By Tun Khin

The Daily Star

June 7, 2018

Bangladesh's ICC cooperation is crucial for Rohingya justice

Since August last year, the world has witnessed how hundreds of thousands of desperate Rohingyas have fled across the border into Bangladesh, bringing with them tales of unimaginable horror. Many of these refugees are my friends and relatives. For the first time, the world has woken up to what we Rohingya have lived with for decades—Myanmar's systematic and genocidal attempts to wipe us out as a people. Now we need the help of the world, and Bangladesh, to obtain justice.

Last week, Myanmar announced it was establishing an “independent commission of inquiry” to “investigate the violation of human rights and related issues following the terrorist attacks” in Rakhine State in 2017. The fact that Myanmar did not even mention its own military's abuses speaks volumes of how credible this investigation will be. Over the past years, I have seen Myanmar establish a multitude of similar commissions, always at politically opportune times. In the end, they accomplish very little—they buy Myanmar a modicum of time and international goodwill, but they lead to no genuine accountability or to improvements for the lives of Rohingya people.

It is abundantly clear that Myanmar is both unwilling and incapable of investigating itself. Senior leaders have taken turns to deny the well-documented atrocities carried out by security forces against the Rohingya people. The military has little incentive to punish itself for its own crimes. State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto political leader, has dismissed reports of human rights violations and questioned why people have been fleeing in the first place.

There is no question that the international community must play a role in providing justice, and the International Criminal Court (ICC) is increasingly looking like the only real hope. Although Myanmar is not a signatory to the Rome Statute of the ICC, that does not mean that all avenues are closed—far from it.

In April this year, ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda asked the court to rule on whether the ICC “can exercise jurisdiction over the alleged deportation of the Rohingya people from Myanmar to Bangladesh,” which is under the jurisdiction of the Court. A ruling affirming such jurisdiction could pave the way for the ICC to investigate Myanmar for the crime against humanity of deportation. Bangladesh, which has already done so much in welcoming refugees, can play a crucial role in making this a reality.

On June 20, a panel of judges will hold a closed-door hearing on the question. The ICC has asked Bangladesh for its opinion on whether it can exercise jurisdiction over the deportation of Rohingyas from Myanmar to Bangladesh. So far, Dhaka has yet to respond, although the deadline of June 11 is fast approaching.

We are grateful for the generosity of Bangladesh since the crisis erupted. Dhaka has essentially kept its borders open and hosted hundreds of thousands of people in what has already become one of the world's largest refugee camps. When I visited Cox's Bazar, I was touched not only by the welcome from officials but also from ordinary people. At the height of the crisis, local Bangladeshis were lining up along the border to offer food to fleeing refugees and spent their own meagre resources on constructing shelters.

But an influx of people of this scale is a strain on any country's resources. The situation is not sustainable, and the only solution to the root cause of the crisis lies on the other side of the Naf river in Myanmar.

It is important to remember that this crisis has not happened in a vacuum but is just the latest chapter in a long cycle of abuse. In the late 1970s and early 1990s, similar violent campaigns by Myanmar security forces pushed hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees to flee into Bangladesh. Each time, Bangladesh struck a deal with Myanmar for the return of refugees, only for renewed violence to force another exodus of people. Each time, it has been Bangladesh that has been forced to deal with a humanitarian crisis that is not of its own making.

My parents were forced to temporarily flee into Bangladesh after Myanmar's first major anti-Rohingya operation (“Operation Nagamin” or “Operation Dragon King”) in 1978. I myself witnessed similar violence in 1991 shortly before I fled Rakhine State. How many more times will history have to repeat itself before something changes? Unless those responsible for atrocities—regardless of their rank or position—are held to account, Myanmar's authorities will feel they can commit similar abuses in the future without consequence.

An ICC investigation into mass deportation would be limited and not cover other crimes against humanity, including murder, rape, torture, persecution or genocide. But in the shorter term, it would be an essential start. Most importantly, it would send a powerful message to Myanmar's authorities that they are not above the law, and that the world is willing to back up condemnation with genuine action. Separately, we will continue lobbying members of the UN Security Council to refer the situation in Myanmar to the ICC, which would pave the way for a broader mandate.

The current lack of accountability is not just affecting the Rohingya, but also people in other ethnic areas where security forces and armed groups commit war crimes with impunity. In Kachin State, for example, violence has again flared between the military and insurgents, driving thousands from their homes.

By responding in the affirmative to the ICC, Bangladesh could play a major role in making such accountability a reality. I urge Dhaka to do what it can to support the ICC and the Rohingya people—not just for us, but for the fight for justice everywhere.

Tun Khin is president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK and a member of the Free Rohingya Coalition.

By The Daily Star

May 12, 2018

Tawakkol Karman, a Nobel Peace Prize winner from Yemen, yesterday said what Myanmar did to the Rohingyas was “genocide”.

“We have visited the Rohingya camps recently and talked with over a hundred women and girls who are victims of sexual violence,” she said at a symposium organised by Asian University for Women (AUW) in Chittagong.

“They described us the barbarity committed before their eyes... they witnessed their kids or parents being slaughtered and shot dead in front of their eyes...their houses were burnt in front of them.

“Thousands of Rohingya people have been compelled to leave their houses,” she said, terming these incidents “genocide”.

Tawakkol was addressing the symposium titled “A Bridge Towards Sustainable Development: Overcoming Threats to Survival” held in a hotel in the port city.

The first Yemeni Nobel laureate said the world is now facing a moral deterioration as genocide and violence are going on in its different parts in the absence of international community.

“More than 500,000 people have been killed in Syria because they said they wanted freedom,” she said.

Human beings deserve democracy and freedom, she said, adding, democracy is a must for development and development is essential for peace.

Tawakkol then urged the students of AUW to fight against corruption and for justice. “Corruption leads to poverty,” she said.

“Your victory begins through your leadership,” she said, adding, “Be a leader in every field you are contributing... if you want to change, lead the change.”

Pramila Patten, special representative of the UN Secretary-General on Sexual-Violence in Conflict and UN Under Secretary General, said sectarian violence has been left unpunished for a long time.

She said what Myanmar did to the Rohingyas was “war crime”.

“Many witnesses told me many girls and women were literally raped to death,” she said, adding, “Not a single soldier or commander has been made accountable for their offence.”

