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Title: ICJ Orders Preliminary Relief in Myanmar Genocide Case
Description: "For the first time, a court has ordered Myanmar to take actions to protect the Rohingya. Last Thursday, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nation’s highest court, issued an order in a case brought against Myanmar by Gambia claiming violations of the Genocide Convention. For more on Gambia’s filing in this case, as well as other efforts to bring accountability for the crimes against the Rohingya, see my previous post for Just Security here. Preceding its decision, the ICJ held oral arguments concerning Gambia’s request for what are known as “provisional measures” in early December. A request for provisional measures is in some ways comparable to a request for a preliminary injunction in U.S. courts. A party is requesting that the court issue an order to prevent further harm while the case is proceeding, which can be particularly important at the ICJ where cases can take years to conclude. A request for provisional measures typically comes early in the case, and well before the record is fully developed and the issues can be judged on their merit. However, the standard of proof for granting provisional measures is that of a prima facie showing, considerably less than that required for final judgment. In theory, determinations made at the provisional measures stage have no bearing on the ultimate decision reached on those issues later. While a request for provisional measures is not uncommon, what made the December oral arguments extraordinary is that Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and the de facto head of Myanmar (albeit with the military retaining a great deal of power) chose to act as the “agent” for Myanmar. This meant she would be leading the delegation and defending Myanmar in court. Once a symbol for human rights, she had already been widely criticized for her actions and inactions in regards to the Rohingya people..."
Source/publisher: "Just Security"
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-29
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Title: Myanmar Rohingya: Government rejects ICJ ruling
Sub-title: Myanmar has responded defiantly to a ruling by the UN's top court ordering measures to prevent the genocide of Rohingya Muslims.
Description: "The country's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it presented a "distorted picture of the situation". Thousands of Rohingya died and more than 700,000 fled to Bangladesh during an army crackdown in 2017. The measures imposed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) are binding and not subject to appeal. However the ICJ has no way of enforcing them. The case was lodged by the African Muslim majority nation of The Gambia. The ruling warned that genocidal actions could recur. The man who took Aung San Suu Kyi to the world court Myanmar Rohingya: What you need to know The Lady who fell from grace Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said its own commission, the Independent Commission of Enquiry, found that there had been no genocide in Rakhine state. However it did say that war crimes had occurred, and were being investigated and prosecuted by Myanmar's national criminal justice system. It also blamed condemnation by "human rights actors" for affecting Myanmar's bilateral relations with some countries. "This has hampered Myanmar's ability to lay the foundation for sustainable development in Rakhine," it added in a statement..."
Source/publisher: "BBC News" (London)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-29
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Title: Real justice for Myanmar's Rohingya will require more than an ICJ ruling
Description: "Rohingya Muslims, described by the UN as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, have finally seen a beacon of light in the fight for justice driven forward by Gambia. The historic decision by the UN's International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Myanmar is now legally bound to protect Rohingya Muslims from genocide, and stipulated four provisional measures they must take in doing so. This unprecedented ruling means that Myanmar's government must prevent any Rohingya Muslim in the country from being killed and reserve any evidence of a genocide that has already happened. In spite of this ground-breaking turning point in the path to justice, concerns still exist in the steps to seeking accountability to bring the perpetrators of the crimes against Rohingya to account. The Myanmar military crackdown in 2017 saw thousands of Rohingya Muslims killed, and 700,000 flee to neighbouring Bangladesh. Rohingya communities continue to be subjected to indiscriminate killing and gang rape. Pregnant women, babies, children and the elderly have not been spared. With so many accounts and evidence of human rights violations, it is shocking that Myanmar continues to evade accountability..."
Source/publisher: "The New Arab" (London)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-29
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Title: Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (The Gambia v. Myanmar)
Description: "Present: President YUSUF; Vice-President XUE; Judges TOMKA, ABRAHAM, BENNOUNA, CANÇADO TRINDADE, DONOGHUE, GAJA, SEBUTINDE, BHANDARI, ROBINSON, CRAWFORD, GEVORGIAN, SALAM, IWASAWA; Judges ad hoc PILLAY, KRESS; Registrar GAUTIER. The International Court of Justice, Composed as above, After deliberation, Having regard to Articles 41 and 48 of the Statute of the Court and Articles 73, 74 and 75 of the Rules of Court, Makes the following Order: 1. On 11 November 2019, the Republic of The Gambia (hereinafter “The Gambia”) filed in the Registry of the Court an Application instituting proceedings against the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (hereinafter “Myanmar”) concerning alleged violations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (hereinafter the “Genocide Convention” or the “Convention”)..."
Source/publisher: International Court of Justice (ICJ) (The Hague)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-24
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Title: ICJ orders Myanmar to protect Rohingya
Sub-title: Top UN court finds 'irreparable damage' caused to Rohingya; orders Myanmar to take steps to prevent genocide.
Description: "The Hague-based International Court of Justice has ordered Myanmar to take emergency measures to prevent genocide of the Rohingya. In a unanimously-ruled order issued by a panel of 17 judges, and read by presiding Judge Abdulaqawi Ahmed Yusuf, the court upheld the provisions of the 1948 Genocide Convention - saying Myanmar had "caused irreparable damage to the rights of the Rohingya". More: Myanmar finds war crimes but no genocide in Rohingya crackdown Myanmar to release its Rohingya crackdown investigation results ICJ to rule on emergency measures in Myanmar genocide case According to the Statute of the ICJ, the court has the power to order provisional measures when "irreparable prejudice could be caused to rights which are the subject of judicial proceedings". The court found that the condition of urgency had been met in this case. In November the Gambia filed a suit against Myanmar alleging it was committing "an ongoing genocide against its minority Muslim Rohingya population" and violating the 1948 Genocide Convention..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-24
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Title: Rohingya crisis: The Gambian who took Aung San Suu Kyi to the world court
Sub-title: Gambian Justice Minister Abubacarr Tambadou's actions brought Aung San Suu Kyi to The Hague to deny that her country's military was committing a genocide. As the UN's highest court orders measures to prevent further mass killings, Anna Holligan takes a look at the man taking on the Nobel laureate.
Description: "It was an unexpected detour that led Abubacarr Tambadou from his home in the tiny West African country of The Gambia to experience an epiphany on the edge of a refugee camp in Cox's Bazar. Listening to survivors' stories he said the "stench of genocide" began drifting across the border into Bangladesh from Myanmar. "I realised how much more serious it was than the flashes we'd seen on television screens," he told the BBC. "Military and civilians would organise systematic attacks against Rohingya, burn down houses, snatch babies from their mothers' arms and throw them alive into burning fires, round up and execute men; girls were gang-raped and put through all types of sexual violence." The Rohingya are a Muslim minority in mainly Buddhist Myanmar. 'Just like Rwanda' These chilling scenes reminded Mr Tambadou of events in Rwanda during the 1994 genocide that claimed the lives of about 800,000 people. "It sounded very much like the kind of acts that were perpetrated against the Tutsi in Rwanda. "It was the same modus operandi - the process of dehumanisation, calling them names - it bore all the hallmarks of genocide..."
Source/publisher: "BBC News" (London)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-24
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Title: Will Myanmar respect ICJ order to stop genocide against Rohingya?
Sub-title: Experts celebrate landmark ruling, but have little hope that gov't which denies genocide will prevent further violence.
Description: "In a ruling that the Rohingya minority have celebrated, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ordered Myanmar to take urgent measures to protect the mostly Muslim minority. On Thursday, a panel of 17 judges unanimously decided that Myanmar should take "all measures within its power" to prevent genocide, following a case filed by The Gambia in November. Presiding Judge Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf said Myanmar has "caused irreparable damage to the rights of the Rohingya", referring to a military campaign of violence in Rakhine state that saw more than 740,000 members of the ethnic minority flee to neighbouring Bangladesh in 2016 and 2017. More: ICJ orders Myanmar to protect Rohingya Myanmar finds war crimes but no genocide in Rohingya crackdown 'Justice served': Rohingya in Bangladesh hail ICJ order While academics and Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh welcomed the judgement, others have urged caution - now, they say, there must be increased international scrutiny on Myanmar's treatment of the minority..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-24
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Title: World Court Rules Against Myanmar on Rohingya
Summary: "The International Court of Justice (ICJ) order on January 23, 2020, directing Myanmar to prevent all genocidal acts against Rohingya Muslims is crucial for protecting the remaining Rohingya in...
Sub-title: International Court of Justice Unanimously Orders Measures to Prevent Genocide
Description: "The International Court of Justice (ICJ) order on January 23, 2020, directing Myanmar to prevent all genocidal acts against Rohingya Muslims is crucial for protecting the remaining Rohingya in Rakhine State, Human Rights Watch said today. The court unanimously adopted “provisional measures” that require Myanmar to prevent genocide and take steps to preserve evidence. Myanmar’s military committed extensive atrocities against the Rohingya, including murder, rape, and arson, that peaked during its late 2017 campaign of ethnic cleansing, forcing more than 740,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. In September 2019, the United Nations-backed International Independent Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar found that the 600,000 Rohingya remaining in Myanmar “may face a greater threat of genocide than ever.” “The ICJ order to Myanmar to take concrete steps to prevent the genocide of the Rohingya is a landmark step to stop further atrocities against one of the world’s most persecuted people,” said Param-Preet Singh, associate international justice director at Human Rights Watch. “Concerned governments and UN bodies should now weigh in to ensure that the order is enforced as the genocide case moves forward.”..."
Source/publisher: "Human Rights Watch" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-24
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Title: Court to rule in case accusing Myanmar of Rohingya genocide
Sub-title: The International Court of Justice decision comes in a case brought by the African nation of Gambia on behalf of an organization of Muslim nations...At public hearings last month, lawyers for Myanmar's accusers used maps, satellite images and graphic photos to detail what they call a campaign of murder, rape and destruction.
Description: "The United Nations' highest court is set to rule Thursday on whether to order Myanmar to halt what has been described as a genocidal campaign against the country's Rohingya Muslim minority. The International Court of Justice decision comes in a case brought by the African nation of Gambia on behalf of an organization of Muslim nations that accuses Myanmar of genocide in its crackdown on the Rohingya. At public hearings last month, lawyers for Myanmar's accusers used maps, satellite images and graphic photos to detail what they call a campaign of murder, rape and destruction amounting to genocide perpetrated by Myanmar's military. The hearings drew intense scrutiny from around the world as Myanmar's former pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi defended the campaign by military forces that once held her under house arrest for 15 years. Suu Kyi, who as Myanmar's state counselor now holds an office similar to prime minister, was awarded the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize for championing democracy and human rights under Myanmar's then-ruling junta. Buddhist-majority Myanmar has long considered the Rohingya to be "Bengalis" from Bangladesh even though their families have lived in the country for generations. Nearly all have been denied citizenship since 1982, effectively rendering them stateless. They are also denied freedom of movement and other basic rights..."
Source/publisher: Arab News (Saudi Arabia)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-23
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Title: International court to rule in Myanmar Rohingya genocide case
Sub-title: Momentous pronouncement follows Hague hearing at which Aung San Suu Kyi gave evidence
Description: "The United Nations’ highest tribunal is to deliver its decision on whether emergency measures are required to prevent Myanmar conducting genocide against its Rohingya Muslim minority. The momentous pronouncement on Thursday follows a three-day hearing at the international court of justice in The Hague last month at which the Nobel peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi defended her country against accusations of systematic human rights abuses and war crimes. The ruling on the need for “provisional measures” will be read out at 10am local time by the court’s president, Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf, and may take more than an hour to deliver. The hearing will be broadcast live on the ICJ website. The case was brought by the Gambia, a predominantly Muslim west African state that alleges Myanmar has breached the 1948 genocide convention enacted after the Holocaust. It argues that the violence is continuing..."
Source/publisher: "The Guardian" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-23
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Title: Myanmar Panel: War Crimes But No Genocide Committed Against Rohingya
Description: "An independent panel created by the Myanmar government has concluded that government security forces committed war crimes against Rohingya Muslims but that they did not commit genocide against the ethnic minority. The findings were included in a report released Monday by the Independent Commission of Inquiry. The commission, established by the government in July 2018, says it was “tasked to investigate allegations of human rights violations and related issues” after terrorist attacks in 2017 by a Rohingya insurgent group in Myanmar’s Rakhine state. The Myanmar government responded to the attacks with a military-led crackdown against the insurgent group, known as the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army. More than 730,000 Rohingya fled Rakhine state to neighboring Bangladesh during the weekslong crackdown that was widely condemned internationally..."
Source/publisher: "VOA" (Washington, D.C)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-23
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Title: Is Myanmar guilty of genocide?
Summary: "It was recently reported that Myanmar had conceded that it had committed “war crimes” against its Rohingya Muslim community. This is as far as Myanmar has ever gone in admitting responsibility for...
