The Rakhine Ethnic Affairs Minister U Aye Zaw Maung urged the regional government in Rakhine State not to grant citizenship to the Muslims in the Rakhine State. Speaking at a media conference in Yangon on 24 July the minister said the Muslims in the state have higher birth rates and if citizenship were granted to them, the ethnic identity of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar will be disappeared. The media conference held at the Dolphin Restaurant was to explain on the 1982 Citizenship Law. U Aye Zaw Maung said Muslim population in Rakhine State is more than half of the all Muslims living in the rest of the country and if citizenship were issued to such a large numbers of people the ethnic identity of Myanmar would disappeared. He said by having citizenship identification cards these people would have right to study in the Universities as well as will get voting rights and also right to stand as candidates in the elections. For these reasons, the new government should not issue citizenship identification cards to Muslims. U Aye Zaw Aung also said at the media conference that his call to deny citizenship rights to Muslim is in line is safeguarding the national sovereignty. He warned the civil servants no to issue citizenship identification cards to those who are not eligible, as they could be punished up to 7 years imprisonment under the section 19 of the citizenship law. Speaking at the same media conference the Chairman of the Arakan National Party (ANP) Dr Aye Maung said many Bengali people are registering themselves as Rohingya during the citizenship verification. He said they are deliberately registering themselves as members of ethnic group as they are aware of the loopholes of the 1982 Citizenship Law. He said they aimed to use these loopholes to make themselves eligible for citizenship. He said the media conference was held to urge the new government not to make the same mistakes the previous government has made in citizenship verification of Bengalis. Instead, it should handle the matter systematically, Dr Aye Maung said. Ref : News Watch