“I would like to congratulate both the government and the people of Bangladesh for saving the lives of the Rohingya people,” she said, urging the world to stand beside Bangladesh.

“It is not the problem of Bangladesh, it is the problem of international community and I think the ball is now in the court of the international community.”

Ismail Serageldin, former vice president of World Bank and founding director of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, said the world should keep open the door for the refugees.

Izzeldin Abuelaish, a professor of the University of Toronto, termed the persecution of the Rohingyas “crime against humanity”.

“The Rohingyas have been living in Myanmar for decades. So, the Myanmar government should recognise them,” he said at the programme.

Kamal Ahmad, founder of AUW, and Prof Nirmala Rao, vice-chancellor of the university, also spoke among others.

By C R Abrar

The Daily Star

May 9, 2018

THIS week has experienced a flurry of diplomatic activities centring the Rohingya issue. Principal among those was what has been dubbed a “historic and highly unusual” visit of an important delegation of the UN Security Council (UNSC) to Bangladesh and Burma. Quite understandably, the visit drew attention of various quarters—states, international agencies, refugee and rights organisations, and most importantly, the hapless Rohingyas who have been “living in mud and shacks, with no hope and no future, no nation and no identity, no past and no future.”

During its visit, the delegation should have experienced two contrasting scenarios. On the one hand, in Kutupalong refugee camp and in the no-man's land, they heard heart-wrenching testimonies of scores of survivors of the ongoing genocide—horrifying tales of mass murder, rape, torture, tossing of children in raging fire, torching of homes and hearths and systematic expulsion of an ethnic community whose identity and claims to citizenship have been meticulously dismantled over the last four decades by a state that has little regard for human rights, which the world body so fervently champions (at least in theory). The delegation also heard how a resource-poor and one of the most densely populated countries of the world, has lived up to its commitment to uphold the UN Charter and the lofty principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in sheltering more than a million of refugees in distress. While UN diplomats heap massive praise on Bangladesh for its generosity and compassion, the organisation has so far failed to do the heavy-lifting in mobilising resources and garnering political will in addressing the root cause of Burma's genocide.

On the other hand, the delegation met representatives of a regime that not only perpetrated perhaps the most gruesome crime against humanity this century has ever witnessed, in fulfilling its long-term genocidal agenda to free Arakan of ethnic Rohingyas, but also blatantly flouted the UN Charter and UDHR, and since the outbreak of current crisis in August 2017, repeatedly hoodwinked the security council that called for bringing an end to the current humanitarian crisis.

By now the authorities in Naypyidaw have established themselves as masters of the art of deception. Time and again they have promised the UNSC that effective action would be taken to create an enabling environment for the return of Rohingyas who are languishing in refugee settlements in Bangladesh. The delegation does not need reminding that till date not a single case of repatriation has taken place, save the staged repatriation of five Rohingya individuals out of a million who have been deported.

Befitting the adage “giving the devil its due”, the astute policy planners of Burma have been immensely successful in manipulating the UNSC. As early as September 2017, Burma informed the UNSC that it was prepared to start the repatriation at any time. The country's National Security Advisor U Thaung Tun assured the UNSC that repatriation would take place by using the framework worked out jointly by Bangladesh and Burma in 1992. However, despite such a pledge, seven months have passed with no sign of repatriation. Under the memorandum of understanding with Bangladesh, Burma promised to stem the flow of refugees. In less than two weeks after signing the document, more than 100,000 Rohingyas crossed the border into Bangladesh. Anticipating the security council's displeasure over its inaction, Naypyidaw was smart enough to cook up yet another scheme—the Union Enterprise Mechanism, with the purported aim to extend humanitarian assistance and resettlement of repatriated Rohingyas. The UNSC fell into the trap and in a presidential statement it “welcomed” the signing of the memorandum with Bangladesh and the formation of the Union Enterprise Mechanism.

Despite its explicit commitment to UNSC to cooperate with Bangladesh in expediting the repatriation process, in contrast to 1992 accord, Burma further tightened the eligibility criteria for the Rohingyas' return and the verification process, thwarting any substantive effort for repatriation. In essence, it rebuffed the calls made by the UNSC in its two meetings held in September and November 2017.

The Burmese swindlers made best use of November 23 agreement with Bangladesh to stave off UNSC criticism for not progressing with repatriation. In a December UNSC meeting, Burma's envoy to UN informed the council that repatriation would begin within the next two months. While the gullible world body appeared to have fallen for the hoax, true to its colour, a week before the commencement of repatriation (on 22 January), Burma demanded family-wise list of Rohingyas—a demand that Bangladesh subsequently complied with.

Even though the Burmese threw in a spanner in the latest effort of repatriation, its minister for international cooperation, Kyaw Tin, claimed that his country was ready to welcome refugees and held Bangladesh responsible for the delay. One hopes while assessing the sequence of stalled repatriation, eminent members of the UNSC delegation would bear in mind the subterfuges that the Burmese resorted to in undermining the repatriation effort.

In their meeting with the UNSC delegation, Rohingya refugees handed over a 13-point demand which they had earlier passed on to the visiting Burmese minister for social welfare. Included in the list were demands for restoration of their citizenship rights, bringing the perpetrators of heinous crimes to justice, ensuring international presence in Arakan, return of ancestral land confiscated by the authorities, payment of compensation for losses, presence of international media and human rights groups in Arakan, release of all political prisoners and closure of internally displaced camps. In other words, the refugee community demanded ensuring “protected return to protected homeland”—a plan that was floated in the February 2018 Rohingya conference in Berlin that has gained near unanimous acceptance of the global Rohingya community.

While briefing the press in Bangladesh, a member of the UNSC delegation noted “We don't have any magic solution in the Security Council”. May he be reminded that maintaining “world peace and security” forms the core function of the security council and the council is duty bound to deliver on both counts? All states that are members of the council are meant to act on what is good for international community and not be guided by their own selfish political, strategic and economic interests. Any departure from this would tantamount to violation of the UN Charter. Rohingyas do not want UNSC delegation to whisk around a magic wand in its search for solution. They want the UNSC to adhere to the UN Charter, in word and spirit, to ensure their protected return to protected homeland and bring the perpetrators to justice.