Description: "It was recently reported that Myanmar had conceded that it had committed “war crimes” against its Rohingya Muslim community. This is as far as Myanmar has ever gone in admitting responsibility for the atrocities committed against its Rohingya minority. Still, to some observers, this is not good enough. On 20 January, a Myanmar-appointed panel concluded that some soldiers likely committed war crimes against the Rohingya but that the military, however, was not guilty of genocide. The "Independent Commission of Enquiry (ICOE)" released the results of its probe just ahead of a ruling by the United Nation's (UN) top court on whether to impose urgent measures to stop alleged ongoing genocide in Myanmar. "There is insufficient evidence to argue, much less conclude, that the crimes committed were undertaken with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical (sic), racial or religious group." The fact that the ICOE would not admit that Myanmar’s military, also known as the Tatmadaw, were actively engaging in genocide as has been alleged, however, did not bode well with human rights groups..."
Source/publisher: "The ASEAN Post" (Malaysia)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-22
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Title: OPINION - Myanmar gov't doggedly continues with its genocide denial
Sub-title: 'Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi and her partners in crimes should know that denial is a part of genocide'
Description: "After having co-presided with the visiting Chinese president Xi Jinping over the signing of 33 agreements, including bilateral trade deals, Memorandums of Understanding, strategic partnership agreements, and technical cooperation, Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi was all smile again this Monday. On the official website of Myanmar's Independent Commission of Enquiry, smiley Ms Suu Kyi was seen posing for cameras as the former Deputy Foreign Minister of the Philippines Ms Rosario Manalo presented her with the final report of the Myanmar-established Independent Commission of Enquiry which the Philippines diplomat chaired. The Free Rohingya Coalition, an international network of Rohingya refugee activists and their supporters, issued a statement, refuting the findings of the commission that there is “no” or “insufficient” evidence to establish the genocidal intent behind Myanmar’s destruction of the Rohingya community in Rakhine state and the mass deportations of estimated 800,000 Rohingya into Bangladesh in 2016-2017..."
Source/publisher: "Anadolu Agency" (Ankara)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-22
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Title: War crimes, not genocide committed against Rohingya: Myanmar probe
Description: "A Myanmar-appointed panel concluded on Monday (Jan 20) that some soldiers likely committed war crimes against its Rohingya Muslim community but the military was not guilty of genocide, findings swiftly condemned by rights groups. The "Independent Commission Of Enquiry (ICOE)" released the results of its probe just ahead of a ruling on Thursday by the UN's top court on whether to impose urgent measures to stop alleged ongoing genocide in Myanmar. It conceded some security personnel had used disproportionate force and committed war crimes and serious human rights violations, including the "killing of innocent villagers and destruction of their homes". But the crimes did not constitute genocide, the panel decided. "There is insufficient evidence to argue, much less conclude, that the crimes committed were undertaken with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical (sic), racial or religious group." Military operations from August 2017 forced about 740,000 Rohingya to flee over the border into sprawling camps in Bangladesh..."
Source/publisher: "CNA" ( Singapore)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-21
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Title: Why Myanmar’s genocide denial will come back to haunt it
Description: "Maung Zarni is the co-founder of FORSEA, a grass-roots organization of Southeast Asian human rights defenders, and the co-author of “Essays on Myanmar’s Genocide of Rohingyas.” Last month, Myanmar’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi took the stand at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague to rebut allegations that her country’s systematic persecution of its Rohingya population amounts to genocide. Aung San Suu Kyi, once lionized for her stand against an oppressive military dictatorship, strenuously denied the charges — despite reams of evidence and the presence of nearly 1 million Rohingyas in refugee camps in Bangladesh. They ended up there after fleeing a so-called counterterrorism campaign by the Myanmar military in 2017 that left uncounted thousands dead..."
Source/publisher: "The Washington Post" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-16
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Title: World Court to Rule on Emergency Measures in Myanmar Genocide Case on January 23: Gambia
Description: "The International Court of Justice, the United Nations' highest court, will issue a decision on a request for emergency measures in a genocide case against Myanmar on Jan. 23, the Gambian Ministry of Justice said on Twitter on Monday. The mainly Muslim west African country filed the suit in November, alleging Myanmar was committing "an ongoing genocide" against its minority Muslim Rohingya population. The ICJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Gambia has accused Myanmar of violating the 1948 Genocide Convention in a military campaign that expelled more than 730,000 Rohingya from the country. It asked the International Court of Justice to order "provisional measures" to prevent more harm, a first step in a legal case that is expected to go on for years..."
Source/publisher: "The New York Times" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-15
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Title: How to Promote Tolerance in Myanmar, a Country that Recently Experienced a Genocide
Description: "In 2017, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya muslims were driven from their homes in Myanmar. At the time, a UN official called this a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing.” And today, the government of Myanmar is being sued at the International Court of Justice for perpetrating a genocide. These attacks against the Rohingya are the most recent and extreme example of sectarian violence and discrimination in Myanmar — which is an incredibly diverse country with a long history of ethnic conflict. So how does one stop this trend? How do you promote tolerance and pluralism in a place in which diversity has been used to fuel conflict? On the line with me today is someone who is doing just that. Aung Kyaw Moe is the founder and executive director of the Center for Social Integrity in Myanmar. This is an organization that provides both humanitarian relief but also engages in peace-building and advocacy work. He is Rohingya and has used humanitarian aid in parts of the country where Rohingya live to encourage cross ethnic partnerships. Aung Kyaw Moe and his organization recently received a high honor, the Global Pluralism Award, which is conferred by the government of Canada and the Aga Khan Foundation — and after listening to this episode, it will be clear why he won that award. We kick of discussing diversity in Myanmar before having a longer conversation about how that how diversity has been used as a wedge to ignite conflict, and how Aung Kyaw Moe is working to reverse that trend..."
Source/publisher: UN Dispatch
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-07
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Title: ‘Growing Together Campaign’ launches Rohingya children’s art exhibition
Description: "The Earth Society organised an eight-day exhibition with drawings made by Rohingya children, aged between nine and twelve. The event opened at EMK Center, Dhanmondi, on January 4. 21 drawings, portraying the heart-wrenching reality of the Rohingyas and the genocide and torture by the Myanmar Military, are on exhibit at the show. The Earth Society is a local NGO working with capacity building, youth engagement, development, disaster management and refugee crisis, among other things. Their ‘Growing Together Campaign’ includes the youth of two different countries finding sustainable ways to address the refugee crisis. The campaign was organised by The Earth Society, with support from InterCollege, FGU, UNG AKTION, and co-funded by Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union. 25 young people from the Danish organisation Youth Action and 27 young people from The Earth Society teamed up to build a project that would help both Rohingya children and their local communities through the Youth Exchange Program 2019. They visited two refugee camps, some of the host communities and participated in a number of interactive sessions with the refugees..."
Source/publisher: "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-07
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Title: Domestic politics drives Suu Kyi’s genocide denial
Sub-title: Myanmar nominal leader’s defense of Rohingya crackdown at ICJ boosts her re-election chances
Description: "To much of the world, Myanmar’s nominal leader Aung San Suu Kyi is a Nobel Peace Prize laureate turned genocide denier. At home, she is seen as a heroine who went to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to defend and uphold her country’s honor, though not necessarily in defense of the powerful military with which she has been at loggerheads for years. The case brought to the ICJ by Gambia “to protect and preserve the rights” of Myanmar’s Muslim Rohingya minority under the United Nations Genocide Convention will likely be a drawn-out and inconclusive legal process. That’s in part because all five permanent members of the UN’s Security Council may veto the enforcement of any verdict, which Myanmar allies China and Russia will likely do. Neither is an investigation ordered by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in November into alleged “crimes against humanity” committed during a Myanmar army campaign against the Rohingyas in 2017, which killed thousands and forced hundreds of thousands to flee across the border into neighboring Bangladesh, expected to succeed in prosecuting the perpetrators..."
Source/publisher: "Asia Times" (Hong Kong)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-05
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Title: Has Myanmar Lost Sight Of Justice, Accountability And Truth?
Sub-title: After decades and decades of iron-fisted rule by one of the most repressive military regimes the world has ever seen, its people deserve better. At least, Justice, accountability, truth, and national reconciliation are aspirations that many have fought and died for many years. Myanmar cannot lose sight of them.
Description: "As 2019 draws to a close, with no positive progress on the situation of human rights, Myanmar[1] has drawn international attention regarding allegations of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for crimes committed against the Rohingya. However, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s decision to represent the country as the Agent at the ICJ court proceedings in the Hague in defense of “the national interest”, has caused and continues to cause deep divisions amongst diverse people of Myanmar inside and outside of the country. Meanwhile in Rakhine State, clashes between the Arakan Army (AA) and the Myanmar military has displaced more than 5,800 people in one week while in some parts of Rakhine State people are still unable to access the internet, making it six months since it was shut down by the government. On Saturyday, twenty civil society organizations in Myanmar issued a joint statement – initiated by Free Expression Myanmar and joined by others including Progressive Voice – condemning this continued shut down of internet access in parts of Rakhine State. In her capacity as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi took the stand at the ICJ over the course of 10 – 12 December 2019 as the Agent of Myanmar. Although she denied the genocidal intent of the crimes, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi admitted at the world court that atrocity crimes have been committed by the Myanmar military. In her statement she admitted that “it cannot be ruled out that disproportionate force was used by members of the Defence Services in some cases in disregard of international humanitarian law.” The Myanmar military can no longer hide its brutal human rights violations against the Rohingya and other ethnic minorities. However, what is troubling is that a number of public rallies were held across the country in support of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi without a clear understanding of the public hearings at the Hague. The Myanmar military and the National League for Democracy government has taken advantage of this lack of clarity, falsely claiming that the people of Myanmar are on trial, rather than the State, for violating the Genocide Convention. Therefore, many of those who gather at the rallies in support of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi believe that they have a duty to support their leader for “defending the country.”..."
Source/publisher: "Progressive Voice" (Thailand)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-05
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Title: Myanmar: Defending genocide at the ICJ
Sub-title: With facts on the ground established, the Myanmar government's defence against the genocide charge can hardly stand.
Description: "On December 9, the world marked the anniversary of the adoption of the 1948 UN Genocide Convention: a covenant signed in the wake of the Holocaust not only to punish genocide but to prevent it. And yet, the tatters of the shredded promise of "never again" were on display the very next day at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which from December 10 to 12 held its first hearings in the case against Myanmar for the genocide of the Rohingya. The case was brought by The Gambia, under a provision of the Genocide Convention that permits state parties to bring a case against any other party for violations, even if they themselves are not directly affected - a reflection of the extreme gravity of the crime. The hearings - in which The Gambia requested "provisional measures" to mitigate further deterioration of the Rohingya's situation while the wheels of justice grind slowly forward - were just the preliminary stage of a long process which will take several more years to determine whether Myanmar bears state responsibility for genocide..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-05
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Title: Why is most of Asia looking away from Myanmar?
Description: "The latest resolution passed by the United Nations General Assembly condemning rights abuses against Rohingya Muslims and other minority groups in Myanmar was the third such resolution on the subject. It was approved by 134 votes in favour and nine against while 28 nations abstained. A vote so close to the hearing at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over a petition seeking interim measures to prevent further killings and abuses with genocidal intent demands closer scrutiny to understand global community’s attitude towards the Rohingya crisis. China and Russia’s opposition to any international condemnation of Myanmar was not unexpected as both of them in the past had supported so-called security operations against alleged insurgency. Had these two veto-wielding nations allowed the UN Security Council to find a way forward to resolve the crisis or at the least refer Myanmar to the International Criminal Court (ICC), victims of those atrocities carried out by Myanmar security forces would have gotten some hope for justice. Apparently, there’s too little Bangladesh can do to win them over. The other seven nations who voted against the resolution were Belarus, Cambodia, Peoples Democratic Republic of Lao, Philippines, Vietnam, Zimbabwe and Myanmar. Records show that these nations too have consistently sided with Myanmar. All these countries for decades have been criticised for their human rights records. Among them, Cambodia has bitter experience of dealing with genocide. It had cooperated fully with international jurists and experts to hold some of the perpetrators to justice. But, the current authoritarian regime’s appalling human rights records in the domestic front and reliance on China for military and economic aid explain its inability to support international actions against Myanmar..."
