More than 400,000 people have reportedly fled for their lives from Myanmar into neighbouring Bangladesh, and each one has their own heart-wrenching story to tell. In the week I was in Bangladesh I met countless families, whilst assessing the need on the ground and seeing how Islamic Relief could help. Caption: Imran Madden at the southernmost city of Teknaf, along the Naf River, where a dozen narrow wooden boats were collecting refugees from a river island where they had fled by night and dropping them on the Bangladesh side of the river. One of the first people I spoke to was Mohammad Rafiq. He was crossing into Bangladesh with his wife Nuru, and their four children. We caught up with Muhammad at a river crossing that was the second step on their journey through the border area. He was joined by several members of his village and they remained together as a means of mutual support. Caption: Muhammad’s youngest son, Noyum, who he holds closely in his arms, had fever and needed immediate medical attention. Muhammad held his young son, Noyum, closely in his arms. Noyum had a fever and seemed semi-conscious, calling constantly to his parents. Muhammad told me, “We left in the middle of the night. We had time only to grab our children. We left everything behind...” He needed to complete the next part of his journey quickly as his son required immediate attention. However, Noyum has to compete with hundreds of others at this crossing, all of whom have similar needs and stories. I cannot help but wonder whether two-year-old Noyum received the urgent medical treatment he needed. Caption: Najmul Haq fled Myanmar, arriving in Bangladesh with 13 members of his family on 6 September. On my second day in Bangladesh, our team visited Poschim Kul village, where I met Najmul Haq. Najmul’s home is now a makeshift camp on top of a hill, a stone’s throw away from the border. What was once a lush hillside has been cleared for a settlement. The huts are constructed from plastic sheeting and locally-cut bamboo, demonstrating the refugees’ incredible ingenuity, but their resources will not last long. There are no latrines and a single water pump serves hundreds of people. Speaking to Najmul was excruciatingly painful. He said: “We had land, cattle and poultry but had to leave it all behind. Yesterday, I tried to cross back into Myanmar to retrieve some of my animals but I was forced back by the border guards. I am not comfortable here but I know I will not be safe if I return. In the end, if Allah wants me to die, I will die.” Caption: Soydul Amin clears the hillside with family members to build a shelter for his family and other refugees. The refugees I met in Bangladesh all showed incredible resilience, but they still need help. At a refugee camp called Tayum Kali, roughly 4km from the Myanmar border, I met Soydul Amin who had arrived in Bangladesh on 12 September with five family members. He had to flee overnight and, like the others I met, he too left everything behind. Soydul showed incredible determination by clearing part of a hillside then levelling it out with hand tools - aiming to, quite literally, build a new home for his recently uprooted family. He then set about building a shelter frame out of bamboo that he covered with plastic sheeting purchased from the local market. You can see that the refugees are self-sufficient and stoic, and that they are determined to help themselves. While this independent spirit is essential in the chaos of the first few days, it will be down to NGOs like Islamic Relief, for the most part, to provide them with improved shelter units, water, sanitation and food. Many of these settlements are on hilltops and in early December the temperature will drop dramatically. These makeshift shelters will be completely inadequate for the coming winter. Soydul, sounding resolute, told me: “My family and I will clear this land and make a shelter. We will support each other and others around us.” Caption: Muhammad Ridwan, from Poschim Kul, Bangladesh (100m from the Myanmar border), opened a small shop when refugees started arriving. In many refugee situations there can be tensions between the new arrivals and the local ‘host’ community. This is not always the case, however. It might seem insensitive, but the arrival of refugees can also provide opportunities for local businesses. Some will no doubt profit unfairly, but for many this allows them to provide refugees with their basic needs until NGOs can provide for them. This undoubtedly reduces some tensions. Muhammad Ridwan is a farmer who opened a small shop next to the refugee camp at Poschim Kul village when refugees started arriving. Ridwan said: “Last night a large number of refugees arrived and some of the villages are located very close to the border on the Myanmar side. I notice that very few women come out of the camp. They are afraid.” His remarks are perhaps a reflection of concerns over the safety of women at night and those venturing out alone. All refugees, of course, are vulnerable to a degree. The crisis in Myanmar has seen an unprecedented number of refugees being forced to flee, a number that we have not seen previously over this decade long conflict. We live in a world where we hear about a new crisis every month, and we are in danger of becoming desensitised to human suffering. It is vital that the stories behind this crisis are told so that we, the international community, can truly comprehend their plight and respond in their hour of need. Islamic Relief UK has launched an emergency appeal for Myanmar. Please donate now and help save lives. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Huffpost

