Our government is at the ASEAN Summit talking about everything, it seems, except one of the most pressing issues for the region. 

And that’s the situation in Myanmar. 

Jacinda Ardern sat next to Myanmar’s leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, at a dinner, and apparently, they touched on the Rohingya situation and then moved on. 

Those fleeing the violence are bringing with them horrific stories of rape and murder. They’re reporting bodies being stacked up on top of each other like cut bamboo. Children among them. People being burned alive. 

The big broadcasters are there. The global media’s reporting on it.  Sky News, CNN, The BBC. Some 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled the violence and are on the Bangladesh border. Half of them are children.

Overnight the British Prime Minister said the situation now looks like genocide. The United Nations has used strong language too, they say it's ethnic cleansing. 

What are we doing? We’re reporting on our Prime Minister having six bodyguards and wearing a coconut husk top. 

This is Prime Minister Ardern's bag. She understands the situation, she's done a lot of work, particularly in her youth, with persecuted people. And yet at the ASEAN Summit, which focuses on economic and cultural development of the South-East Asian countries, nothing. Some of the focus has been on the refugees on Manus Island but they're not dying or at risk of death right now. The Rohingyas are and yet it's a topic all the ASEAN country leaders are avoiding. Nothing to see here.

Aung San Suu Kyi, once a hero. A winner of the Nobel Peace prize and the face of a free government in Myanmar is there. She has been unforgivably silent on this. And she's been criticised all over the world for it. She has failed to show any support or leadership to those who are being persecuted in her own country. She's stood back and allowed the slaughter to happen, fearful that her popularity will fall among the Buddhist majority if she supports the Rohingya.

Ardern sat next to Aung San Suu Kyi at dinner and touched on the issue briefly, apparently. And that's it. 

Two women who have been staunch advocates on human rights issues over the years. Two women who chose to eat dinner together at this summit and not discuss the elephant in the room. The slaughter, torture and rape of Myanmar's fleeing Muslims.