Source/publisher: "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2020-01-05
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Title: Explainer: Genocide case against Myanmar at the top U.N. court
Description: "Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi was due to leave the Netherlands on Friday after defending her country against accusations of genocide during three days of hearings at the International Court of Justice. The west African country of Gambia filed a case in November, alleging Myanmar was committing “an ongoing genocide” against its minority Muslim Rohingya population. As a first step, Gambia asked the court to order emergency measures to protect the Rohingya and keep the conflict from getting worse. These are meant as a kind of restraining order while the 17-judge panel looks at the full case on its merits, which usually takes several years to complete. The court said it would rule on the request as soon as possible, but did not set a specific date. A ruling is expected within weeks. These hearings are expected to have been the first in a long process. The genocide case against Bosnian Serbs in Srebrenica in 1995 took almost 15 years to complete..."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-16
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi appears at ICJ as UN rights expert urges greater protection for Myanmar activists
Description: "“I call on each and every organ of the Myanmar State to ensure that absolutely no reprisals are taken against any group or individual that is advocating for justice and accountability in Myanmar,” said the independent expert in a statement issued on Tuesday, adding that those targeted include members of the Free Rohingya Coalition. Legal proceedings begin The Rohingya are a mainly Muslim population residing in northern Rakhine state in Myanmar, a majority Buddhist country. More than 600,000 members of the minority group fled to neighbouring Bangladesh following a reported military crackdown in August 2017. Numerous alleged human rights abuses took place, with the then UN human rights chief describing it as bearing all the hallmarks of a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing”. Ms. Lee recalled that The Gambia in November filed an application against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the main judicial organ of the United Nations. The West African country brought the case to the world court on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). The ICJ proceedings began on Tuesday in The Hague, with Nobel peace laureate and Myanmar’s civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi also present in court to defend the country against accusations of genocide. She is due to address the court on Wednesday. The International Criminal Court (ICC) has also authorized an investigation into alleged crimes against humanity committed against the Rohingya, while criminal complaints of genocide and crimes against humanity have been filed in Argentina under the principle of universal jurisdiction..."
Source/publisher: UN News
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi impassive as genocide hearing begins
Sub-title: World’s failure to act over Myanmar is ‘stain on collective conscience’, UN court told
Description: "Aung San Suu Kyi has sat impassively through graphic accounts of mass murder and rape perpetrated by Myanmar’s military at the start of a three-day hearing into allegations of genocide at the UN’s highest court. “I stand before you to awaken the conscience of the world and arouse the voice of the international community,” Abubacarr Marie Tambadou, the Gambia’s attorney general and justice minister, said as he opened his country’s case against Myanmar at the international court of justice (ICJ) in The Hague. “In the words of Edmund Burke: ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.’ “Another genocide is unfolding right before our eyes yet we do nothing to stop it,” he said. “This is a stain on our collective conscience. It’s not only the state of Myanmar that is on trial here, it’s our collective humanity that is being put on trial.” Before dawn on Tuesday, a long queue had formed outside the Peace Palace in the Dutch city to witness the first of three days of hearings that will focus attention on military clearance operations in 2017 against the Rohingya Muslim minority, 700,000 of whom were forced to flee across the border to neighbouring Bangladesh..."
Source/publisher: "The Guardian" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi to appear at ICJ as Myanmar faces genocide case (video)
Description: "Myanmar is preparing to defend itself against charges of genocide at the International Court of Justice on Tuesday. Heading the country's legal team will be leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Ethnic Groups Support ICJ Rohingya Genocide Lawsuit Against Burma Government And Its Military
Sub-title: The International Court of Justice began its hearing on December 10 in The Hague, Netherlands on its genocide lawsuit filed by Gambia against Burma government.
Description: "Prior to the court hearing, several ethnic Karen, Karenni and Shan civil society groups put out a joint statement supporting Gambia’s lawsuit. On December 2, 2019 the Worldwide Karen Community issued a statement welcoming the filing of the genocide case against Burma at the ICJ and the decision by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to proceed with an investigation into the crime of deportation against the Rohingya. The statement endorsed by 48 Karen civil society organizations around the world said that as the Rohingya case, Karen people suffered for decades from systematic human rights violations by the Burma Army. The Worldwide Karen Community statement said; “this is a critical time for action. It is urgently needed for the international community to exert further pressure, including economic sanctions, to push for a complete halt to Burma Army offensives throughout the country – and to start a genuine, inclusive dialogue. Only a new federal constitution, granting the ethnic people their right to autonomy, and bringing the Burma Army under civilian control, can bring an end to the civil war and the ongoing crimes by the Burma Army.” On December 8, the Karen Grassroots Women Network put out a statement supporting the ICJ lawsuit saying that for decades, women have experienced and witnessed the abuse of ethnic people in Burma taking place with impunity..."
Source/publisher: "Karen News" (Myanmar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: 'Genocidal intent': Myanmar faces genocide case at ICJ
Description: "A three-day hearing initiated after Gambia filed lawsuit in November on Rohingya crisis. Aung San Suu Kyi arrived at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague on Tuesday for a highly anticipated genocide case against Myanmar. The case, the first international legal attempt to bring Myanmar to justice over alleged mass killings of the Rohingya minority, comes after the Gambia on November 11 filed an application at the ICJ, accusing Myanmar of violating the 1948 Genocide Convention. More than 700,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh to escape the violence..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: A Journalist Looks Back as Myanmar's Government Faces Genocide Charges
Description: "The sight of more than a dozen young men armed with machetes walking out of a burning village in Western Myanmar is the moment I realized that I was witnessing a genocide in progress. In the eight years I spent documenting a campaign of oppression against the country's ethnic minority Rohingya Muslims, I had heard countless tales from victims who had endured or witnessed atrocities committed by Myanmar's security forces. Now, I was witnessing it in real time during the tail end of a government-approved press tour to Rakhine state’s conflict zone in September of 2017. Two men, barefoot and wearing traditional longyis, stopped briefly on a dirt footpath in front of me as I filmed the destruction. A journalist asked what they were doing. Speaking a local dialect, one replied that they had been ordered by Myanmar's Border Guard Forces (BGF) to burn the village. At their feet lay plastic jugs with diesel fuel. Behind them, orange flames devoured the bamboo huts in the now-empty hamlet of Gaw du Thara.
Source/publisher: "VOA" (Washington, D.C)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Myanmar's Suu Kyi to take stand in genocide case at The Hague
Sub-title: In an unprecedented move, former human rights icon defends Myanmar generals over mass killings, rape, and displacement.
Description: "Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi will defend genocide allegations against Myanmar's military on Wednesday amid accusations of mass killings, rape, and expulsion of the Rohingya Muslim minority. The Gambia, a small West African country, launched the case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nations's highest court, alleging it violated the 1948 Genocide Convention. More: New Rohingya book tells of the 'slow burn of genocide' Aung San Suu Kyi arrives at ICJ as Myanmar faces genocide case US slaps sanctions on Myanmar military chief over Rohingya abuses Aung San Suu Kyi - once a human rights icon who fought against the powerful military for democracy - shocked critics and galvanised supporters at home by travelling to The Hague to head her country's delegation. Her office said she was going to "defend the national interest". She listened impassively on Tuesday as lawyers for The Gambia detailed graphic testimony of suffering of Rohingya at the hands of Myanmar's security forces, including gang rape, torture, and murder. "It was very important to see her have to sit inches away from people who were describing - in really painfully excruciating detail - all the horrible crimes of the Burmese military that happened on her watch," Brad Adams, of New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW), told Al Jazeera..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Netherlands: ICJ begins hearings on Myanmar genocide allegations
Description: "The International Court of Justice (ICJ) kicked off its first hearings on The Gambia's case against Myanmar over accusations of genocide against the Rohingya people in The Hague on Tuesday. The Nobel Peace Prize winner, and one-time champion for human rights, Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi attended Tuesday's hearing at the ICJ, representing Myanmar, in a move which has been widely criticised. "All that The Gambia asks is that you tell Myanmar to stop these senseless killings, to stop these acts of barbarity that continue to shock our collective conscience, to stop this genocide of its own people." Gambia's Attorney General and Justice Minister Abubacarr M. Tambadou said during the hearing. The Gambia is seeking provisional measures to protect the rights of Rohingya people under the 1948 UN Genocide Convention..."
Source/publisher: "Ruptly" (Berlin)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: UK to still fund Myanmar camps despite fears of 'apartheid-like' conditions
Sub-title: Humanitarian agencies say Rohingya people displaced by violence in Rakhine state are forced to live in squalid conditions
Description: "The UK has broken ranks with the UN and will keep funding “closed” Rohingya camps inside Myanmar despite fears that doing so may entrench “apartheid-like” conditions in the country, the Guardian has learned. Internal briefing documents as well as interviews with UN and humanitarian agency officials in Myanmar showed the British government was maintaining a policy of providing aid and other support to displaced people living in camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine state that have been slated for closure since 2017. The facilities have been criticised for being squalid, unsanitary and entrenching the segregation of Rohingya and other Muslim minorities, who in most cases are prevented from leaving..."
Source/publisher: "The Guardian" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-11
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi to appear at ICJ as Myanmar faces genocide case (Text)
Sub-title: Myanmar leader will defend country against charges of genocide over a 2017 crackdown on the Rohingya filed by Gambia.
Description: "Aung San Suu Kyi will appear at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague on Tuesday for a highly anticipated genocide case against Myanmar. The country's civilian leader, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her struggle against Myanmar's military dictatorship, arrived at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport on Sunday alongside Wouter Jurgens, the Dutch ambassador to Myanmar, and was greeted by a handful of supporters. More: Rohingya campaigners say won't be 'silenced' by online threats Myanmar sets up special legal unit as Rohingya cases loom A boy who can sing: The life of a Rohingya child refugee Several demonstrations, for and against her, are expected to take place in the coming days in the Dutch city. The case, the first international legal attempt to bring Myanmar to justice over alleged mass killings of the Rohingya minority, comes after the Gambia on November 11 filed an application at the ICJ, accusing Myanmar of violating the 1948 Genocide Convention. Aung San Suu Kyi's office confirmed last month that she would participate in the hearing and lead her country's team to "defend the national interest". More than 700,000 Rohingya, a mostly-Muslim minority, fled to neighbouring Bangladesh after a bloody crackdown in 2017 by the Myanmar military, which UN investigators have concluded was carried out with "genocidal intent"..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-10
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Title: From democracy icon to genocide defender
Description: "From democracy champion to defending Myanmar against genocide charges, the shock decision by civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi to face the UN’s top court risks further damaging her image overseas and deepening the siege mentality at home. “We stand with you,” proclaim billboards across Myanmar, sporting beaming portraits of the Nobel laureate as she prepares to face the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the Rohingya crisis. Suu Kyi’s supporters are printing off T-shirts, organising rallies and even signing up to VIP tours to The Hague to offer their backing. Political parties and even some rebel armed groups have also fallen over themselves to give their support, in a country where the Rohingya garner little sympathy and are widely regarded as illegal immigrants. Yet overseas, particularly in the West and in Muslim countries, Suu Kyi’s reputation lies in tatters with multiple awards and even an honorary citizenship revoked. Critics say “The Lady”, once lauded alongside Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela, has become an apologist for a murderous military intent on wiping out the country’s Rohingya Muslims. The spectacle of Suu Kyi standing up in court on behalf of the nation might play well at home but she risks suffering a fatal blow to what remains of her international reputation. “If she’s only going to use the visit to demonstrate defiance and continue to defend the indefensible, then it only widens the impasse,” Yangon-based analyst David Mathieson told AFP..."
Source/publisher: Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-10
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Title: Interview with Aung Myo Min about the situation in the ICJ - Part 1: ICJ မှာ ရင်ဆိုင်ရမယ့် အခြေအနေအကြောင်း ဦးအောင်မျိုးမင်းနှင့် တွေ့ဆုံမေးမြန်းချက် (၁)
Description: "နယ်သာလန်နိုင်ငံက ICJ တရားရုံးအထိ ကိုယ်တိုင်သွားပြီး နိုင်ငံ့ကိုယ်စား ဦးဆောင်ရင်ဆိုင်ရဲတဲ့ ဒေါ်အောင် ဆန်းစုကြည်ရဲ့လုပ်ရပ်ကို ကြိဆိုထောက်ခံတယ်လို့ ဝါရင့် လူ့အခွင့်အရေးလှုပ်ရှားသူ Equality Myanmar ရဲ့ အမှုဆောင်ဒါရိုက်တာ ဦးအောင်မျိုးမင်းကပြောပါတယ်။ One News က ဦးထက်အောင်ကျော်နဲ့ သီးသန့် မေးမြန်းခန်းအတွင်း သူက အဲဒီလိုပြောခဲ့တာပါ။ အခု ထုတ်လွှင့်ပေးမယ့် မေးမြန်းချက် ပထမ ပိုင်းမှာတော့… ICJ နဲ့ ICC ဘာကွာသလဲ၊ ICC က စွပ်စွဲစဉ်က ဘာမှမတုန့်ပြန်ဘဲ ICJ ပြောမှ နိုင်ငံတော်အတိုင်ပင်ခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ်ကိုယ်တိုင် သွားရောက်ဖြေရှင်းတာ ဘာကြောင့်လဲ၊ တရားရုံးရဲ့ ဆုံးဖြတ်ချက်က ဘာဖြစ်နိုင်သလဲ၊ လူထုထောက်ခံပွဲတွေက ဒေါ်အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည်ကို ထောက်ခံ တာအပြင် ရခိုင်အရေးဖြစ်စဉ်တွေအပေါ်ပါ ကရက်ရိုက်မှုရှိလာနိုင်သလား… စတဲ့အကြောင်းအရာတွေကို ဆွေးနွေးတင်ပြထားပါတယ်။..."