A Rohingya refugee reacts as people scuffle while waiting to receive aid in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, Sept. 26, 2017. The United Nations will focus its attention this week on the Rohingya humanitarian crisis and what has been described as “ethnic cleansing” in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, although analysts say China is unlikely to support any actions that would put pressure on Yangon and its military. One key reason Beijing is unlikely to back tougher steps, the experts note, is because the crisis is happening in a state where China has huge business interests. The business interests not only account for billions of dollars in investment, but are part of the country’s ambitious global “Belt and Road” trade project. Almost right in the middle of Rakhine state’s coastline on the Bay of Bengal, a consortium led by China’s CITIC Group has proposed taking a 70 percent to 85 percent stake in a $7.3 billion deep sea port. The port at Kyauk Pyu is a key link in China’s “Belt and Road” initiative, and what some Chinese analysts call “blue economic passageways.” In addition to the sea port, China also plans to build an industrial park and a special economic zone there, where Chinese companies will be located. The project is a crucial link in a larger passageway connecting China’s southwestern provinces with the Indian Ocean, Africa and further to the Mediterranean Sea. The port is also where oil and gas pipelines begin and run through Myanmar to China’s southern Yunnan province. “The importance of your investments, to secure your investments and ensure that this region [Rakhine state of Myanmar] is peaceful so that your important pipelines can pass through. I would say that this takes more precedence against the humanitarian issue,” says Irene Chan, an associate research fellow with the China Programme at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. “Chinese foreign policy is very much driven by domestic needs.” A Chinese port terminal is seen in Made island outside Kyauk Pyu, Rakhine state, Myanmar, May 18, 2017. Chan adds that Beijing is trying to use neighboring countries like Myanmar to export its industrial overcapacity, and provide the necessary development impetus to its relatively backward western region. The latest outbreak of violence began in late August when a group of Rohingya militants attacked dozens of police posts and an army base. The group says the attack was launched to protect their ethnic minority from persecution. Fleeing Buddhist Rakhine residents arrive by ship from the unrest in Maungdaw region at the jetty, Aug. 29, 2017, in Sittwe, Rakhine State, western Myanmar. At least 400 people have been killed in the violence and subsequent clashes, while a military counteroffensive has pushed more than 400,000 Rohingya into Bangladesh. Some of the world’s major countries including China, Russia and India have refused to specifically condemn the ongoing violence against the Rohingyas. Beijing has offered small amounts of humanitarian aid to both Bangladesh and Myanmar, and Chinese officials have spoken about the need for a permanent solution to the crisis. Rohingya refugees queue for aid at Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, Sept. 26, 2017. When it comes to the crisis and the ongoing violence, however, China has put its support squarely behind the Myanmar government and military, and what it says are efforts to “protect its national security.” “It [China] clearly is supporting the government of Myanmar in addressing the issue of how it responded to the attack by the so-called [Arakan] Rohingya Salvation Army. China is telling the Myanmar, telling the U.N. that it understands and supports Myanmar’s attempts to preserve its sovereignty,” said Murray Hiebert, who serves as senior adviser and deputy director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Tuesday, the U.N. will hold a closed-door briefing on the crisis. On Thursday, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres will address the Security Council about the situation. So far, a U.N. Human Rights Council fact-finding mission, established earlier this year, has been barred from visiting Myanmar's Rakhine state. Houses are on fire in Gawdu Zara village, northern Rakhine state, Myanmar, Sept. 7, 2017. The United States has called for “strong and swift action” to end the violence, but already earlier this month there were reports that Myanmar was negotiating with Russia and China to protect Yangon from any Security Council actions. “China certainly would not accept resolution or something of this kind at the Security Council at this point, that’s for sure,” Hiebert said. “I don’t know if it could change its position depending on what the wording of the resolution would be, but China very much would stand behind the Myanmar government’s opposition to the U.N. taking any political action, taking any direct action.” Hiebert, does not think, though, that China needs to placate Yangon to forward its economic agenda in Myanmar. Kerry Brown, a professor of Chinese studies at London’s King College said, “[China] will need to produce a balancing act, where it will not antagonize an important regional partner and ally, nor through this action irritate the international community.” He says Beijing is likely to “assert to the Myanmar leadership the imperative that they maintain stability and do not create a crisis, but in such a way that it still will be regarded as non-interventionist and a relatively benign ally.” Analyst say the Western world is divided about whether it should put more pressure on Myanmar’s defacto leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Some believe that international disapproval of her role on the Rohingya crisis would offer Myanmar’s military an opportunity to push her out of the picture and assume full control. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 VOA

