The world’s top court will deliver a judgment this week on whether Myanmar committed genocide against its Rohingya minority, in a landmark case that will set a critical 21st-century benchmark for the gravest of all international crimes.
asserted
that → deliver → crimes
The closely watched judgment could become one of the most significant moments in international law since the end of the second world war.
uncertain
judgment → watch → war
The international court of justice (ICJ) has never found a state responsible for genocide, a crime defined after the Nazi-led Holocaust.
asserted
state → find → Holocaust
The ruling will have implications for a separate high-profile genocide case against Israel.
asserted
ruling → have → Israel
Nearly a decade after a military campaign forced hundreds of thousands of Muslim Rohingya to flee across the border, the ICJ in The Hague will deliver its judgment on Thursday morning.
asserted
ICJ → force → morning
“The ICJ ruling will be historic for Rohingya survivors and their families around the world,” said Yanghee Lee, a former UN rights investigator to Myanmar.
asserted
Lee → say → Myanmar
“The international community failed to prevent Myanmar military atrocities against the Rohingya nine years ago.
asserted
community → fail → Rohingya
It must seize this opportunity to finally secure justice for the Rohingya and begin to reckon with these failings.”
asserted
It → seize → failings
ICJ judges have spent seven years weighing accusations by the Gambia, a Muslim-majority state, that Myanmar’s repression of the Rohingya breached the 1948 UN genocide convention.
asserted
repression → spend → convention
A key issue in previous cases has been how to prove “intent” in a crime defined as acts committed with the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part” a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.
asserted
issue → prove → group
Antonia Mulvey, the founder of Legal Action Worldwide (Law), a group that represents hundreds of Rohingya survivors, said she was “cautiously optimistic” the court would hold Myanmar fully accountable.
asserted
Myanmar → represent → survivors
Government actions showed “patterns of conduct” that proved clear attempts to destroy the group, she said.
asserted
she → show → group
“The attacks on the villages took place the same way,” she said.
asserted
she → take → place
“They would attack the civilians, burn the villages, separate men and women, conduct sexual violence … and then as they fled, they would continue to kill them.”
asserted
they → attack → them
Two other ICJ cases dealing with atrocities in the Balkans fell short of finding states directly responsible for genocide, although Serbia was found legally responsible for failing to prevent the genocide at Srebrenica.
asserted
Serbia → deal → Srebrenica
Mulvey said a key part of the upcoming judgment will be how it handles the issue of rape and sexual violence as an act of genocide.
asserted
it → say → genocide
Her team has collected accounts of soldiers mutilating women’s genitals and biting their faces.
asserted
soldiers → collect → faces
“That’s to mark people, to brand them … it is also to stop reproduction,” she said.
asserted
she → ’ → reproduction
“Yes, we would say sexual violence is a critical part to show their intent to destroy the group,” she added.
asserted
she → say → group
“You don’t need to gang-rape people.
asserted
You → need → people
You don’t need to kill their children in front of them.
asserted
You → need → them
You don’t need to mutilate them.
asserted
You → need → them
You don’t need to do it in public.
asserted
You → need → public
The purpose is to destroy the group.”
In January, the ICJ held closed-door sessions to hear directly from Rohingya survivors who travelled from camps in Bangladesh.
asserted
who → destroy → Bangladesh
One witness said her child was taken from her arms, stabbed and thrown into a fire, according to Law, while another described seeing piles of bodies in a mass grave.
uncertain
another → say → grave
During hearings, Gambian justice minister Dawda Jallow told the court the case was not “about esoteric issues of international law”.
asserted
case → tell → law
“It is about real people, real stories and a real group of human beings,” said Jallow.
asserted
Jallow → say → beings
They have been targeted for destruction.”
asserted
They → target → destruction
Myanmar, which has denied carrying out a genocide, claims its actions targeted a military uprising from insurgents.
uncertain
actions → deny → insurgents
For decades, Rohingya people have been stripped of their citizenship and targeted by increasing discrimination, amid a backdrop of communal violence with Buddhists in the country’s western Rakhine state.
asserted
people → strip → state
The crisis reached a climax after a Rohingya militant group conducted guerrilla-style attacks in the summer of 2017.
asserted
group → reach → 2017
The Myanmar army responded with massive “clearance operations”.
asserted
army → respond → operations
Refugees who fled into Bangladesh in 2017 told the Guardian of a massacre in the village of Tula Toli, where survivors described systematic shooting of civilians, including the drowning of children in a river.
asserted
survivors → flee → river
This testimony from Tula Toli – which satellite footage later showed had been razed – added to dozens of witness accounts collected over the years to build a case for genocide.
asserted
footage → show → genocide
A ruling that Myanmar committed genocide would add international pressure on its leader Min Aung Hlaing, who headed the military during the 2016-2017 attacks and later overthrew the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in a 2021 coup, triggering a civil war that has left tens of thousands dead.
asserted
that → commit → thousands
The former general is separately being investigated by the international criminal court (ICC), which prosecutes individuals and not states like the ICJ, on allegations of crimes against humanity.
asserted
which → investigate → humanity
He was installed as civilian president in April after elections that were widely condemned as a sham, and has made efforts to rebuild diplomatic ties.
asserted
that → instal → ties
For many onlookers, the ICJ decision will hold relevance far beyond Myanmar, as it will provide the strongest hint of how judges might assess the seminal genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel over its campaign in Gaza.
uncertain
judges → hold → Gaza
The cases have much in common, with an ethnic group targeted by a powerful military, although Israel has far stronger diplomatic backing from the US.
asserted
Israel → have → US
The judgment comes as Washington has been on the offensive against international human rights bodies, including sanctioning the ICC.
asserted
Washington → come → ICC
…and 9 more, not listed.
The Aporia