Source/publisher: One News (Myanmar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-10
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Title: Myanmar Rohingya: Suu Kyi to defend genocide charge at UN court
Description: "The Nobel Peace Prize laureate will hear allegations that Myanmar committed atrocities against Muslim Rohingya. Thousands of Rohingya were killed and more than 700,000 fled to neighbouring Bangladesh during an army crackdown in the Buddhist-majority country in 2017. Myanmar has always insisted it was tackling an extremist threat. The case has been brought by the small African nation of The Gambia. In the initial three-day hearing at the ICJ, it will ask the court to approve temporary measures to protect the Rohingya. What are the accusations? At the start of 2017, there were one million Rohingya in Myanmar (formerly Burma), most living in Rakhine state. But Myanmar, a mainly Buddhist country, considers them illegal immigrants and denies them citizenship. Blow by blow: How a 'genocide' was investigated Will Omar get justice for his murdered family? The Rohingya have long complained of persecution, and in 2017 the military - the Tatmadaw - launched a massive military operation in Rakhine. According to the ICJ documents, the military stands accused of "widespread and systematic clearance operations" against the Rohingya, beginning in October 2016 and expanding in August 2017. It will hear allegations that the clearances were "intended to destroy the Rohingya as a group, in whole or in part", via mass murder, rape, and setting fire to their buildings "often with inhabitants locked inside"..."
Source/publisher: "BBC News" (London)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-10
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Title: Timeline: How the crackdown on Myanmar's Rohingya unfolded
Sub-title: A brutal crackdown on the minority Rohingya has brought Myanmar to the UN's highest court and charges of genocide.
Description: "Aung San Suu Kyi, former political prisoner, Nobel Peace Prize winner and now Myanmar's civilian leader, is in the Netherlands to defend the country against charges of genocide in relation to a brutal 2017 crackdown on its Rohingya minority. Around 740,000 mostly Muslim Rohingya fled into neighbouring Bangladesh when the military swept through villages in western Rakhine state after an armed group attacked a number of security posts. The United Nation's top court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), will start hearing the case brought by The Gambia against Myanmar on Tuesday. The International Criminal Court has also approved a full investigation of allegations of crimes against humanity committed during the military crackdown, while Aung San Suu Kyi herself has been accused of committing crimes against the Rohingya in a case brought in Argentina. Myanmar has denied charges of genocide..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-10
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi heads to The Hague for Myanmar genocide showdown
Sub-title: Peace prize winner will lead her country’s defence against claims at court in Netherlands
Description: "A momentous legal confrontation will take place at the UN’s highest court on Tuesday when the Nobel peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi appears in person to defend Myanmar against accusations of genocide. Once internationally feted as a human rights champion, Myanmar’s state counsellor is scheduled to lead a delegation to the international court of justice (ICJ) in The Hague. The claim that Myanmar’s military carried out mass murder, rape and destruction of Rohingya Muslim communities has been brought by the Gambia, a west African state that belongs to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. The contrast is repeatedly drawn between Aung San Suu Kyi’s 1991 peace prize win and 15 years spent under house arrest, and her present position as chief denier that any ethnic violence has been perpetrated against the Rohingya. Last year, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum revoked her Elie Wiesel award..."
Source/publisher: "The Guardian" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi risks image defending Rohingya genocide
Description: "From democracy champion to defending Myanmar against genocide charges, the shock decision by civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi to face the UN’s top court risks further damaging her image overseas and deepening the siege mentality at home. “We stand with you,” proclaim billboards across Myanmar, sporting beaming portraits of the Nobel laureate as she prepares to face the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the Rohingya crisis. Suu Kyi’s supporters are printing off T-shirts, organizing rallies and even signing up to VIP tours to The Hague to offer their backing. Political parties and even some rebel armed groups have also fallen over themselves to give their support, in a country where the Rohingya garner little sympathy and are widely regarded as illegal immigrants..."
Source/publisher: "Asia Times" (Hong Kong)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: How To Move Forward. Yanghee Lee, UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar
Description: "Speaking at the first day of the International Conference on Protection of Rohingya Survivors and Accountability for Genocide, professor and UN Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee delivered an inspirational opening keynote, calling Myanmar’s policies of persecution towards Rohingyas a classic genocide while exhorting activists in the audience – and on YouTube – to “call a spade a spade”. She invoked the inter-state treaty known as the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Lee rightly slammed the United Nations, particularly the Security Council, to discharge its founding charter, exposed the unconscionable presence of Myanmar solders among the UN Peacekeepers and destroyed the credibility of the United Nations. The two-day International Conference was at at Sogang University in Seoul, S. Korea, August 23-24, 2019..."
Source/publisher: "FORSEA Forces of Renewal Southeast Asia"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: Human Rights in Myanmar - videotape presentation by Prof. Yanghee Lee
Description: "Human Rights in Myanmar - videotape presentation by Prof. Yanghee Lee at the International Conference on Protection and Accountability..."
Source/publisher: " Free Rohingya Coalition"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: Rohingya Crisis: UN Special Rapporteur to Myanmar Yanghee Lee on CNNi
Source/publisher: "CNN" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: UN envoy urges Myanmar government to lift Internet ban
Description: "The United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on human rights Yanghee Lee urged Myanmar's government to lift its ban on Internet access in several townships. Speaking to media in Kuala Lumpur, she said her findings showed the worsening rights situation in Myanmar..."
Source/publisher: "CNA" ( Singapore)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: UN Human Rights Council 41 Side Event on Myanmar
Description: "Physicians for Human Rights was joined by Amnesty International and UN Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee for a Human Rights Council 41st session side event on the long-term legacy of state-backed violence against Myanmar's minorities. Experts: Yanghee Lee, Special Rapporteur on Myanmar, United Nations Hilary Power, Senior Advocate for the UN Human Rights Council, Amnesty International Phelim Kine, Director of Research and Investigations, Physicians for Human Rights Moderated by: Antoine Madelin, International Advocacy Director, International Federation for Human Rights..."
Source/publisher: "PHRvideo"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: UN: violence against Myanmar's Rohingya continuing
Description: "The U.N. special rapporteur on Myanmar Yanghee Lee said on Friday that violence against Rohingya Muslims was continuing and that Myanmar's military was forcing them to flee. The military is "slowly bleeding the remaining Rohingya population and continuing to force them to flee to Bangladesh," Yanghee Lee told reporters in Dhaka after a visit to the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh. "The causes of the current Rohingya situation lie in Myanmar and it is to Myanmar that we must look for the solution," said Lee The government of Myanmar has refused Lee entrance to the country. Referring to recent reports of Saudi Arabia and India deporting groups of Rohingya, Lee said these countries must ensure that Rohingya within their borders are protected and that their status as refugees is recognised. Most people in Buddhist-majority Myanmar do not accept that the Rohingya Muslims are a native ethnic group..."
Source/publisher: "AP Archive" (New York)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-09
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Title: Canada: Using all tools against Myanmar for solution to Rohingya crisis
Sub-title: The causes and solutions to the crisis lie in Myanmar, Benoit Préfontaine said
Description: "Canada has said they are using all tools at their disposal, including sanctions, against Myanmar leaders and companies as well as diplomatic efforts to help find a solution to Rohingya crisis. "We fully agree that the causes and solutions to the crisis lie in Myanmar, and this is why we are using all tools at our disposal to help," Canadian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Benoit Préfontaine. The High Commissioner was addressing a symposium titled “Bangladesh-Canada Relations: Prognosis for Partnership” at a Dhaka hotel organized by Cosmos Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Cosmos Group, as part of its Ambassador’s Lecture Series on Saturday. Highlighting Canada’s supports over Rohingya issue, Foreign Secretary (Senior Secretary) Md Shahidul Haque, who spoke at the event as the chief guest, termed Bangladesh-Canada relation a trouble-free one which is growing on all fronts, reports UNB. Chairman of the Cosmos Foundation Enayetullah Khan delivered the welcome speech at the symposium chaired by Dr Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury, the Principal Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore, and former foreign affairs Adviser to Bangladesh’s previous caretaker government..."
Source/publisher: "Dhaka Tribune" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-08
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Title: Myanmar leader Suu Kyi departs for genocide hearings amid fanfare at home
Description: "Myanmar leader and Nobel peace prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi departed on Sunday for the U.N’s top court in The Hague to defend the country against charges of genocide of its Rohingya Muslim minority. Suu Kyi was pictured smiling as she walked through the airport in the nation’s capital, Naypyitaw, flanked by officials, a day after thousands rallied in the city to support her and a prayer ceremony was held in her name. Crowds are expected to gather again in the afternoon to send off several dozen supporters who will travel to The Hague in the Netherlands and demonstrations are planned throughout the coming week, with hearings set for Dec. 10 to 12. Gambia, a tiny, mainly Muslim West African country, filed a lawsuit in November accusing Buddhist-majority Myanmar of genocide, the most serious international crime, against its Rohingya Muslim minority. During three days of hearings, it will ask the 16-member panel of U.N judges at the International Criminal Court of Justice to impose “provisional measures” to protect the Rohingya before the case can be heard in full..."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-08
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Title: Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi prepares to take on Rohingya genocide lawsuit in The Hague
Description: " From democracy champion to defending Myanmar against genocide charges, the shock decision by civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi to face the UN's top court risks further damaging her image overseas and deepening the siege mentality at home. "We stand with you," proclaim billboards across Myanmar, sporting beaming portraits of the Nobel laureate as she prepares to face the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the Rohingya crisis. Suu Kyi's supporters are printing off T-shirts, organising rallies and even signing up to VIP tours to The Hague to offer their backing. Political parties and even some rebel armed groups have also fallen over themselves to give their support, in a country where the Rohingya garner little sympathy and are widely regarded as illegal immigrants. Yet overseas, particularly in the West and in Muslim countries, Suu Kyi's reputation lies in tatters with multiple awards and even an honorary citizenship revoked..."
Source/publisher: "CNA" ( Singapore)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-08
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Title: Thousands in Myanmar rally behind Suu Kyi ahead of Hague court date
Description: "Thousands rallied in support of Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar Saturday, on the eve of her departure for the UN’s top court to defend Myanmar against charges of genocide against Rohingya Muslims. The raucous rally in the capital Naypyidaw came as China’s foreign minister arrived for a visit at Suu Kyi’s invitation. Analysts say Beijing’s permanent seat on the UN Security Council – and its veto vote – makes it a valuable ally as Myanmar faces intensifying scrutiny over its treatment of the Rohingya. Once-lauded democracy champion Suu Kyi’s shock decision to face the International Court of Justice (ICJ) next week to defend Myanmar against charges it committed genocide against the Muslim minority risks further damaging her already tattered overseas reputation. But domestically “The Lady” remains revered, and the resolve of her supporters has only hardened in the lead-up to the ICJ hearing scheduled for December 10-12. “We are proud of her taking accountability... by going to The Hague to protect the nation’s image,” shouted prominent writer Htin Lin Oo into a microphone in front of a banner emblazoned with the words “We stand with our leader.” “Our blood shall come together and unite us when it is important,” he shouted to a cheering crowd, who hoisted colourful artwork of Suu Kyi in the air..."
Source/publisher: Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "New Straits Times" (Malaysia)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-08
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Title: Rohingya Minority In Myanmar Between The Religious Persecution And The Reality Of Constitutional Protection
Description: "The government's performance in the State of Myanmar raises questions about the reality of its position on what is happening to the range of its citizens who are Muslims Alrohengjian, it bear full responsibility for the protection and preservation of their rights. Despite the government's signing of Myanmar on the international agreements and conventions on human rights, despite its stated commitment to the protection of human rights and the promotion of democracy and the rule of law; the government has not taken any real action to protect the Rohingyas and address violence or stop racist policy of ethnic cleansing, which govern the Muslims of Rohingya by Buddhist extremists. We will discuss in this paper what is really happening to the Muslims Alrohengjian in Myanmar, especially in the recent wave of persecution and ethnic cleansing against them, and we are exposed to historical backgrounds of these crimes and the role of internal constitutional provisions and the provisions of international conventions on the protection of this vulnerable minority..."
Source/publisher: "Academia.edu" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-07
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Title: Impact of the Rohingya Refugee Crisis on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Sub-title: A short paper on the region‘s response to the recent refugee crisis.
Description: "The objectives of this short report are to: (a) give a comprehensive historical background on the plight of the Rohgingya and the events of the migrant crisis; (b) identify, explain the role and response of entities such as the governments of ASEAN and other organizations such as the United Nations (UN) and relevant non-governmental organizations (NGOs); (c) explain the political, economic and social aspects, factors and developments on the issue; (d) give a conclusion and recommendations based on the author‘s research. Studying refugees and forced displacement flows is essential in understanding emerging trends in migration, as well as an indicator of consequences of conflict, economic stagnation, and environmental degradation. As of 2014, the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) reported an accelerated growth in global forced displacement whilst reaching unprecedented levels. There are 59.5 million individuals globally that were forcibly displaced because of persecution, armed conflict, generalized violence, or human rights violation1 . Crises in the Middle East, Africa, Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia have severely stretched the global humanitarian system. In addition, the gaps can be observed on the current global legal framework in protecting, asylum seekers, refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs). Out of the 59.5 million displaced, 19.5 million are refugees, 28.2 million are IDPs, and 1.8 million are asylum-seekers. 42,500 individuals are forcibly displaced daily due to conflict and persecution..."
