Rohingya crisis must not destabilise Bangladesh

The silence from the international community, especially proponents of the principle of Responsibility to Protect, is deafening

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) boasts of itself as a very successful geopolitical grouping that has succeeded in improving the lot of its members where other regions have failed. Some Asean triumphalists even compare their regional bloc favourably with the European Union. Underlying the smugness is the argument that Asean’s founding principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of member countries is what distinguishes it from other groupings, allowing each country to focus on economics without getting embroiled in the politics.

This convenient, self-serving worldview takes for granted that for the past quarter-century, the United States’ military power maintained