The influential UK permanent representative Karen Pierce observed “…it is not the Security Council's fault that there is a crisis.” Well, not quite so. For decades, the Burmese state has pursued a policy of annihilation of ethnic Rohingya considered as “the most persecuted minority in the world” by the United Nations. As the community was gradually stripped of their citizenship and other associated rights, being subjected to methodical discrimination and unleashing of spikes of violence periodically triggering massive refugee flows, the international community opted to look the other way. Rohingyas were also considered a dispensable lot as western countries raced to exploit the resources and engage in trade with the genocidal regime under the rubric of supporting democratic transition. Every veto wielder in the security council is guilty of complicity in the four decade long slow genocide. The difference in complicity among them is in degree and not in kind.

This charade is exposed when UK representative in the delegation Pierce told BBC in Burma on May 1 that there is no difference between Burma's domestic investigation and international investigation as long as Aung San Suu Kyi accepts and launches the investigation with the help of the security council. What could be crueller for the victims of genocide than the security council openly lending its collective assistance to the genocidal government to conduct such investigation into its own crimes?

Over the last four decades, the UN has failed to stop genocide and other atrocious crimes that led to death and displacement of millions (Rwanda, Bosnia, Sudan and now Burma). The onus lies on the permanent members of the security council to make the institution functional and relevant. The Rohingya case provides an opportunity for the UN's redemption. Ensuring protected return to protected homeland and bringing the perpetrators to justice is the first step in that direction.

While members of the UNSC delegation return to New York and deliberate on their whirlwind mission, one hopes they bear in mind that for the first time in the history of the august body that is tasked to maintain global peace and security, they had the rare opportunity of visiting the sites where genocide was perpetrated by a murderous regime.

C R Abrar teaches international relations at the University of Dhaka.

By CR Abrar

The Daily Star

April 10, 2018

Last week, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina expressed her dismay at the stalemate on the repatriation of the Rohingyas. “We've been making various efforts… but there has been virtually no progress,” she said. A day earlier, her foreign affairs adviser, Gowher Rizvi, called for re-imposition of sanctions against Burma. “Without pressure, nothing will happen. Myanmar won't be secure for the Rohingyas. If Myanmar is not secure, Rohingyas will not go back,” the adviser noted. Underscoring the severity of the situation, Rizvi went on to state, “If Myanmar can get away [with that], there will be no security of minorities anywhere in the world. So, we really need to wake up,” he said, calling for “extraordinary international support” for the Rohingyas.

So far Burma has cleared some 600 cases for repatriation in response to Bangladesh's supplied list of 8,030 names. The former accused the latter of not adhering to the terms of the agreement in preparing the list. Dhaka rejected the allegation. It feels betrayed by Naypyidaw's machinations to stall the much-desired repatriation. Included in those are: coming up with new demands and inordinate delay in verification.

The repatriation and the physical arrangement deals, signed on November 23, 2017 and January 16, 2018 respectively, set the January 23 deadline for the repatriation of 670,000 Rohingyas who sought shelter in this country, fleeing atrocities of a monumental scale in the Arakan state. In order to placate its eastern neighbour, Bangladesh refrained from including in the list more than 200,000 Rohingyas who came before August 25, 2017.

The Burmese attitude and handling of the repatriation process raise the question if Naypyidaw was ever sincere in taking back the Rohingyas. At a time when repatriation deals were being negotiated, instead of creating an enabling condition, the security forces in Burma continued their operations in the northern Arakan, killing people, torching houses and forcing the survivors to seek asylum in Bangladesh until a few weeks ago. As a matter of strategy and to erase the evidence of genocide, Naypyidaw is bulldozing the charred dwellings and other structures of Rohingya villages and vegetation. It is also setting up security installations and facilitating transmigration of Rakhine Buddhists in the Rohingya land. Press reports inform that members of the Rakhine community of Bangladesh are also being encouraged by the Burmese authorities to settle in the Rohingya land—in all likelihood, with the purported aim to malign Bangladesh that Buddhists are not safe in this land.

The so-called “temporary shelters” in a closed zone with high-perimeter, barbed wire fences and watch towers clearly indicate the interned conditions in which the repatriated Rohingyas would be in for uncertain periods, before (if ever) they are settled in their own homes. The above conditions, coupled with the failure to acknowledge the wanton atrocities committed and prosecute the perpetrators, the bizarre laying of blame on the Rohingyas for torching their own homes, and the outright refusal to consider restoration of citizenship and other associated rights, have led discerning observers to conclude that a “safe, dignified and sustainable repatriation of Rohingyas” is no longer a valid option. It also needs to be borne in mind that since August 25, 2017, despite calls for independent international enquiry into the violence, thus far Burma has remained resolute in not granting full access to areas of concern to the UN Fact Finding Mission, the Special Rapporteur on human rights in Burma, and also the office of High Commissioner for Human Rights, impeding the process of establishing truth and accountability. Such conditions led the International Commission of Jurists to conclude that “The current situation in Rakhine State is incongruous to voluntary returns of the Rohingya refugees.”

Of the three “durable solutions” recognised in conventional refugee discourse, if “voluntary repatriation” is ruled out, then “third-country resettlement” and “local integration” remain the other options. Are those options feasible in the Rohingya refugee context?

Very recently, the special envoy of the Canadian prime minister recommended that Canada should welcome refugees from the Rohingya community. Days ago, the Filipino president also expressed a similar interest. There is no reason to believe if at all these countries and others will end up taking Rohingyas; the number in all likelihood would be paltry compared to the existing refugee caseload. In that context, such declarations should be essentially viewed as well-meaning expressions of solidarity with the Rohingyas. With the United States, the largest refugee receiving country, in retreat from its decades-long policy of admitting refugees and with the increase in sway of right-wing political forces in Europe and Australia, the future of a third-country resettlement appears to be bleak.

Against the current anti-refugee, anti-migrant and xenophobic context, particularly in the global north, Bangladesh has set a unique example by admitting and providing shelter to the hapless victims of genocide. It has done so despite being a resource-poor and densely populated country. Bangladesh government has categorically stated that local integration of Rohingyas is not an option, a view largely shared by its populace. Such a policy, if ever considered, will likely be politically charged and will, in all likelihood, work against the national consensus that exists in favour of the Rohingyas now. There is also the important moral and strategic question: by exploring solutions other than voluntary return, would not the international community be complicit in fulfilling the long-term Burmese agenda of depopulating Arakan of the Rohingyas?