Source/publisher: "Academia.edu" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-07
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Title: It’s Time to Indict Aung San Suu Kyi for Genocide Against the Rohingya in Myanmar
Description: "ISN’T IT TIME Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was indicted for war crimes and genocide at the International Criminal Court? This Sunday marks two years since the Burmese military, the Tatmadaw, arrived in Rakhine state, in western Myanmar, to launch a renewed campaign of terror and violence against the country’s long-persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority. Unspeakable crimes were committed by Burmese troops and vigilantes: Rohingya men hacked to death; children burned alive; women and girls raped and sexually assaulted in their hundreds and thousands. Scores of villages were pillaged and razed to the ground as more than 700,000 Rohingya were driven from their homes. One cautious estimate put the death toll at more than 10,000. Two years on, as Rohingya refugees languish in squalid camps across the border in Bangladesh, it is difficult to overstate the sheer barbarism they have had to endure. The U.S. State Department has called it “ethnic cleansing,” with Sam Brownback, the U.S. ambassador for international religious freedom, describing the violence against the Rohingya “as bad as or worse than any other I have personally seen — including as one of the first U.S. officials to visit Darfur in 2004.” In August 2018, a United Nations fact-finding commission accused the Burmese military of genocide — a view endorsed by, among others, experts at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., and a unanimous vote by the Canadian parliament in Ottawa. The U.N.’s investigators even demanded Myanmar’s top military commanders be investigated and prosecuted for the “gravest” crimes against civilians under international law..."
Source/publisher: "The Intercept"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-07
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Title: Questions and Answers on Gambia’s Genocide Case Against Myanmar before the ICJ
Description: "Myanmar’s military, known as the Tatmadaw, has committed extensive atrocities against ethnic Rohingya Muslims, including murder, rape, and arson. These abuses reached their peak during the Tatmadaw’s brutal ethnic cleansing campaign, beginning in August 2017, that forced more than 740,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. These crimes have been thoroughly documented by the United Nations, the media, and human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch. Gambia – with the backing of the 57 members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation – has filed a case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) alleging that Myanmar’s atrocities against the Rohingya in Rakhine State violate various provisions of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (“the Genocide Convention”). Gambia, which ratified the convention in 1978, brought the case under article 9 of the convention, which allows for disputes between parties “relating to the responsibility of a State for genocide” and related acts to be submitted to the ICJ by any party. The ICJ previously confirmed that all member states of the convention have a duty to prevent and to punish genocide. Myanmar has been a party to the Genocide Convention since 1956..."
Source/publisher: "Human Rights Watch" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-07
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Title: How to protect the rights of the stateless Rohingya people in Myanmar?
Description: "Few years ago, I was in London attending a human rights festival, where I watched a documentary about Myanmar. At that time I knew little about Myanmar, but that movie struck my attention and gave a different direction to my life. I decided to take action and understand what was behind the Junta’s curtain and the military violence against its own people. Therefore, few months later, I started a Master in Human Rights & Conflict Management at Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy and then spent four months at the United Nations Regional Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Bangkok. During my time at OHCHR, I got closer to the Rohingya’s cause when in October 2012, following an escalation of violence in Myanmar, they organized a protest in front of the UN building in Bangkok, asking the United Nations Security Council to deploy, within 72 hours, UN Peacekeeping Forces in the Rakhine State to protect the Rohingya people and to constitute a UN Commission of Inquiry to investigate the international crimes committed against them and bring the perpetrators to justice. The decision to research on the topic of the stateless Rohingya has been taken as a way to stand for their cause. Their particular vulnerability and determination at the same time, inspired me..."
Source/publisher: "Institute of Law, Politics and Development"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-06
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Title: An icon's journey: Aung San Suu Kyi's life in troubled Myanmar
Description: "On Tuesday, World Human Rights Day, Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi will fight accusations of genocide brought against her country at the International Court of Justice at The Hague. Myanmar has been called to answer for alleged atrocities committed during a military-led crackdown two years ago that saw more than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims flee to neighboring Bangladesh. The case has been filed with the court by Gambia. This timeline charts Suu Kyi’s journey from political prisoner to leader of her troubled nation: June 19, 1945: Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of Myanmar’s independence hero General Aung San, is born. Her father is assassinated when she is 2 years old. 1988: She returns to Myanmar to care for her dying mother and is swept up in nationwide protests against decades of military rule. 1989: Having crushed the protests and killed thousands, the military puts Suu Kyi under house arrest..."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-06
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Title: In rare legal test, Myanmar faces genocide hearings at The Hague
Description: "In a wood-panelled hall of the ornate Peace Palace at The Hague, lawyers pressing a case against Myanmar for alleged genocide against its Muslim Rohingya minority will next week ask judges to order immediate action to protect them from further violence. Gambia, a tiny, mainly Muslim West African country, filed a lawsuit in November accusing Myanmar of genocide, the most serious international crime. During three days of hearings starting Dec. 10, it will ask the 16-member panel of U.N. judges at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to impose “provisional measures” to protect the Rohingya before the case can be heard in full. More than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Myanmar to neighboring Bangladesh since a 2017 military crackdown, which U.N. investigators found in August to have been carried out with “genocidal intent”. Myanmar vehemently denies allegations of genocide..."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-06
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Title: The Lady and The Hague: Myanmar leader Suu Kyi courts home audience
Description: "The last time Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi traveled to western Europe, she was feted as the freshly elected civilian ruler of a fledgling democracy who had brought an end to half a century of military dictatorship. When the Nobel peace prize laureate returns next week, her first trip to the region since a 2017 military crackdown on Rohingya Muslims in western Myanmar, it will be to face accusations of genocide, alongside the army she spent much of her life battling. Gambia, a tiny, mainly Muslim West African state backed by the 57-nation Organisation for Islamic Cooperation (OIC), lodged a lawsuit at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last month against Myanmar for genocide, including mass murder and rape. Myanmar denies the allegations, and Suu Kyi’s office said she would fly to The Hague for the first hearings, from Dec. 10, to “defend the national interest”. “There is a discrepancy between the opinion of Myanmar and the international community,” said Myo Nyunt, the senior spokesman for her National League for Democracy Party. “She has to explain what has really taken place in northern Rakhine.”...."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-06
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Title: Muslim Minority In Myanmar: A Case Study Of Myanmar Government And Rohingya Muslims
Description: "The discrimination suffered by Rohingya Muslims is increasingly blewed up in media in last decade. The peak of the discriminatory treatment against Rohingya Muslim by Myanmar government is the unavailability of shelter from Myanmar government. In the perspective of international law, Myanmar government’s actions constitute a serious violence, because it ignores the rights of its citizens. Even a series of massacres and inhumane treatment became a major offense committed by Myanmar government in terms of humanity. This attracted international attention in solving the problem. This article illustrated the fate of Rohingyas who are not given citizenship rights by Myanmar government. It also revealed the irony of Muslims of Rohingya life who are discriminated by the government of Myanmar, both in the practical as well as in the political context. Diskriminasi yang diderita oleh Muslim Rohingya semakin mengemuka di media dalam dekade terakhir. Puncak perlakuan diskriminatif terhadap Muslim Rohingya adalah tidak tersedianya tempat tinggal dari pemerintah Myanmar. Dalam perspektif hukum internasional, tindakan pemerintah Myanmar ini merupakan..."
Source/publisher: "Academia.edu" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-06
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Title: Going To The ICJ: Myanmar, Genocide And Aung San Suu Kyi’s Gamble – OpEd
Description: "Leaders currently in office rarely make an appearance before either the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court. International law remains affixed to the notion that heads-of-state are, at least for the duration of their time in office, safe from prosecution. Matters change once the time in office expires. Be that as it may, Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi, with an ever dwindling number of peace prizes and awards to her name for questionable responses to the plight of the Rohingya Muslim minority, has a plan. She intends to personally plead the case of her country against charges of genocide being made in the International Court of Justice. As the Ministry of the Interior has claimed, the argument against state brutality against the Rohingya has arisen due to ignorance about “the complexities of the issue and the narratives of the people of Myanmar.” The case itself is drawn from the well of universal jurisdiction, a concept that Henry Kissinger finds so troubling to the freedom of flexible statecraft. The former US secretary of state, in 2001, warned that subjecting international relations to judicial procedures came with risks. “The danger lies in pushing the effort to extremes that risk substituting the tyranny of judges for that of governments; historically, the dictatorship of the virtuous has often led to inquisitions and even witch-hunts.”..."
Source/publisher: "Eurasia Review"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-05
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Title: Myanmar, Genocide, and Aung San Suu Kyi’s Gamble
Sub-title: Going to the ICJ
Description: "Leaders currently in office rarely make an appearance before either the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court. International law remains affixed to the notion that heads-of-state are, at least for the duration of their time in office, safe from prosecution. Matters change once the time in office expires. Be that as it may, Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi, with an ever dwindling number of peace prizes and awards to her name for questionable responses to the plight of the Rohingya Muslim minority, has a plan. She intends to personally plead the case of her country against charges of genocide being made in the International Court of Justice. As the Ministry of the Interior has claimed, the argument against state brutality against the Rohingya has arisen due to ignorance about “the complexities of the issue and the narratives of the people of Myanmar.” The case itself is drawn from the well of universal jurisdiction, a concept that Henry Kissinger finds so troubling to the freedom of flexible statecraft. The former US secretary of state, in 2001, warned that subjecting international relations to judicial procedures came with risks. “The danger lies in pushing the effort to extremes that risk substituting the tyranny of judges for that of governments; historically, the dictatorship of the virtuous has often led to inquisitions and even witch-hunts.”.."
Source/publisher: "Dissident Voice" (California)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-05
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Title: Suu Kyi gears up for genocide hearing
Description: "There has been strong reaction in Myanmar to Aung San Suu Kyi's decision to appear at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to defend the country against charges of genocide. While Western diplomats have tried to persuade the civilian leader that she was embarking on a high-risk strategy, and should reconsider. Attitudes amongst the intellectuals, politicians, MPs and civil society range from animated support to more measured approaches. Myanmar's civilian government and its military leaders are accused of crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing and genocide towards its Muslim population in the strife-torn western Rakhine state during the last three years of military operations. These "clearance campaigns" forced nearly a million Muslims -- or Rohingya as they call themselves -- to flee to neighbouring Bangladesh for safety. While the move came as a surprise to most people in the country including foreign diplomats, the response was swift. Demonstrations of support -- organised by the governing party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), "spontaneously" took place in the commercial capital Yangon and other urban centres almost hours after the official announcement of the State Counsellor's planned trip. More demonstrations are planned in the coming weeks before hearing opens on Dec 10..."
Source/publisher: "Bangkok Post" (Thailand)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-05
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Title: Can Suu Kyi stand up to the lawsuit avalanche?
Sub-title: International pressure to rehabilitate the Rohingya and reform Rakhine is unlikely to dissipate
Description: "Myanmar’s top leaders -- both military and civilian -- have been shell-shocked by the avalanche of international legal cases they are now facing. In the space of days, three cases have been lodged in separate courts, all intended to make the Myanmar government and the country’s military leaders accountable for the horrendous events that unfolded in strife-torn western Rakhine state during military operations over the last three years. But the key case -- at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) brought by Gambia on behalf of the 57-nation member Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) -- has finally propelled the Myanmar government to take decisive action. The State Counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi, announced late last week that she will lead the country’s defense team, supported by a panel of prominent international lawyers to contest the case submitted by Gambia. “The Myanmar government is taking this case very seriously,” the minister for international cooperation and deputy foreign minister, Kyaw Tin told the Bangkok Post in the sidelines of a major economic conference in the capital Naypitaw on Friday. In fact, as Myanmar is a signatory to this convention -- which the democratic government of U Nu’s signed in 1956 -- it cannot ignore the process..."
Source/publisher: Bangkok Post (Thailand) via "Dhaka Tribune" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-04
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Title: What We're Watching: Myanmar's Nobel Peace Prize winner at the Hague
Description: "Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel peace prize winner who spent years under house arrest in Myanmar before being elected leader of the country in 2015, will travel to the Hague next month to defend her country against allegations of genocide. Few have been punished since the military-led crackdown on the Rohingya Muslim minority in Rakhine state in 2017, which left thousands dead and forced more than 700,000 people to flee to Bangladesh. Aung San Suu Kyi is thought to have little control over the army (a junta until recently), but she has refused to condemn its actions. Until now, Aung San Suu Kyi has defended the onslaught as a legitimate counterinsurgency against Muslim militants. The first public hearing at the International Court of Justice will begin on December 10. Violent clashes in Lebanon – Clashes between Lebanese protesters and supporters of Hezbollah and Amal – the forces representing the country's large Shia population – intensified on Tuesday with reports of gunfire in some cities. The confrontations are some of the worst since protests erupted in mid-October, forcing Prime Minister Saad Hariri to step down. And they're a worrying display of precisely the political and sectarian strains that demonstrators say they want to get rid of. Consultations to appoint a new prime minister are expected to begin later this week. We're watching to see if this new appointment– a post reserved for a Sunni Muslim in Lebanon's sectarian power-sharing system – will defuse tensions, or inflame them..."
