KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak led a protest rally Sunday against what he called a “genocide” of Myanmar’s Muslim Rohingya minority, as he urged Asian neighbors and the world to step up the pressure to stop the violence. Malaysia’s premier has called on the global community to help stop the “genocide” of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, slamming the country’s de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, for her inaction on the bloodletting against the minority community. The plight of the Rohingya, once characterized by the U.N. as the world's most friendless people, has attracted the attention of Muslim extremists since a spike in intercommunal violence in Rakhine in 2012 that left hundreds dead and forced more than 100,000 into squalid camps. FILE - In this Nov. 25, 2016, file photo, a Muslim woman wears a mask of Myanmar's Foreign Minister Aung San Suu Kyi during a rally against the persecution of Rohingya Muslims, outside the Embassy of Myanmar in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak leads a protest rally against the persecution of Myanmar's Muslim Rohingya minority in the predominately Buddhist country, and calls on Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and the United Nations to address the Rohingya's plight and end the violence. Myanmar's president's office said the rally is timed for Malaysian political purposes, and that Malaysia should respect the Association of Southeast Asian Nations's principle on sovereignty.