Today justice for the Rohingya is one step closer.
The International Criminal Court Prosecutor has today applied for an arrest warrant for Min Aung Hlaing, Head of the Burmese military. This is long overdue and will be celebrated across Burma. For decades the Burmese military has been allowed to get away with violating international law without facing consequences. Now the military’s sense of impunity is finally being eroded.
The crimes relate to the Burmese military offensive against Rohingya civilians which began on 25th August 2017, which forced around 800,000 Rohingya to flee into neighbouring Bangladesh. Although Burma is not a signatory to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Bangladesh is, and the ICC ruled that it has jurisdiction relating to the crime of deportation as this happened in an ICC member state.
The ICC is an international court set up to investigate the most serious international crimes and prosecute the people committing those crimes. The Rome Statute is the international treaty that established the court, and details the crimes the court can investigate, such as war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
The Prosecutor stated that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Min Aung Hlaing “bears criminal responsibility for the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya, committed in Myanmar, and in part in Bangladesh.” He also said that more applications for arrest warrants will follow.