Source/publisher: "GZERO Media"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-04
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Title: ASEAN, Myanmar And The Rakhine Crisis: Two Years On – Analysis
Sub-title: In 2017 Myanmar established the Union Enterprise for Humanitarian Assistance, Resettlement and Development in Rakhine State (UEHRD) to facilitate peacebuilding. Two years on, peace remains elusive.
Description: "On October 18, 2019, Myanmar celebrated the second anniversary of the formation of the Union Enterprise for Humanitarian Assistance, Resettlement and Development in Rakhine State (UEHRD), an institution to facilitate peacebuilding in the Myanmar state that has attracted much global attention. The event in Nay Pyi Daw was attended by representatives of the Myanmar government, military, local civil society, as well as organisations like ASEAN. Speaking in her role as Chairperson of the UEHRD, Aung San Suu Kyi emphasised self-reliance in resolving challenges in Rakhine State. Her statement came even as Myanmar responds to international pressure, especially on the fate of the Rohingya. Suu Kyi understands well her need for ASEAN as an organisational buffer to help manage the international pressure to build peace in Rakhine State. But the space for ASEAN to manoeuvre in the situation is limited, and subject to Myanmar’s willingness to cooperate..."
Source/publisher: "Eurasia Review"
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-03
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Title: Suu Kyi’s loyalists rally for Myanmar leader before genocide trial
Description: "As Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi prepares to travel to the Netherlands to fight charges of genocide against her country at the International Court of Justice, her supporters have embarked on an impassioned publicity campaign. Suu Kyi’s reputation overseas has sunk to its lowest ebb over the treatment of Rohingya Muslims but the Nobel Peace Prize laureate enjoys overwhelming support at home, where her image is undented by accusations of complicity in atrocities. On Sunday, several hundred people gathered in downtown Yangon for the third in a series of rallies organized by supporters since the announcement was made that she would personally fight the charges. “Aung San Suu Kyi is the bravest leader in the world,” Saw Phoe Kwar, a reggae singer known for his hits ‘Love Each Other’ and ‘Stop the Hate’, told the crowds, who waved flags and chanted..."
Source/publisher: "Reuters" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-03
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Title: UWSA, NDAA Support State Counselor’s Defense of Myanmar at ICJ
Description: "Two ethnic armed groups with strong militaries—the United Wa State Army (UWSA) and the National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA)—have both said they welcome the Myanmar government’s move to defend itself against charges of alleged genocide against the Rohingya in 2017 at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague. “We welcome [the government’s] courage, embracing responsibility and accountability by going to defend itself instead of issuing denials,” said UWSA liaison officer U Nyi Rang. “The truth cannot be hidden. The court will decide whether there are genocidal crimes or not. We do not support any circumstances which could cause more confusion.” State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is preparing to travel to the UN’s court in The Hague to lead Myanmar’s legal defense team against a lawsuit filed by The Gambia accusing Myanmar of genocide. The Gambia filed the suit on behalf of the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on Nov. 11 and the ICJ will hold the first public hearings in the case on Dec. 10-12. The Office of the State Counselor formed the Special Unit on International Criminal Justice on Nov. 26. The unit includes two military officers, one of whom is reportedly an expert on international law..."
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" (Thailand)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-03
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Title: Hundreds rally in Myanmar to show support for Suu Kyi
Description: "About 700 people rallied Sunday to show support for Myanmar’s leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, as she prepares to defend the country against charges of genocide at the U.N.’s highest court. Members of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party swelled the ranks in front of the colonial-era City Hall in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, as the crowd waved national flags and listened to music and poetry. A popular local singer told them “Mother Suu is the bravest human being in the world – her weapon is love.” Many carried banners saying, “We stand with you, Mother Suu.” The case before the International Court of Justice in The Hague relates to a harsh counterinsurgency campaign waged by Myanmar’s military against members of the country’s Muslim Rohingya community in August 2017 in response to an insurgent attack. More than 700,000 Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh to escape what has been called an ethnic cleansing campaign involving mass rapes, killings and the torching of homes..."
Source/publisher: "Associated Press" (New York)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-02
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi faces first legal action over 'existential threat' to Rohingya
Description: "Former democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is among several top Myanmar officials named Wednesday in a case filed in Argentina for crimes against Rohingya Muslims, the first time the Nobel Laureate has been legally targeted over the crisis. Rohingya and Latin American human rights groups submitted the lawsuit in Argentina under the principle of "universal jurisdiction," a legal concept enshrined in many countries' laws. The premise is that some acts - including war crimes and crimes against humanity - are so horrific they are not specific to one nation and can be tried anywhere. "This complaint seeks the criminal sanction of the perpetrators, accomplices and cover-ups of the genocide. We are doing it through Argentina because they have no other possibility of filing the criminal complaint anywhere else," lawyer Tomas Ojea told AFP. The lawsuit demands top military and political leaders - including army chief Min Aung Hlaing and civilian leader Suu Kyi - face justice over the "existential threat" faced by the Rohingya Muslim minority..."
Source/publisher: Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "The Telegraph" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-01
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Title: Myanmar’s judicial defense of the indefensible
Summary: "Next month, Myanmar’s government will get the first taste of what it has fought hard to prevent for more than two years: international accountability for widespread and systematic violence against...
Description: "Next month, Myanmar’s government will get the first taste of what it has fought hard to prevent for more than two years: international accountability for widespread and systematic violence against its Muslim Rohingya minority. Between December 10 and 12, Myanmar’s de facto civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, will lead this first phase of her government’s defense at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague against The Gambia’s official complaint against Myanmar for violations of the United Nations’ 1948 Genocide Convention. That complaint hinges on abuses inflicted by Myanmar security forces against the Rohingya in northern Rakhine state in 2017. Suu Kyi will not face Myanmar’s accusers alone. Myanmar has already warned that it will deploy unidentified “prominent international lawyers” to challenge The Gambia’s complaint. Myanmar has not shared what its legal strategy at The Hague will entail beyond “defending the national interest.” What’s certain is that Suu Kyi and Myanmar’s lawyers face an uphill battle in challenging the extensively documented campaign of mass murder, gang rape, and mutilation targeted at Rohingya civilians..."
Source/publisher: "Asia Times" (Hong Kong)
Date of entry/update: 2019-12-01
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Title: A long-drawn Rohingya case awaits Myanmar at world court
Description: "Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi will next month personally defend her country at the United Nations' top court against Gambia's allegation that her country committed genocide on the Rohingya. The state counsellor, who also holds the post of Foreign Minister, caused a stir when it was announced recently that she would lead Myanmar's legal team before the International Court of Justice (ICJ)..."
Source/publisher: "The Straits Times" (Singapore)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-30
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Title: Israel denounces atrocities against Rohingya in Myanmar after diplomat’s tweet
Sub-title: Ambassador Ronen Gilor publicly wished ‘good luck’ to southeast Asian nation’s officials facing a genocide trial in international court, then deleted message
Description: "The Foreign Ministry condemned the atrocities that occurred in Myanmar against the Rohingya Muslims after an Israeli diplomat tweeted support for government officials there facing a genocide trial in international court. “Encouragement for a good verdict and good luck!” Israel’s ambassador to Myanmar, Ronen Gilor, tweeted at the beginning of the week, expressing support for Myanmar State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Prize winner who also serves as the country’s foreign minister. The tweet was later deleted, after a query from the Israeli daily Haaretz, the newspaper and news website reported. On Thursday, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the tweet was written “in error, and was corrected immediately.” The statement also said that “Israel strongly condemns the atrocities that took place in the Rakhine region against the Rohingya. About a week ago, Israel voted in favor of a resolution to denounce the atrocities.”..."
Source/publisher: "The Times of Israel" (Israel)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-29
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Title: Rebel coalition supports int'l lawsuits against Myanmar
Sub-title: Members of Northern Alliance bloc of armed groups say they have evidence for prosecuting military for war crimes, genocide
Description: "A coalition of ethnic rebel groups has welcomed efforts by the international community to punish Myanmar’s military through legal processes for alleged genocide against ethnic minority groups including Rohingya Muslims in the country’s west. Three members of the Northern Alliance bloc of armed groups -- the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), Arakan Army and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army -- issued a joint statement on Thursday welcoming three lawsuits against Myanmar at the International Criminal Court (ICC), the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and an Argentine court for rights violations in ethnic areas. The groups said that during the past 70 years of the ongoing civil conflict, Myanmar’s military has committed genocide, extrajudicial arrests, inhuman torture, massacres, abductions and use of gang rape as instruments of war. They added that they stand ready to cooperate and collect evidence of war crimes by the military in northeastern Shan state and western Rakhine state between 2009 and 2019 and are in full support of the international organizations that have taken up the matter with the ICC and ICJ..."
Source/publisher: "Asia-Pacific"
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-29
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Title: Myanmar’s Rohingya crisis is moving backwards. Here’s how to resolve it
Description: "Myanmar’s Rohingya crisis is sliding dangerously backwards. The denial of civil rights, a massive land grab and an upsurge in armed fighting undermine any real hope for change. Despite reports that some Rohingya refugees have returned to Myanmar, the suggestion that more will follow stands in stark contrast to what I witnessed recently when visiting the areas from which they fled. International solidarity with these stateless people needs a fundamental rethink. If we succeed to only administer the crisis, we will fail to ever resolve it. In 2012, the world watched as a wave of violence pushed at least 110,000 Rohingya people in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state from their land. Families wound up in overcrowded, flood-prone displacement camps, surrounded by armed guards, with neither the permission nor security to return home. The unmaking of their communities began. They were still waiting for permission to return and security when I met them in camps outside Sittwe town at the end of October..."
Source/publisher: "South China Morning Post" (Hong Kong)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-28
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Title: Myanmar begins court martial after probe into Rohingya atrocities
Summary: "Myanmar's military began a rare court martial of soldiers on Tuesday following a probe into alleged atrocities during a crackdown on Rohingya Muslims, a spokesman said, as the country prepares to...
Sub-title: Army blames soldiers and officers deployed to one village saying they were 'weak in following rules of engagement'.
Description: "Myanmar's military began a rare court martial of soldiers on Tuesday following a probe into alleged atrocities during a crackdown on Rohingya Muslims, a spokesman said, as the country prepares to face genocide charges at an international court in The Hague. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled to neighbouring Bangladesh to escape a Myanmar military offensive launched in August 2017 that United Nations investigators described as having been executed with genocidal intent. Soldiers, police, and Buddhist villagers are alleged to have razed hundreds of villages in the remote western Rakhine state, torturing Rohingya as they fled, carrying out mass killings and gang rapes..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-27
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Title: Myanmar may have chemical weapons stockpile: U.S.
Description: "Myanmar is in breach of a global convention banning chemical weapons and may have a stockpile left over from the 1980s, the United States said on Monday. The Southeast Asian nation may still have weapons at a “historic” facility where mustard gas was produced, a senior State Department official told the annual meeting of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. Myanmar officially joined the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which bans the production, storage and use of chemical arms, in 2015. “The U.S. has serious concerns that a chemical weapons stockpile may remain at Myanmar’s historical chemical weapons facility,” Thomas DiNanno, deputy assistant secretary of state, told the OPCW in The Hague. Washington had information that Myanmar “had a chemical weapons program in the 1980s that included a sulphur mustard development program and chemical weapons production facility,” he added. “Based on available information, the United States certifies that Myanmar is in noncompliance with the CWC, due to its failure to declare its past chemical weapons program and to destroy its chemical weapons facility.” Myanmar has previously faced accusations of storing and using such weapons. In 2013, a parliamentary report said police had used phosphorus the previous year against protesters at a copper mine in the north of the country, causing severe burns..."
Source/publisher: Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "Japan Times" (Japan)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-26
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Title: Myanmar's military must be sanctioned
Sub-title: Myanmar's army continues to fund its brutal campaigns through its vast economic operations. It must be stopped.