Thus, if safe, dignified and voluntary repatriation is not in the offing, if third-country resettlement is a non-starter, and if local integration is not a practical proposition, what fate should lie for the Rohingyas? Surely, Bangladesh does not have the capacity to take care of more than a million people for an uncertain period. At this time of global uncertainty, there is always the likelihood of the outbreak of new humanitarian crises and hence no guarantee that the international community will continue to support maintaining the Rohingya refugees for perpetuity. All these lead us to think of a creative and practical durable solution to address the issue. The Protected Return to Protected Homeland (PR2PH) plan, presented at the Berlin Myanmar Genocide Conference in February this year by the members of global Rohingya community and their supporters, is an important contribution in that conversation.

The core of PR2PH plan is the declaration of northern Arakan as the Rohingya Homeland, the ancestral home of the Rohingya, protected by international forces and ensuring the return of 1 million Rohingyas from Bangladesh and other members of Rohingya diaspora who fled what Amartya Sen and Desmond Tutu had termed as “slow burning genocide” to Arakan permanently, or on a temporary basis, to rebuild their homeland through self-rule. It will also entail setting up a demilitarised zone south of Maungdaw ensuring that no Tatmadaw forces are present in the region. Such an arrangement will address the Rohingya's existential need for an internationally protected homeland in northern Arakan within the Union of Burma.

While facilitating their return, Bangladesh and the international community must acknowledge the reality that this is not a typical case of repatriation and thus a matter of agreeing on modalities and setting up of logistics for facilitating the return of refugees to their country of origin, where the situation that led to their flight has registered an improvement. On the contrary, this is a case where the genocidal regime is still in control of the state and has remained resolutely committed in its intent to exterminate the population. Hence, the emphasis is on the concept, Protected Return.

The idea of re-establishing Rohingya homeland, though conceived by the Rohingya leaders, was neatly articulated by Irwin Cotler, a Canadian constitutional lawyer, war crimes justice and legal counsel of Nelson Mandela and Andrei Sakharov, at the Berlin conference. There is little scope to dismiss the Homeland plan as impractical and unfeasible. As has been noted by Rohingya specialist Maung Zarni, the idea of “a home for Rohingya is rooted in the Burmese official documents including Encyclopaedia which defined officially Northern Arakan State (of Mayu Frontier area) as Rohingya homeland (1964) and Myanmar Ministry of Defence's highest leadership spelled this out in July 1961 during the Mujahideen's surrender.” Zarni provides documentary evidence to back his statement and argues that as part of a surrender deal, the military leadership in Rangoon gave in to the Mujahideen's demand to keep Mayu district out of Akyab (Sittwe) based Rakhine control. This suited the military's own agenda of keeping Rakhine nationalists in check. The first founding chief administrator of this homeland for Rohingyas was the then young Lt-Colonel Tin Oo, now 95-year-old Vice Chair of the ruling National League for Democracy, the oldest colleague of Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi. The unwillingness of the Burmese state to provide protection to the Rohingya has necessitated the need for international protection of the designated homeland that very much existed four decades ago.

No doubt the Burmese leadership will oppose the PR2PH plan. Time has long past for the international community to go beyond appeasing the murderous regime and robustly implement the homeland plan for the Rohingyas. This is perhaps the only feasible and legitimate durable solution to save them from the predatory genocidal Burmese politico-military establishment and to avert undesirable consequences that this protracted refugee situation may create not only for Bangladesh, but also for the region as a whole, with wider consequences for the global community.

CR Abrar teaches international relations at the University of Dhaka.

By The Daily Star

March 5, 2018

Cox's Bazar: After a three-day interval, Myanmar Army again took position along Tambruborder in Naikkhonchhari upazila of Bandarban district today, creating panic among the Rohingyas who have taken shelter on no man's land.

Confirming the incident, Lt Col Manjurul Hasan of Border Guard Bangladesh 34 Battalion said, "The situation along the Tambru border point is now calm and the BGB members, deployed in the border area, are on alert. There's nothing to be panicked and the BGB is ready to tackle any situation."

AKM Jahangir Aziz, chairman of Ghumdhum union, said members of Myanmar's Border Guard Police (BGP) were seen patrolling the area since Monday morning.

On Saturday, Myanmar removed its Army from the Tambru border following a flag meeting with BGB on Friday.

Myanmar Army took position with heavy troops and artillery along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border from Thursday morning.

A good number of Rohingyas gathered near the zero point of the border in the last one month where the members of BGP along with Myanmar Army were seen conducting various activities like installing barbed-wire fences and setting up advance technological surveillance equipment.

By Shakhawat Liton

The Daily Star

December 25, 2017

Demand for trial getting louder but no concrete actions by UN

Nine years ago when a former judge and two prosecutors at the international criminal tribunals for Rwanda and former Yugoslavia were examining the documents on human rights abuses in Myanmar, they were astonished by the UN inaction even though the global body knew for years the severe, widespread, and systematic violations of human rights there.

They saw that the UN resolutions and special rapporteurs had spoken out over and over again about the abuses that were reported to them. But the UN Security Council did not move the process forward, as it should have and had done in similar cases like that of the former Yugoslavia and Darfur of Western Sudan.

Internationally acclaimed jurists Justice Patricia M Wald of the US, Justice Richard J Goldstone of South Africa, and Sir Geoffrey Nice QC of the UK were working as commissioners for a report called "Crimes in Burma" which was prepared in 2009 by the law school of Harvard University. 

Justice Wald, who served as the chief judge for the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, was a judge at the international criminal tribunal for former Yugoslavia. Justice Goldstone, who served as a judge of the Constitutional Court of South Africa, was the chief prosecutor at the international criminal tribunals for former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda. Sir Nice was deputy prosecutor of the international criminal tribunal for former Yugoslavia and the principal prosecution trial attorney in the case against Slobodan Milosevic at The Hague.

Milosevic was the world's first president to be indicted for war crimes by an international criminal court.

As judge and prosecutors at the two international crimes tribunals set up by the UN, they worked relentlessly to complete trials of perpetrators of genocides in Rwanda and Bosnia.

Judge Pedro Nikken of Venezuela, a former member of the executive committee of the international commission of jurists, and Ganzorig Gombosuren, a former judge at the Supreme Court of Mongolia, worked with them.