Human rights activists and Catholic groups are questioning why the State Department still appears reluctant to direct money Congress appropriated to assist Christians, Yazidis, and other persecuted religious minorities in Iraq but this week quickly dispatched $32 million to help a majority Muslim group fleeing violence in Burma. The State Department on Thursday announced it would provide a humanitarian aid package worth nearly $32 million to the Rohingya, a persecuted minority group in Burma, most of whom are Muslim. More than 400,000 Rohingya have fled Burma, a majority Buddhist nation, for Bangladesh over the past month to escape wide-scale violence that the United Nations' top human rights official has labeled ethnic cleansing. The aid package came the day after Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spoke with Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of Burma, and urged the Burmese government and military to "address deeply troubling allegations of human rights abuses and violations." Tillerson's quick efforts to help the Rohingya demonstrated the State Department's ability to quickly direct humanitarian aid to a threatened minority group. However, critics say the swift action stands in sharp contrast to State's foot-dragging when it comes to directing funds to Yazidis, Christians, and other religious minorities facing genocide in Iraq. Earlier this year, Congress allocated more than $1.4 billion in funds for refugee assistance and included specific language to ensure that part of the money would be used to assist Yazidis, Christians, and Shia Muslims—all groups the State Department deemed victims of genocide in 2016. Over the summer, Tillerson affirmed his belief that these religious minority groups in Iraq are the victims of Islamic-State genocide. Lawmakers who passed the bills providing the funds, as well as human rights activists and Catholic charities, were encouraged by Tillerson's affirmation of the genocide declaration, but they say his statements have done nothing to change the situation on the ground. The Yazidis and Christians are still not getting the necessary money to help them rebuild their lives and communities in the Northern Iraq's Ninevah province, where they have thrived for thousands of years. The Knights of Columbus, a global Catholic charity helping with the housing, feeding, and medical care of thousands of Yazidis and Christians, has stated that a much larger rebuilding plan is needed to save them from extinction in Iraq. Stephen Rasche, general counsel of the Archdiocese of Erbil, Iraq, applauded the State Department's assistance to the Rohingya community in Burma. However, he and other Catholic leaders remain "deeply concerned" that the U.S. government has still directed "little or no aid" to the Christian community in Iraq despite its clear declaration that ISIS committed genocide against Christians. President Trump promised to aid the victims of ISIS genocide, and Congress has placed a statutory obligation on the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development to do so before the current fiscal year runs out in a few days, Rasche said. "We urge these government agencies to make good on President Trump's promise and to immediately assist the Christian, Yazidi, and other religious minority victims of genocide in Iraq," he said. ISIS murders and kidnappings, as well as efforts to flee this persecution, have radically reduced the Yazidi and Christian population in Iraq. Christians, which numbered between 800,000 to 1.4 million in 2002, number fewer than 250,000 now. Without action, these lawmakers and activists warn, Christians could soon disappear completely from Iraq. The Yazidi population also has plummeted, although estimates of how far the population has fallen vary wildly, ranging from the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands since ISIS launched its attack in the Sinjar region of Iraq in 2014. Despite the congressional commitment, lawmakers and human rights activists say most of the U.S. taxpayer money going to help people in Iraq is channeled through the United Nations, which has a "religion-blind" policy of distributing most of the money to refugee camps that Yazidis and Christians avoid out of fear of further violence and persecution. "It is always good when people who are in danger are helped. But why is there a terrible disparity between our government's treatment of the Rohingya Muslims in Burma and the absolute lack of help for Yazidis and Christians in Iraq, whom Secretary Tillerson declared last month to be victims of genocide?" asked Nina Shea, an international human rights lawyer who directs the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom. "In Iraq, we should be helping people who are victims of genocide, but our government is not," she said. "We should be caring for religious minorities. But our government is not. We should be concerned about religious freedom. But our government is not." Shea, who spent 12 years as a commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, said the dearth of U.S. taxpayer resources getting to these communities is incredibly frustrating, considering the direct national security interests of rebuilding those communities. Displaced Christians specifically could help play a stabilizing role in the Ninevah Plain area of Iraq if they have enough infrastructure and support to rebuild their homes and communities, she said. If they had the resources, they also could combat Iran's colonization of northern Iraq, where pro-Iranian militias are illegally buying up Christian-owned property in the area to try to broaden their influence, she said. "Right now, Iran is using the Ninevah province as a land bridge to Syria and the Mediterranean and that is a threat to our interests and Israel's interests," she said. The State Department's inaction continues despite Trump's promise to do everything in his power to defend and protect "historic Christian communities of the Middle East." Trump made the pledge after meeting with Pope Francis and again in the wake of the ISIS