UN: Myanmar military top brass should be tried for genocide

ROHINGYA CRISIS Mission’s report says top generals have committed crimes against humanity

LONDON: UN investigators on Monday said Myanmar’s army chief Min Aung Hlaing and five more generals should be prosecuted in an international court for “genocide” against the Rohingya minority.

A mission, established by the UN Human Rights Council in March 2017, found patterns of gross human rights violations and abuses that it said “undoubtedly amount to the gravest crimes under international law”, principally by the military, but also by other security forces.

Some 700,000 Rohingya refugees have taken shelter in neighbouring Bangladesh and India since August 2017 due to what the UN had previously described as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing”.

The Myanmar government has denied the allegations.

The latest international criticism of Yangon’s approach to the Rohingya crisis came in the report of the UN fact-finding mission. It called for the generals to be tried for crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Rakhine, Kachin and Shan states.

The report also criticised civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi for not preventing “the unfolding events in Rakhine state”.

Responsibility for the situation, the report said, starts at the top, with Hlaing. The five others named are deputy commanderin-chief Vice Senior-Gen Soe Win, bureau of special operations-3 commander Lt Gen Aung Kyaw Zaw, western regional military command chief Maj Gen Maung Maung Soe, 33rd Light Infantry Division commander Brig Gen Aung Aung, and 99th Light Infantry Division commander Brig Gen Than Oo.

Holding the Myanmar military – the Tatmadaw – responsible, the report said that military necessity would never justify killing indiscriminately, gang-raping women, assaulting children, and burning entire villages.

“The Tatmadaw’s tactics are consistently and grossly disproportionate to actual security threats, especially in Rakhine state, but also in northern Myanmar. They are shocking for the level of denial, normalcy and impunity that is attached to them,” the report stated. “The Tatmadaw’s contempt for human life, integrity and freedom, and for international law generally, should be a cause of concern for the entire population.”

The UN mission was never granted access to Myanmar, but the report says the team amassed information from primary sources, including through 875 in-depth interviews with victims and eyewitnesses, satellite imagery and authenticated documents, photographs and videos.

Only verified and corroborated information was taken on board, and the mission travelled to Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and UK, it added.

A fuller report, containing detailed information and legal analysis will be presented to the Human Rights Council on September 18.