaung said Myanmar had established an aid distribution unit that involves the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and a number of state parties, as well as ASEAN.

The lunch meeting was convened ahead of a televised state address by Myanmar’s de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, in Naypyidaw on Tuesday, during which she condemned all human rights violations and instructed security forces to “exercise all due restraint, [...] avoid collateral damage and the harming of innocent civilians.”

“Action will be taken against all people, regardless of their religion, race and political position, who go against the law of the land and violate human rights,” Suu Kyi said in her address, as quoted by Reuters.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s remarks came in her first address to the nation since the latest military clampdown in Rakhine, with a message that was largely welcomed by attending diplomats and aid officials, although some doubted if she had said enough to stem further criticism.

Human rights monitors and experts were dismissive of her words, with Amnesty International saying Naypyidaw officials were “burying their heads in the sand” for ignoring the role of the army in the violence.

International relations expert Dewi Fortuna Anwar said she was “deeply disappointed but not too surprised” that Suu Kyi only rehashed her earlier pronouncements.

“I share the disappointment of others who had hoped that the democracy icon and Nobel Peace Prize winner would not just be like any other politicians who pander to the views of the majority,” Dewi told the Post on Tuesday.

The UN has declared the military operation is ethnic cleansing, with Guterres previously saying that “grievances that have been left to fester for decades” contribute to the destabilization of the region.

The Indonesian delegation headed by Vice President Jusuf Kalla is in New York for a week full of high-level UN meetings under the banner of the 72nd UNGA and is expected to tackle a variety of issues like the Rakhine crisis.

Kalla and Retno are also expected to attend a number of bilateral meetings and other related meetings.