ICC Arrest Warrant for Myanmar Junta Leader, a Long-awaited Step towards Justice and Accountability
Press Release | November 27, 2024
The arrest warrant that the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) seeks for Myanmar junta leader General Min Aung Hlaing is a first step towards the long-awaited justice and accountability for the Rohingya people who have faced two campaigns of genocide under his leadership between 2016 and 2017.
The prosecutor’s Wednesday application for the arrest of General Min Aung Hlaing for his “criminal responsibility for the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya committed in Myanmar and in part in Bangladesh”, should not have taken five years in the making when the evidence of his gravest crimes have been extensively documented and recorded by several UN agencies and reputable human rights organisations.
Nearly a million Rohingya civilians who General Min Aung Hlaing and the Myanmar military have expelled into Bangladesh refugee camps bear all hallmarks of genocide, not just “crimes against humanity” that he has been accused of in the application for the ICC arrest warrant.
However, the request for the arrest of the junta leader will serve a warning to end the cycle of atrocities against the Rohingya people and other ethnic minorities that he and the military have been committing with full impunity. The arrest warrant will also set an example of holding accountability for Twan Mrat Naing and Arakan Army (AA) who are committing the similar crimes against humanity and gross human rights violations against the remaining Rohingya civilian population in two-Rohingya majority townships – Maungdaw and Buthidaung as Arakan Army continues to control over swaths of territory from the Myanmar Military.
General Min Aung Hlaing will become the first Myanmar junta leader if the three ICC judges rule on in the favour of the prosecutor’s request for the arrest warrant. However, he is not the lone criminal during the campaigns of genocide against the Rohingya people. Behind the chief perpetrator of genocide, General Min Aung Hlaing, there are civilian, military and religious leaders who have played the active roles in his “unfinished business” of completely destroying the Rohingya people.
The European Rohingya Council (ERC) acknowledges and welcomes the historic first step in holding the junta leader accountable for his gravest crimes against the Rohingya people. The ERC also urges the court to expand the scale of crimes to the crimes of genocide that General Min Aung Hlaing and co-perpetrators have committed against the Rohingya people.
For more information:
Dr. Ambia Perveen
Chairperson
The European Rohingya Council
info@theerc.eu
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