In their examination, they found that UN documents have included a range of human rights and humanitarian law violations in Myanmar since 1992.

The International Human Rights Clinic of the Harvard Law School prepared the report by reviewing four types of crimes perpetrated in Myanmar: forced displacement of the population, sexual violence, murder, and torture that had been documented in various UN reports since 2002.

Based on the report's findings and recommendations, the five jurists called on the UN Security Council to urgently establish a commission of inquiry to probe and report on crimes against humanity and war crimes in Myanmar.

The world cannot wait while the military regime continues its atrocities against the people of Myanmar, they said in the report, adding that the day may come for a referral of the situation to the International Criminal Court or the establishment of a special tribunal to deal with the country and member states of the UN should be prepared to support such action.

The law school of Harvard has moved further and opend another inquiry in 2011 regarding the situation in Myanmar. 

In 2014, the inquiry released its report where it said three military commanders and a combat division of Myanmar army committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in Kachin and northern Shan State of Myanmar in 2005-06.

The report documented how soldiers fired mortars at villages; opened fire on fleeing villagers; destroyed homes, crops, and food stores; planted landmines in civilian areas; forced civilians to work; and captured and executed civilians.

The law school accused the three senior army officials, one of whom later became the home minister, of committing war crimes. It said, “The abuses perpetrated by the military have been too widespread, too persistent, and too grave to be ignored.”

It said it found enough evidence for International Criminal Court at The Hague to press war crimes and crimes against humanity charges against the trio and for issuing arrest warrants.

But nothing happened to the three.

In a legal analytical report the following year, the law school of Yale University documented atrocities perpetrated by Myanmar military against the Rohingyas. It found atrocities committed against the Rohingyas had increased precipitously since 2012.

The report concluded that the available evidence strongly suggested that all the elements of genocide were present in Rakhine State.

It too urged the UN to adopt a resolution to establish a commission of inquiry on the human rights situation in Rakhine State. "Myanmar may be responsible under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide for failing to prevent genocide from occurring within its borders," it stated.

Again, nothing happened to the perpetrators and like before, the Myanmar authorities denied all allegations.

The world waited and the inaction resulted in painful consequences. Over the years the situation worsened. The Rohingyas faced much worse than the people in Kachin and Shan states.

Like on previous occasions, UN senior officials kept voicing concern. After Myanmar military's crackdown on the Rohingyas in October 2016, the UN special rapporteur for human rights in Myanmar in March this year said the situation in northern Rakhine state was far worse than anticipated.

"I would say crimes against humanity. Definite crimes against humanity… by the Burmese, Myanmar military, the border guard or the police or security forces," Yanghee Lee told the BBC in March.

At least 87,000 Rohingyas fled Myanmar in the wake of the violence.

Lee has been banned by Myanmar government for her strong voices against human rights abuses.

A few months later, Myanmar refused entry to members of a UN investigation focusing on allegations of killings, rapes, and tortures by security forces against the Rohingyas.

Keeping the eyes of the world away, Myanmar military continued its brutalities.

The intensified atrocities perpetrated by the Myanmar military against the Rohingyas since August has already been labelled by UN and right bodies as "text book example of ethnic cleansing" and genocide and crimes against humanity. Over 6.5 lakh Rohingyas have fled to Bangladesh since then.

According to Doctors Without Borders at least 6,700 Rohingya were killed in attacks during the first month of the military crackdown.

Rights bodies presented evidence in piles, about the burning of Rohingya villages, raping of women, and indiscriminate murder of the Rohingyas. 

DEMAND FOR JUSTICE LOUDER

In September, an international people's tribunal in Malaysia held Myanmar guilty of “genocide” against the Rohingyas and said the “systematic targeting of civilians” and other acts committed by the Myanmar army qualified as war crimes.

The seven-member bench of Permanent People's Tribunal, holding proceedings on alleged atrocities and state crimes against the Rohingya, Kachin and other ethnic minority groups in Myanmar, said the Myanmar army was committing the crime in the “context of official duties”.

“On the strength of the evidence presented, the tribunal reached the consensus ruling that the State of Myanmar has the intent to commit genocide against the Kachin people and the other Muslim groups," read the judgement delivered in a court-like setting at the University of Malaya's Faculty of Law.

New York-based Human Rights Watch on November 3 urged the UN Security Council to refer Myanmar to the International Criminal Court because of its failure to investigate massive atrocities perpetrated against the Rohingyas.

The European Parliament recently urged its member states to adopt disciplinary sanctions against the perpetrators of violence and “human rights abuses” in Myanmar.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein said he would not be surprised if a court one day ruled that acts of genocide had been committed against the Rohingyas in Myanmar.

In a recent interview with the BBC, he said that attacks on the Rohingyas had been "well thought out and planned" and he had asked Myanmar's leader Aung San Suu Kyi to do more to stop the military action.

Zeid called the campaign "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing".

During her visit last month, Pramila Patten, UN special representative of the secretary general, promised to put the guilty soldiers in the dock of the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

If the UN could do what it had done in the cases of genocides in Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, there could be hope.

UN'S TRACK RECORD

After its shocking failure to act on time to prevent the Rwanda genocide in 1994 in which more than 800,000 Tutsi were massacred by the Hutu majority, at least two former UN chiefs and some world leaders had apologised to the Rwandans. 

The UN got the opportunity in 1998 to boast about its stance against genocide when trials were being held for the genocide perpetrators, including the then Rwanda prime minister. The first verdict was delivered in early September 1998 against a Rwanda politician. 

In a discussion on the trial of Rwanda genocide perpetrators, the UN in October 1998 hoped the legacy of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda laid the foundation for a new era in international criminal justice.

The UN's failure to act comprehensively was again seen in Bosnia. More than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims were massacred in Srebrenica in July 1995. The then UN secretary general Kofi Annan in a report in the General Assembly in 1999 concluded “the tragedy of Srebrenica will haunt our history forever”.

Yet, sentencing of Ratko Maldic, the former Bosnian Serb military commander known as the Butcher of Bosnia, to life in prison on November 22 by a UN criminal tribunal for genocide and his role at Srebrenica demonstrated the UN's stance against the heinous crimes.

Less than 10 years after Rwanda, genocide unfolded in Darfur of Western Sudan, exposing once again the failure of UN and international community to protect civilians.

