However, the tide of international public opinion has been turning sharply against Suu Kyi as human rights activists, the United Nations and several other Nobel laureates have strongly criticized her handling of what has now become known as the "Rohingya crisis."

The crisis centers on the plight of the Rohingya, a historically persecuted Muslim minority living in Myanmar's coastal Rakhine state (formerly Arakan state). The Rohingya are also stateless, as Myanmar's government has long refused to recognize their centuries-long claim to the region and has asserted on several occasions that the Rohingya are not native to Myanmar but instead "illegal immigrants" from neighboring Bangladesh. Deprived of citizenship and thus of basic rights, their suffering has been compounded by Myanmar's government, which has used the military to violently intimidate the Rohingya and force them from their lands.