Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum human rights award was rescinded for her lack of action against the ethnic cleansing of the Myanmar's Rohingya Muslim minority.
Aung San Suu Kyi was a Nobel laureate and was only the second person to receive the Elie Weisel award (the first was Wiesel), The New York Times reported. The award is given to "an internationally prominent individual whose actions have advanced the Museum's vision of a world where people confront hatred, prevent genocide and promote human dignity."
The museum has come to believe that Aung San Suu Kyi failed to meet these criteria because of her refusal to stop or even acknowledge the Rohingya slaughter by Myanmar's military since it began last August, the Times reported. Thousands of Rohingya have been killed and up to 700,000 have fled to Bangladesh as refugees.
Aung San Suu Kyi also refused to cooperate with the United Nations and blocked journalists from reporting on the crisis, The Hill reported. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson condemned the violence in November and said that the U.S. could impose certain sanctions on Myanmar in response to the slaughter.
Other Myanmar leaders have denied that Rohingya Muslims exist, and one official has called the reports of the massacre "fake news," the Hill reported.
Aung San Suu Kyi was originally given the award for standing up to the country's military dictatorship and serving 15 years of house arrest, The Hill reported.
"We did not take this decision lightly," a letter by the museum that was posted on its website Wednesday said, the Times of Israel reported.