In 2005, the UN Security Council passed a resolution and referred Darfur to the International Criminal Court to investigate and prosecute serious crimes committed in Darfur.

In 2010, the international criminal court charged Sudan's president Omar al-Bashir with three counts of genocide in Darfur.

THE HURDLES

Myanmar is not a state party to the Rome Statute establishing the International Criminal Court. Therefore, the situation in Myanmar needs to be referred to the international criminal court by the UN Security Council through a resolution, which will empower the court to investigate human rights abuses and prosecute the abusers.

But passage of such a resolution by the Security Council looks almost impossible due to China, a close supporter of Myanmar for decades for its strong economic and business interest there. 

Since 2007, China backed by Russia has killed several efforts taken by the Security Council on Myanmar with their veto power.

China's support helped Myanmar military generals to remain above the law for decades. This impunity gave them the licence to carry out the genocide.

Time has come for China to reassess its strategy so that in future it is not branded as a partner of genocide in Myanmar.

If China supports a UN move to refer the Myanmar situation to the International Criminal Court, there will be no dearth of evidence to prosecute the alleged perpetrators.

By Maliha Khan

The Daily Star

December 9, 2017

How Rohingya citizen journalists have been documenting the crisis over the years and what's changed now

For years now, the persecution of Rohingya in Myanmar has been broadcast to the world largely through volunteers who use smartphones to send photos, audio and video clips out to the Rohingya diaspora, larger Muslim community and the world. In the camps in the south of Bangladesh, refugees show images and videos of scenes of violence back home on their phones. Members of these WhatsApp or Facebook groups include the Rohingya diaspora in countries as wide-ranging as Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and the UK.

Rakhine state has been “closed” to the outside world with the government restricting access to the region to independent observers, journalists, rights groups, and the UN. “Due to the denial of access to the region, it is essentially impossible to get information,” says Rohingya refugee Mohammed Rafique, founder of The Stateless, a Rohingya community news portal.

What little has come out has been through social media, community outlets, and blogs. Two prominent sources of news online include the Rohingya Blogger and The Stateless.

Nay San Lwin, based in Germany, runs the Rohingya Blogger. The blog has become an important news media outlet for documenting human rights abuses against the Rohingya as well as featuring major international articles doing the same. Lwin's father, U Ba Sein, founded the website in 2005 and Lwin himself has been blogging since 2012. “We have gathered a great deal of evidence which arguably amount to show genocide has occurred against the Rohingya,” stated Lwin recently at a conference organised by the Refugee and Migratory Movement Research Unit (RMMRU) in Dhaka.

The year 2012 marked deadly riots between Buddhists and the Rohingya in the state of Rakhine, with allegations that the subsequently deployed military committed human rights abuses in Rohingya villages. As the national media largely ignored the violence, Rohingya community leaders and members of the diaspora set up their own media outlets to document and report on atrocities being committed in the state.

It was at this time that both Rohingya Blogger and The Stateless came into being. Lwin formed a team of volunteers based in northern Rakhine state. His team members keep tabs on all the villages in the area to document actions of the Border Guard Police (BGP), military and civilian authorities against the Rohingya.

“We also have volunteers in central Rakhine state who are reporting about the situation of refugee camps,” says Lwin. Around 120,000 internally displaced Rohingya have been interned in camps across Rakhine State since 2012 with the government restricting the UN and aid groups from distributing vital food aid or providing healthcare services.

Rohingya Blogger also has volunteers this side of the border, who have covered several incidents in the camps. They do not have problems recruiting, says Lwin, because they are well-known and many are willing to cooperate for the sake of getting information of their plight out to the world. 

The Rohingya Blogger team works discreetly, even among the villagers who are their sources. They are also anonymous online as they could all be sentenced to long imprisonment for their activities, says Lwin.

“Two of our team members were arrested two years ago but they managed to get released by themselves. We didn't publicise that they were our members as they would have been sentenced to imprisonment for their work. Some non-members who sent reports to us were arrested as well and four people from Buthidaung township have been sentenced for six years,” says Lwin.

Mobile phones have been available in the villages of Rakhine state only since 2014. Even without, says Lwin, his sources are tenacious. Lwin says of his experiences over the years, “I used to receive handwritten information. They know how to send information and they know how to reach me. I have even received handwritten reports from prison cells.”

What's changed in 2017? For one, half of Lwin's team is now in Bangladesh, having fled there since the most recent spate of violence August onwards. The rest of the volunteers remain in their villages but mobility is no longer an option. Many of their contacts, too, have fled across the border. This has led to a change in focus for the blog. “As the atrocities against the Rohingya are mostly known to the world by now, we are shifting our attention to writing news updates in Burmese to better inform Burmese Buddhists,” says Lwin.

Lwin and his news site have come under attack by the government. An article published in January of this year was dismissed by the Information Committee of the State Counsellor's Office as “fabricated”. “Our work has been publicly attacked by the government and the military. The official Facebook page of the Office of the President has attempted to attack and discredit us. They claim that our evidence and reporting was fake news,” stated Lwin at the RMMRU conference.

The Stateless is also run by a member of the Rohingya diaspora, based in Ireland. This, too, is run with the help of volunteers based within Rakhine State who operate with no pay and undertaking enormous risk.

Mobile journalism has been crucial for the persecuted Rohingya to get information out, using social media groups in WhatsApp and WeChat among others.“We normally go through a process in the groups to verify the authenticity of information by confirming with other members and video or imagery evidence. Then we proceed in writing the report,” says Rafique.

Recently, there have been reports of journalists documenting the Rohingya crisis going missing, targeted by the military. Since October 9 of last year, nine out of 10 of their mobile journalists have either disappeared or been killed, reports Rafique.

Since August 25 of this year, hundreds of villages have been entirely destroyed by the military with over 600,000 having sought refuge in neighbouring Bangladesh. The Stateless is currently starved of information with no sources left in the villages of Rakhine, says Rafique. This draught of information also has repercussions for human rights activists and international media outlets which depend on community sources in the otherwise “closed” state for information from inside.

Burmese journalists have not been spared, even on this side of the border. In September, Minzayar Oo and Hkun Lat, two photojournalists from Myanmar, were detained for almost 10 days. According to Bangladesh police, they were arrested for conducting their journalist work while on tourist visas. Ironic, considering that the rest of the world's journalists have been going about their work in Cox's Bazar without the threat of arrest.