Description: "During the optimistic years that ultimately led to the National League for Democracy forming a government in 2016, the international community confirmed its faith in Myanmar's transition from military rule by lifting a succession of economic sanctions that had been imposed on the country. But there were warnings that this response came too soon. With the army's involvement in politics protected by the constitution it drafted in 2008, continued progress in the reforms was not guaranteed. Removing the sanctions reduced important leverage against the military, which could have been instrumental to the new government. For its part, the military-allied elite had spent years carefully positioning itself to be the main beneficiary of economic liberalisation and Myanmar's re-engagement with the global market. As Myanmar now once again approaches general elections in 2020, the optimism has decidedly diminished. Under Aung San Suu Kyi's government, the reforms have stalled, and the human rights situation has deteriorated across the country. Democratic freedoms have been curbed, armed conflict has plagued the lives of hundreds of thousands, and the relentless plunder of natural resources has persisted unabated. The emboldened military leadership retains a firm grip on politics and the economy, while the government has so far proved unwilling or unable to make any significant move against it..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-26
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Title: Myanmar may have ‘state policy’ to attack Rohingyas
Description: "Judges of the International Criminal Court (ICC) fear that Myanmar may have a “state policy” to attack the Rohingya population in Rakhine state, said ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda on Friday. “The judges accepted that there is a reasonable basis to believe that there may have been a state policy [in Myanmar] to attack the Rohingya population,” she said. The made the statement following ICC’s approval to commence an investigation into crimes committed against Rohingyas. As per the judges’ observation, the prosecutor said there were many sources indicating heavy involvement of several Myanmar government forces and other state agents along with members of Myanmar armed forces [Tatmadaw] in the crimes committed against humanity on the land. “These coercive acts could qualify as the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution on grounds of ethnicity and/or religion against the Rohingya population,” the prosecutor said. Saying that the judges authorised the investigation with broad parameters, Bensouda termed it as a “significant development against atrocity in Myanmar”. On November 14, the ICC judges of Pre-Trial Chamber III authorised the prosecutor office to commence an investigation into the “situation in Bangladesh/Myanmar”..."
Source/publisher: "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-25
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Title: Aung San Suu Kyi Will Go to the Mat for Myanmar’s Military in The Hague
Description: "One of the enduring mysteries in recent years is what happened to Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi. Somehow, some way, the woman known as “the Lady of Burma”—who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 after she spent 15 years under house arrest in Myanmar for her democratic activism—seems to have lost her soul. Her drive to the top of Myanmar’s political hierarchy and quest to burnish her political legacy have been relentless, but also devastating for all those who once hailed her commitment to democracy and nonviolence. Since she became the de facto civilian head of Myanmar’s government following landmark elections in 2015, assuming the newly created position of state counselor, equivalent to prime minister, Aung San Suu Kyi has emerged as one of the most virulent defenders of the military junta that separated her from her family for years and ruled Myanmar for decades—and whose generals still wield most of the power in the country. This week, however, the Nobel laureate showed just how much she will compromise for the sake of power when she announced that she will personally lead the legal team defending Myanmar against charges of genocide at the International Court of Justice. Next month, she will travel to The Hague to fight tooth and nail in a case brought to the ICJ recently by Gambia, with the support of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, alleging that Myanmar’s military committed crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing in its campaign to drive minority Rohingya Muslims out of western Myanmar. The announcement comes at an inauspicious time for Myanmar, since this is not the only case seeking justice for the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who have been displaced from their homes since the military onslaught began in August 2017. As noted by Andrew Boyle at Just Security, in addition to the war crimes charges at the ICJ, government officials in the majority-Buddhist country are also facing additional charges of genocide and crimes against humanity brought on behalf of the Rohingya under a universal jurisdiction claim in Argentina. Meanwhile, judges at the International Criminal Court in The Hague have also authorized the court’s chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, to move forward with a formal investigation into charges that Myanmar’s leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi and her military compatriots, were complicit in genocide..."
Source/publisher: "World Politics Review (WPR)"
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-24
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Title: Myanmar: New Al Jazeera documentary uncovers Rohingya abuse
Summary: "Myanmar's leader Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to defend her military against allegations of genocide at the International Court of Justice. The army is accused of targeting the country's Rohingya...
Sub-title: As Myanmar goes on trial at the International Court of Justice over its crackdown on Muslim Rohingya, Al Jazeera sheds new light on some of its alleged crimes.
Description: "Myanmar's leader Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to defend her military against allegations of genocide at the International Court of Justice. The army is accused of targeting the country's Rohingya Muslim minority in 2017. A documentary being aired on Al Jazeera sheds new light on the abuses. Al Jazeera's Osama Bin Javaid reports. Warning, this report contains some disturbing images..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-24
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Title: Suu Kyi to defend Myanmar against genocide accusation at UN court
Sub-title: Buddhist-majority Myanmar is accused of genocide against Rohingya in a 2017 crackdown by the country's military.
Description: "Myanmar's leader and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi will head a delegation to the United Nations' top court to argue against a case accusing the mainly Buddhist country of genocide against the Rohingya, the government said. More than 730,000 Rohingya, most of them Muslims, fled to neighbouring Bangladesh following a 2017 crackdown by Myanmar's military, which UN investigators said was carried out with "genocidal intent". More: Rohingya crisis through the eyes of Al Jazeera's journalists Lawsuit: Aung San Suu Kyi 'committed crimes' against Rohingya Gambia files Rohingya genocide case against Myanmar at UN court The Buddhist-majority country has repeatedly justified the crackdown on the Rohingya as necessary to stamp out fighters. It also insists its own committees are adequate to investigate allegations of abuse..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-21
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Title: Experts: Dhaka needs to utilize growing global pressure on Myanmar
Sub-title: There should be negotiations with other countries, and it will be easier for Bangladesh to talk about the issue, Prof Imtiaz Ahmed said
Description: "Foreign affairs analysts have said Bangladesh needs to utilize the growing global pressure on Myanmar until a solution to the Rohingya crisis is found. The pressure is not only building on Myanmar, rather it is a pressure for Myanmar’s friends too who kept mum amidst questions of why other countries cannot do the same as Gambia and Argentina, one of the foreign affairs analysts said. “The pressure on Myanmar should be there until there is a solution. I think it will not be wise for us to give up until a solution is found. We should not stop here,” Prof Imtiaz Ahmed of Dhaka University’s (DU) International Relations department said, reports UNB. There should be negotiations with other countries, and it will be easier for Bangladesh to talk about the issue, he added. Prof Imtiaz said, there are already questions around why the European Union (EU), Canada, France or other countries cannot do the same on the legal front as they talk much about human rights..."
Source/publisher: "Dhaka Tribune" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-18
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Title: Myanmar’s days of impunity are numbered
Sub-title: Its attempts to exterminate the Rohingyas must be thwarted
Description: "Over two years into Myanmar’s brutal military campaign against its Rohingya minority, its days of impunity seem to be coming to an end. Four developments in as many days over the last week ignited hopes for the prosecution of officials responsible for the genocidal campaign. First, The Gambia filed a case with the UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Myanmar of committing genocide against the Rohingyas. Two days later, several rights bodies filed a lawsuit with an Argentine court against Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and several other top officials. On Thursday, the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague approved a full investigation into Myanmar’s crimes. The same day, in New York, a resolution was adopted at the third committee of the 74th UN General Assembly, which is expected to exert significant pressure on the Security Council to take action. We hope the cumulative effects of these developments will finally hold accountable a repressive regime that has persecuted its minorities for decades, destabilising the entire region. But there are still barriers which call for a cautious optimism. Myanmar has rejected the ICC investigation while China, Russia and India had either vetoed the UN resolution or refrained from voting. Their persistent refusal, particularly of China and Russia, to stand up for human rights and justice for the Rohingyas is likely to continue. But these reactions are not unexpected, and the international community must not be blindsided by any such impediment now that the ball has finally started rolling..."
Source/publisher: "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-18
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Title: Myanmar rejects ICC probe into alleged crimes against Rohingya
Sub-title: ICC investigation into alleged crimes against Rohingya 'not in accordance with international law', says government.
Description: "Myanmar has rejected an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation into alleged crimes against the Rohingya, as its faces mounting global legal pressure over its treatment of the minority ethnic group. The Hague-based court on Thursday approved a full probe into Myanmar's bloody 2017 military crackdown against the mostly-Muslim group - a move welcomed by the rights groups. "The investigation over Myanmar by the ICC is not in accordance with international law," government spokesman Zaw Htay said at a news conference on Friday. More: UN chief 'deeply concerned' over Rohingya crisis ICC approves probe into Myanmar's alleged crimes against Rohingya What will happen to the Rohingya people? Zaw Htay repeated that Myanmar's own committees would investigate any abuses and ensure accountability if needed. A brutal army campaign in August 2017 forced more than 740,000 Rohingya to flee Myanmar's Rakhine State, most seeking refuge in overcrowded camps across the border in Bangladesh..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-16
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Title: Stop Myanmar
Description: "At long last international arrest warrants may be headed the way of Myanmar’s top military and political leaders, including the country’s de facto prime minister, Aung San Suu Kyi, for crimes against Rohingya Muslims. Neither the Nobel peace prize nor her Oxford PPE (politics, philosophy and economics) degree will be able to save the state counsellor if the Argentinian court, where the lawsuit was filed on Wednesday by human rights groups, has its way. Argentina — whose law allows its court to exercise universal jurisdiction — has in the past heard cases involving Spanish dictator Francisco Franco and the Falun Gong movement in China. Earlier on Monday, Gambia filed a genocide case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague. Unlike the Argentinian case, the Gambian genocide case filed at ICJ is a novelty. At best, it might end up being a verdict on how badly the world is tackling genocide and other crimes against humanity. Gambia and other Organisation of Islamic Cooperation countries that filed the case, citing the little-used 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, just want to pass the message to the world how miserably the United Nations and its courts — especially the International Criminal Court (ICC) — have failed humanity. Take the case of the UN. The Rwandan genocide is a good place to start. There, in one estimate, between 800,000 and one million Tutsis and Hutus were killed under the watch of UN peacekeepers. It was an abject failure for the world body.But slow learning UN remains a slow learner..."
Source/publisher: "New Straits Times" (Malaysia)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-16
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Title: ICC approves probe into Myanmar's alleged crimes against Rohingya
Sub-title: Judges approve request to investigate alleged crimes against humanity over Myanmar's crackdown against ethnic group.
Description: "The International Criminal Court (ICC) has approved a full investigation into Myanmar's alleged crimes against the Rohingya, as the Southeast Asian nation faces mounting legal pressure worldwide over the treatment of the minority ethnic group. ICC judges on Thursday backed a prosecution request to investigate allegations of crimes against humanity and persecution over Myanmar's bloody 2017 military crackdown against the majority-Muslim group. The ICC's decision came after Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar's de-facto civilian leader, was named in an Argentine lawsuit over crimes against the Rohingya and Myanmar faced a separate genocide lawsuit at the United Nations's top court. More than 740,000 Rohingya were forced to flee over the border into sprawling camps in Bangladesh, in violence that the UN investigators said amounted to genocide..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-15
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Title: Lawsuit: Aung San Suu Kyi 'committed crimes' against Rohingya
Summary: " Before becoming Myanmar's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi spent 15 years under house arrest for defying the country's feared generals. Now, the Nobel peace laureate faces an attempt to have her imprisoned...
Sub-title: Human rights icon Suu Kyi accused of 'tending towards the annihilation of the Rohingya', criminal complaint alleges.
Description: " Before becoming Myanmar's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi spent 15 years under house arrest for defying the country's feared generals. Now, the Nobel peace laureate faces an attempt to have her imprisoned for supporting them. A lawsuit filed in Argentina on Wednesday alleges the former human rights icon contributed to a genocidal campaign against the Rohingya minority that included military-led mass killings in August 2017. More: Gambia files Rohingya genocide case against Myanmar at UN court UN chief 'deeply concerned' over Rohingya crisis Opinion: Inaction on China and India's crimes emboldens Myanmar Among other things, she oversaw government policies "tending towards the annihilation of the Rohingya", such as confining them to "ghettos" with severely limited access to healthcare and education, the lawsuit said. "For the cycle of violence to end, it is crucial that all those responsible for the genocide - whether they wear a uniform or not - are brought to justice," said Tun Khin, president of the London-based Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK), which filed the case at a federal court in Buenos Aires. Efforts at securing justice for the Rohingya have so far largely focussed on top generals who orchestrated the 2017 killings in coastal Rakhine state, including the military's commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-15
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Title: Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi faces first legal action over Rohingya crisis
Summary: "Aung San Suu Kyi is among several top Myanmar officials named in a case filed in Argentina for crimes against Rohingya Muslims, the first time the Nobel Laureate has been legally targeted over the...