The international media have finally taken a sustained interest in the matter due to the influx of over a million refugees into Bangladesh over the last year. But the work of these Rohingya mobile journalists remains as important as ever. With Rakhine still closed to the outside world, information from the epicenter of the crisis is vital to the fight of the Rohingya both inside and outside Myanmar.

By The Daily Star

November 26, 2017

The United Kingdom along with other countries would continue to put pressure on Myanmar so that condition is created for early repatriation of the Rohingya people.

Visiting UK Secretary for International Development Penny Mordaunt, MP, said this when she called on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at her official Ganabhaban residence here this evening.

After the meeting, PM's Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim briefed reporters.

The UK minister said her country fully endorses Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's five-point proposal that she placed in the last UN General Assembly for solution to the protracted Rohingya crisis.

She highly appreciated Bangladesh's humanitarian gesture by sheltering tens of thousands of Rohingya people.

The press secretary said the rehabilitation and repatriation of the Rohingya people also came up for discussion.

At the meeting, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh has given shelter to the Rohingya people on the humanitarian grounds.

She, however said, it would not be possible for Bangladesh to keep them here for a long time.

Sheikh Hasina expressed satisfaction as the Myanmar government has agreed to take back their nationals from Bangladesh.

Pointing out the MoU signed between Bangladesh and Myanmar in this regard, she said a joint working group would be formed to deal with the repatriation of the Myanmar nationals from Bangladesh.

Recalling the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) peace accord, the prime minister said the decades-long insurgency problem in the CHT was solved peacefully without any third-party involvement.

Sheikh Hasina said the government is issuing identity cards to the Rohingyas with their Myanmar address.

PM's International Affairs Adviser Dr Gowher Rizvi and PMO Secretary Suraiya Begum were present on the occasion.

By The Daily Star

October 31, 2017

UN says about those who have fled Rakhine

Almost every Rohingya woman and girl, who fled the Rakhine State in Myanmar and took shelter in Bangladesh, is either a survivor of or a witness to multiple incidences of sexual assault, murder through mutilation or burning alive of a close family member or neighbour, said UN Women.

“Women and girls have experienced sexual and gender‑based violence, perpetrated by both the Myanmar army and by Rakhine locals,” according to the latest report of UN Women.

The October 2017 report titled “Gender brief on Rohingya Refugee Crisis Response in Bangladesh” published yesterday said many women whose sexual assault resulted in conception were reported to have sought out abortions after arriving in Bangladesh.

UN Women prepared the report with testimonies from community leaders and interviews with refugees in makeshift settlements in Balukhali of Cox's Bazar.

It said 51 percent of the displaced people were women and girls and they live in terrible conditions and lack adequate food, water, sanitation, medical care and access to their livelihoods and assets.

The crisis disproportionately affects women, girls and the most vulnerable and marginalised Rohingya refugee population groups by reinforcing, perpetuating and exacerbating pre-existing, persistent gender inequalities, gender-based violence and discrimination, it said.

This is a frightening reminder that sexual and gender‑based violence are among the most horrific weapons of war, instruments of terror most often used against women, the report said.

The recent influx has more than doubled the population living in refugee settlements and stretched the capacities of humanitarian agencies working to provide emergency shelter, access to clean water and sanitation, healthcare services, delivery of food, nutrition support for malnourished girls and boys, education, and protective services.

Increasing overcrowding and decreasing privacy at all refugee sites elevate safety and security risks, particularly for women and girls, it said.

Almost 400,000 refugees need immediate access to water and sanitation. Due to the increased population, women and men are forced to share toilets without basic protection measures including gender segregation, it said.

Twenty‑four thousand pregnant and lactating women require maternal healthcare support at the already overstretched healthcare facilities.

Many Rohingya refugee households are female headed. Households led by females or elderly people with no male relatives are exhibiting greater vulnerability than those with adult males, the report said.

Having fled extreme circumstances, these households are not only traumatised by the loss of their loved ones, but also the loss of their assets, livelihoods and all forms of financial security.

Women and children are also at heightened risk of becoming victims of human trafficking, sexual abuse or child and forced marriage for the same reasons.

The report said women and adolescent girls between the ages of 13 and 20 newly arriving from Myanmar typically have two to four children each.

SANITATION ISSUE

The lack of toilets and well-maintained manual water pumps have complicated the crisis of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, where 30 percent of the 4,370 manual pumps installed were in poor condition and 36 percent of the 24,773 latrines were about to overflow, the United Nations reported Sunday.

"There is continuous new influx of refugees resulting in increase in population at multiple sites which is overloading existing WASH facilities (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) due to heavy use," said the Inter Sector Coordination Group, which coordinates agencies working in the refugee camps.

The number of refugees who have fled the armed conflict in Myanmar to Bangladesh since August 25 has risen to 607,000, as of October 28. The new influx of refugees brought the number of the ethnic group that sought refuge in Bangladesh to about 819,000.

EU COMMISSIONER IN TOWN

Meanwhile, EU Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides arrived in Dhaka last night for a two-day visit to the Rohingya refugees camps and see their plights.

Christos Stylianides will leave Dhaka this morning for visiting the Kutupalong camp in Cox's Bazar. He will back to Dhaka tomorrow and hold bilateral meeting with Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali and will depart Bangladesh.

By The Daily Star

October 8, 2017

Home Minister Asadzzaman Khan Kamal today said that he would visit Myanmar this month to discuss the smooth and immediate repatriation of the Rohingyas, who have fled to Bangladesh for persecution in Rakhine state.

“We will set agenda of our talking points and possibly Myanmar visit will take place within this month,” Kamal said while talking to reporters at the secretariat in Dhaka this noon.

About biometric registration of Rohingyas, the minister said biometrically unregistered Rohingyas will be deprived of aids from local and international communities.

He said around 91,423 Rohingyas have already been brought under the biometric registration process while around 9,000 Rohingyas are being registered every day.

Alongside the Rohingya issue, talks will also be held with the Myanmar authorities over the smuggling of narcotic items including Yaba tablets to Bangladesh, Kamal said.

The home minister also said the government will install scanning machines at all 16 land ports across the country to curb smuggling of all illegal items into Bangladesh.

“We have already ensured all-time intelligence surveillance on border areas to stop the flow of Yaba tablets,” Kamal said.