Sub-title: Case launches in Argentina under ‘universal jurisdiction’ demanding justice over ‘existential threat’ to minority
Description: "Aung San Suu Kyi is among several top Myanmar officials named in a case filed in Argentina for crimes against Rohingya Muslims, the first time the Nobel Laureate has been legally targeted over the crisis. Rohingya and Latin American human rights groups submitted the lawsuit in Argentina on Wednesday under the principle of “universal jurisdiction,” a legal concept enshrined in many countries’ laws. The premise is that some acts – including war crimes and crimes against humanity – are so horrific they are not specific to one nation and can be tried anywhere. “This complaint seeks the criminal sanction of the perpetrators, accomplices and cover-ups of the genocide. We are doing it through Argentina because they have no other possibility of filing the criminal complaint anywhere else,” lawyer Tomas Ojea told AFP. The lawsuit demands top military and political leaders – including army chief Min Aung Hlaing and civilian leader Suu Kyi – face justice over the “existential threat” faced by the Rohingya Muslim minority. “For decades, the Myanmar authorities have tried to wipe us out by confining us to ghettos, forcing us to flee our home country and killing us,” said Tun Khin, President of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK (BROUK). Argentinean courts have taken up other universal jurisdiction cases, including in relation to ex-dictator Francisco Franco’s rule in Spain and the Falun Gong movement in China. Myanmar faces mounting legal pressure in courts around the world for the 2017 expulsion of the Rohingya..."
Source/publisher: Agence France-Presse (AFP) (France) via "The Guardian" (UK)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-14
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Title: 57 countries sue Myanmar over reported genocide of Rohingya in historic lawsuit
Description: "Fifty-seven nations are suing Myanmar at the International Court of Justice, alleging in a historic lawsuit that the government has conducted genocide against its Rohingya minority. The suit comes just weeks after the United Nations warned that the violent campaign against the Rohingya is continuing in northwest Myanmar, and its special envoy called for the U.N. Security Council to refer Myanmar's senior officials to the International Criminal Court, a separate international body. Over 700,000 Rohingya, a Muslim-majority ethnic minority, have fled Myanmar since a campaign by the country's military to push them out and raze their villages began in August 2017. Myanmar, previously called Burma, has denied any wrongdoing, saying that the campaign was against an Islamist extremist group. (MORE: Rohingya refugees say they would choose death over repatriation to Myanmar) The Gambia, a small West African country, filed the lawsuit Monday on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, a coalition of countries with significant Muslim populations. It asks the ICJ to investigate whether Myanmar's government has violated the Geneva Convention, which prohibits genocide..."
Source/publisher: "ABC News" (Australia)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Canada supports genocide case against Myanmar at International Criminal Court
Sub-title: The case targets systemic violence that forced more than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee their country
Description: "Canada is supporting a genocide prosecution of the Myanmar government for systemic violence that forced more than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee their country. Gambia filed the genocide case Monday with the International Criminal Court in The Hague on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Co-operation, a group of 57 Muslim countries. Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement the move will advance accountability for the crime of genocide, which includes mass murder, systemic discrimination, hate speech and sexual and gender-based violence. The Canadian government will look for ways to support Gambia’s legal efforts, she added. To that end, she said the government will enlist the help of former Liberal interim leader and longtime politician Bob Rae, who also served as Canada’s special envoy to Myanmar..."
Source/publisher: "Penticton Western News"
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Gambia Brings Genocide Case Against Myanmar
Sub-title: International Court of Justice to Address Atrocities Against Rohingya
Description: "The Gambia’s case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for violating the Genocide Convention, filed on November 11, 2019, will bring the first judicial scrutiny of Myanmar’s campaign of murder, rape, arson, and other atrocities against Rohingya Muslims, 10 nongovernmental organizations said. States that are party to the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide agreed that genocide “whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish” and, by extension, have an obligation not to commit it. The convention permits member states to bring a dispute before the ICJ alleging another state’s breach of the convention, and states can seek provisional measures to stop continuing violations. Myanmar became a party to the Genocide Convention in 1956..."
Source/publisher: "Human Rights Watch" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Gambia files Rohingya genocide case against Myanmar at World Court
Sub-title: Gambia has filed a "game-changing" case at the United Nations' top court, accusing Myanmar of committing genocide against its Rohingya Muslim minority.
Description: "The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, is the UN's top legal institution that rules on disputes between states. Gambia's application alleges Myanmar has carried out mass murder and rape in Rakhine state and asked the ICJ to urgently order measures "to stop Myanmar's genocidal conduct immediately". The 46-page case will bring the first judicial scrutiny of what a UN fact-finding mission called a systematic military campaign of murder, gang rape, arson, and "genocidal intent" against Rohingya Muslims — warning just last month that there was "a serious risk of genocide recurring". The mission also said in its final report in September that Myanmar should be held responsible in international legal forums for alleged genocide against the Rohingya. More than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims fled to neighbouring Bangladesh following a 2017 crackdown by Myanmar's military in response to an insurgency attack. Myanmar, which has a Buddhist majority, denies accusations of genocide and says its crackdown targeted militant separatists in Rakhine state. Both Gambia and Myanmar are signatories to the 1948 Genocide Convention, which not only prohibits states from committing genocide but also compels all signatory states to prevent and punish the crime of genocide. Under the rules of the ICJ, the application argues, member states can bring actions against other member states over disputes alleging breaches of international law..."
Source/publisher: "ABC News" (Australia)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Myanmar faces genocide lawsuit at top UN court
Description: "Myanmar faced accusations of genocide in a landmark lawsuit filed by Gambia at the UN's top court on Monday (Nov 11) over the Southeast Asian nation's treatment of Rohingya Muslims, Gambia's government said. Gambia said it was acting on behalf of the 57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in bringing the case against Myanmar before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague. The lawsuit accuses mainly Buddhist Myanmar of breaching the 1948 UN Genocide Convention through a brutal military campaign targeting the Rohingya minority in Rakhine state. The 2017 crackdown forced 740,000 Rohingya to flee over the border into sprawling camps in Bangladesh, in violence that United Nations investigators say amounts to "genocide". "The Gambia is taking this action to seek justice and accountability for the genocide being committed by Myanmar against the Rohingya," Justice Minister Abubacarr Tambadou said in a statement. The court is expected to hold its first hearings in December on Gambia's request for urgent interim measures "to protect the Rohingya against further harm", Gambia's lawyers Foley Hoag said in a statement, describing the case as "historic". Human Rights Watch hailed the move by the tiny west African state, saying it was the "first judicial scrutiny" of Myanmar's alleged crimes against the Rohingya..."
Source/publisher: "CNA" ( Singapore)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Myanmar sued for genocide
Sub-title: On behalf of OIC, the Gambia files the case with International Court of Justice seeking orders to stop atrocities on Rohingyas immediately
Description: "The Gambia has filed a case with the top court of the United Nations, accusing Myanmar of committing genocide against its Rohingya Muslim minority, more than two years after some 750,000 Rohingyas fled a military crackdown in the Rakhine State. “We have just submitted our application to the ICJ under the Genocide Convention,” Gambian Justice Minister Abubacarr Tambadou said at a news conference yesterday in The Hague, where the court is based. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, is the UN’s top legal institution that rules on disputes between states. The West African nation, which is predominantly Muslim, has filed the case on behalf of the Organisation for Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which has held a series of meetings to encourage its 57 members to support the case. “The aim is to get Myanmar to account for its actions against its own people: the Rohingya. It is a shame for our generation that we do nothing while genocide is unfolding right under our own eyes,” he said, reports Reuters. Both the Gambia and Myanmar are signatories to the 1948 Genocide Convention, which not only prohibits states from committing genocide but also compels all signatory states to prevent and punish the crime. Tambadou, who has worked for more than a decade as a lawyer at the UN tribunal that dealt with the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, assumed a position of leadership in the lawsuit because of his special expertise..."
Source/publisher: "The Daily Star" (Bangladesh)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: Rohingya crisis: The Gambia accuses Myanmar of genocide at top UN court
Sub-title: The small west African nation of The Gambia has filed a lawsuit at the UN's top court formally accusing Myanmar of genocide against Rohingya Muslims.
Description: "It was filed at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which normally rules on disputes between states. Last year, the UN issued a damning report into the violence in Myanmar, saying military leaders should go on trial for genocide. Myanmar's government denies its troops carried out such crimes. Thousands of Rohingya were killed and more than 700,000 fled to neighbouring Bangladesh during an army crackdown in the Buddhist-majority country in 2017. The UN's Independent International Fact Finding Mission on Myanmar said in August 2018 that the army's tactics were "grossly disproportionate to actual security threats" and that "military necessity would never justify killing indiscriminately, gang raping women, assaulting children, and burning entire villages." Myanmar rejected the report. It has consistently said its operations targeted militant or insurgent threats..."
Source/publisher: "BBC News" (London)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-12
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Title: ASEAN can no longer turn a blind eye to Myanmar's atrocities
Sub-title: ASEAN has a responsibility to help facilitate a repatriation process that prioritises the well-being of the Rohingya.
Description: "After fighters attacked security targets in Myanmar's northern Rakhine state on August 25, 2017, the Myanmar military responded by killing and maiming thousands of Rohingya civilians, raping hundreds of women and girls, and burning entire villages to the ground. Almost two years after the military-led "clearance operation" that forced more than 745,000 Rohingya men, women and children to flee and seek refuge in Bangladesh, this humanitarian crisis seems more intractable than ever. Systematic state discrimination against the Rohingya, making them stateless and without rights, and recurring state-sanctioned violence has spurred various influxes of refugees into Bangladesh in the 1970s and 1990s. Together with more than 300,000 Rohingya who had already taken shelter during these previous waves of violence, Bangladesh now hosts over one million Rohingya refugees - most of whom reside in Cox's Bazar, now the world's largest refugee camp. It is a testament to Bangladesh's historic generosity that it did not turn away any recent arrivals despite already hosting large numbers of refugees..."
Source/publisher: "Al Jazeera" (Qatar)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-08
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Title: Is Aung San Suu Kyi Silent in the Face of Myanmar Atrocities?
Description: "My interest in Myanmar goes back to the 1950s when the country was called Burma. I first visited it in 1967 but did not begin focusing on it as a scholar until 2007. For the past ten years, it has been my primary policy research project at Brookings. I’ve made about 20 trips from my home in Washington, DC to Myanmar since then and have written many op-eds, research papers, and reports on the country. Whenever I speak to a group about Myanmar, however, one of the first things I say is that if you don’t speak the Burmese language you don’t know what’s going on in this country and you can’t know. And I don’t speak Burmese. So take the words that follow with a grain of salt. They are just my best guess. I have been asked to write about “genocide and violence that has plagued Myanmar.” I’m not an expert on genocide, but I don’t see anything in Myanmar’s post-independence (in 1948) history that looks like an attempt by the government to exterminate by death any group of people living within the country’s borders. What I do see is a pattern of violence by the Buddhist ethnic Bamar majority (at least 60 percent of the population), with the armed forces (Tatmadaw) as its instrument, to forcibly assimilate or subjugate most if not all of the ethnic minority groups, or drive them out into neighboring countries. No other country in the world today is experiencing a civil war that has continued without interruption for this long – 70 years..."
Source/publisher: "The Global Post" (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-06
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Title: Be firm on ‘genocidal’ Myanmar regime, Asean told ahead of leaders summit
Description: "A Rohingya rights group today urged Asean leaders to review their relationship with Myanmar over its treatment of the minority group as country leaders meet in Bangkok for the 35th Asean Summit. Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organisation Malaysia (Merhrom) also asked if it was ethical for countries to do business with a “genocidal state”, adding that a stable regional environment is necessary for sustainability. Merhrom president Zafar Abdul Ghani said the 35th Asean Summit, themed “Advancing Partnership for Sustainability”, was contradictory to the reality in the region. “How do we expect to advance partnership for sustainability when Rohingya genocide is ongoing in Asean and affecting Asean member states and the rest of the world? “Nothing has changed despite thousands of reports published, thousands of testimonies from the genocide survivors recorded and thousands of visits to the largest refugee camp in the world,” he said. “The most persecuted ethnic group in the world remains.” In a statement, he said the region had become desensitised to the atrocities committed against the Rohingya, adding that a “state of denial” would continue to exist until the genocide is stopped..."
Source/publisher: "Free Malaysia Today" (Malaysia)
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-01
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Title: Seoul Conference on Rohingya Genocide [Day 1] Wrap-up by Dr. Zarni
Description: "International Conference on Protection of Rohingya Survivors and Accountability for Genocide "Rape as a Weapon of Wars and Genocides, Past and Present in the Region"..."
Source/publisher: "Free Rohingya Coalition"
Date of entry/update: 2019-10-09
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Title: Seoul Conference on Rohingya Genocide [Day 2] Wrap-up by Dr. Zarni
Description: "International Conference on Protection of Rohingya Survivors and Accountability for Genocide "Rape as a Weapon of Wars and Genocides, Past and Present in the Region"..."
Source/publisher: "Free Rohingya Coalition"
Date of entry/update: 2019-10-09
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Title: Responding to the Genocide of the Rohingya People in Burma
Description: "On the Oct.1, 2019 broadcast of "Talking Foreign Policy," Dean Scharf discusses the international response to the Rohingya genocide in Burma with five panelists, who are experts on peace negotiations, national security, human rights and war crimes. Panelists include: Ambassador Todd Buchwald, former Ambassador at Large for War Crimes.."
Source/publisher: Case Western Reserve University School of Law (USA)
Date of entry/update: 2019-10-08
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