Meanwhile, Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader said that his government will keep the bordering area open for Rohingya people on the humanitarian ground. 

“We will not close our door forcibly without consents of the United Nations and other international communities,” Quader told reporters while visiting activities of the mobile court in Banani area this noon.

Quader, also road transport and bridges minister, expressed his government’s hope that India and China would interfere over the Rohingya crisis to ensure its immediate and peaceful end.

Since August 25, an estimated 515,000 Rohingya people entered Bangladesh to flee “ethnic cleansing” in Rakhine state in Myanmar.

By The Daily Star

October 1, 2017

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir today called upon the external world to impose sanctions on Myanmar, compelling the country to resolve the Rohingya crisis. 

“A strong diplomatic pressure will have to be mounted on Myanmar after convincing the external world,” Fakhrul said while addressing a press conference at the party Chairperson Khaleda Zia’s Gulshan office in Dhaka this evening.

Earlier, he held a meeting with the representatives of Buddhist Nagorik Oikya and leaders of the 20-party alliance to discuss the Rohingya issue.

The BNP leader also reiterated his party’s call to the government for forging a national unity ignoring hypocrisy to cope up with the Rohingya crisis. 

Criticising the government for its failure to convince India and China over the Rohingya issue, he said one-way friendship cannot bring any result.

“What a fantastic diplomacy and what a fantastic friendship it is! We are unfortunate as our all closest friends have stood beside Myanmar,” he said.

Govt diplomatically helpless: Mosharraf 

Earlier in the day, BNP Standing Committee Member Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain today slammed the government for its "diplomatic failure" in convincing India and China to mitigate the Rohingya crisis.

“The government can neither convince China nor India to solve the Rohingya crisis. It proves the government is diplomatically helpless,” Mosharraf came up with remarks while addressing a discussion at the National Press Club in Dhaka.

After Chinese president visit to Bangladesh, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said the bilateral relation between the two countries reached a new height. After returning from India without any success, the prime minister termed the Bangladesh-India ties as high as the Himalayas, Mosharraf said.

“When we are facing Rohingya crisis, neither China nor India stand beside Bangladesh,” Mosharraf said adding that the situation would be different if the government could have taken appropriate diplomatic efforts.

The BNP leader also expressed his disappointment as the UN Security Council ended its meeting without taking any resolution to peaceful end to the Rohingya crisis.

Mosharraf also underscored the need for imposing sanctions on Myanmar forcing the country to take back its Rohingya citizens fled to Bangladesh in the face of persecution.

By The Daily Star

September 15, 2017

British High Commissioner in Dhaka Alison Blake today said there is now a global understanding that the decades-old crisis in Myanmar’s Rakhine State’s cannot be allowed to continue and the UK is active to find a lasting solution to the Rohingya situation.

“And this understanding is not just to stop violence, it’s to come to a lasting solutions,” she said, referring to the statements of her government and the UN Security Council where UK along with the Sweden tabled the issue.

The Security Council at a meeting on September 13 agreed on the importance of a long term solutions to the situation in Rakhine and called for implementation of the recommendations of the Advisory Commission of Rakhine State, chaired by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Blake said there is no “magic wand” to solve the decades-old crisis overnight. “But there is a global understanding that this cannot be allowed to continue.”

Talking to a select group of journalists, including The Daily Star at her residence today, the British envoy said that Bangladesh has set an example for the world with its response to the Rohingya crisis.

About the current situation, she said the UK was not just active on the humanitarian ground, but as the member of Security Council and friend of Bangladesh, they have been clear to say that people responsible for violence which is the armed forces and security forces must stop it.

“This is a crisis Bangladesh dealing with. But it’s not made in Bangladesh,” she said, adding since the crisis is created in Rakhine, so Myanmar government must take the lead to resolve it.

Alison Blake also said her government has already announced £30 million to meet the humanitarian needs of vulnerable Rohingyas following the August 25 military crackdowns that forced more than 400,000 Myanmar nationals to flee Rakhine State and take shelter in Bangladesh.

Head of DFID Bangladesh Jane Edmondson who was also present with the High Commissioner said there is a “huge coordination” challenges to manage all the resources coming for the humanitarian need.

“We are working with the partners on how to improve this and manage that,” she said, adding that they are also preparing for the “worst-case” scenario.

The UK government, earlier, called for violence to stop after hundreds of thousands of people fled their homes.

By The Daily Star

September 8, 2017

A lawyer today served legal notice to the prosecution of International Crimes Tribunal to prosecute Aung San Suu Kyi for “genocide and crime against humanity” in Myanmar.

Supreme Court lawyer Mohammad Delwar Hossain also sought investigation into alleged genocide and crime against humanity against Suu Kyi and six other Myanmar officials.

Six other officials of Myanmar are – Senior General Min AungHIaing, commander in chief of armed forces, Lt Gen KyawSwe, union minister for home affairs, NaiThetLwin, union minister of ethnic affairs, Lt Gen Ye Aung, union minister of border affairs, General Zaw Win, chief of national police, and Monk Ashin Wirathu, Leader of ‘969 Movement’ currently representing Ma Ba Tha (Committee for the protection of Nationality and Religion), according to the legal notice. 

Delwar Hossain sent the legal notice through Advocate Yousuf Ali yesterday saying that he will seek relief in appropriate court, if the chief prosecutor of ICT does not take steps to investigate into the seven Myanmar leaders for the offence of “Genocide and Crime against humanity perpetrated against the ethnic minority group of Rhingya in the vicinity of Magndow Township of the Republic of Union of Myanmar” within seven days.

He said in the legal notice that CNN and Al Jazeera reported that the Rohingyas were being raped tortured or saw their homes burned down and family members executed.

The ongoing attacks of the Myanmar government, military, police and security forces on and persecutions of the Rohingya population in Myanmar constitute genocide as defined by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (the Genocide Convention) which is ratified by both Bangladesh and Myanmar, he said in the legal notice, adding that the Convention declares that genocide is a crime under the international law.

The legal notice said, “The State Bangladesh had an ‘erga omnes obligation’ under genocide convention to bring end to the crime against humanity. Therefore to discharge that obligation the state has promulgated the International Crimnes (Tribunals) Act 1973 (the ICT) making provision of the setting up of the tribunals for the prosecution and trial of the perpetrators of the international crimes including the crime against humanity”.