attack on Coptic Christians in Egypt in late May. A State Department official did not respond directly to questions about why the money is not getting to Yazidis and Christians despite the genocide declaration. Instead, the officials stressed that the U.S. government is the largest single donor to the Iraq and Syria humanitarian crises, having contributed $1.7 billion since fiscal year 2014. "The United States closely monitors the needs of all vulnerable, displaced and conflict-affected populations, including members of religious and ethnic minorities and has taken extraordinary measures to aid imperiled civilians," the official said in a statement to the Washington Free Beacon. "Freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief is fundamental to the United States and who we are. The United States remains committed to ensuring the protection of religious freedoms for all," the official added. Congressional aides dispute any suggestion that the United States is committed to ensuring that Yazidis and Christians communities remain in Iraq. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill and human rights activists are tracking the list of U.N. development projects in Iraq closely and said there are only very minor projects in Christian towns and communities. Shea said she is aware of one that would repair a canopy on a municipal building but that she believes there are no major infrastructure or road projects that would help Christian communities return and provide interim jobs for those returning. The Iranians, in contrast, just opened a new elementary school, mosque, and library in the Ninevah region, Shea said. The continued push to get the funds to Yazidis and Christians on the ground comes the same week that the U.N. Security Council created an investigative team aiming to hold ISIS accountable for war crimes and genocide in Iraq. U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley called the resolution creating the team a "landmark" development. "It is a major step towards addressing the death, suffering, and injury of the victims of crimes committed by ISIS in Iraq—crimes that include genocide. These victims have been Yazidis, Christians, Shia and Sunni Muslims, and many, many more." Shea and other activists consider the resolution a good first step but argue it is critically important that Yazidi and Christian leaders are appointed to help lead the investigative team aiming to hold ISIS accountable for war crimes and genocide in Iraq. According to a Security Council resolution calling on the U.N. secretary-general to create the investigative team, its mission would be to collect, preserve and store evidence of ISIS war crimes and genocide. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Washington Free Beacon

A Rohingya refugee cries as he holds his 40-day-old son, who died as a boat capsized in the shore of Shah Porir Dwip while crossing the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, in Teknaf, on September 14, 2017. Photo: Reuters Finally, the barbaric regime of Myanmar has been put on the dock and found guilty of the crime of all crimes: genocide. The verdict was delivered on the last day of the final session of the Permanent People's Tribunal (PPT) on alleged state crimes against the Rohingya, Kachins and other ethnic minority groups on September 22 in Kuala Lumpur after three days of deliberations. In the opening session held in London in March this year, following preliminary hearings on the complaints of Kachins, Rohingyas and other Muslim populations in Myanmar, the court convened this final hearing. The tribunal, comprised of eminent jurists, genocide scholars and those involved in past genocide trials, heard testimonies of a number of survivors, members of victims' families, witnesses and expert witnesses. Oral testimonies, documents and records, including those of the Burmese government and the military (retrieved from archival sources of different countries), and visual materials (photographs and video footages) were presented before the tribunal. Although symbolic, the verdict has major significance. For the first time, a conclusion has been drawn by competent authorities following thorough examination of facts and rigorous legal scrutiny: “The State of Myanmar is guilty of the crime of genocide against the Rohingya group.” It went on to observe that “genocide against the Rohingya is now taking place with ongoing acts of genocide and the possibility the casualties of that genocide could be even higher in the future if nothing is done to stop it.” This essay argues that despite overwhelming evidence there has been a palpable reticence of the international community to call it genocide. The international community refused to acknowledge that the Burmese state's intent and actions were systematically directed to dismantle the structures of protection that the Rohingyas enjoyed until the martial law regime of General Ne Win in 1962. Jettisoning the country's pluralist and secularist practices from the get-go, the military government was hell-bent on ridding the country of the Rohingya population. 1978 witnessed the brutal execution of that intent when about 280,000 were driven out of Arakan with the launch of Operation Naga Min, or Operation King Dragon. The 1978 exodus was not the outcome of any communal strife between the Buddhist Rakhines and the Rohingya Muslims in Arakan. It was the result of a deliberate policy of banishing an ethnic minority from their ancestral habitat by the Burmese state. Within months of their arrival in Bangladesh, Myanmar (then Burma) had to concede to Bangladesh's demand of taking back the Rohingyas who by law were still its citizens. By the subsequent enactment of the 1982 Citizenship Law, Rohingyas were stripped of their rightful status. In pursuit of its genocidal agenda the Burmese state crafted a comprehensive policy to destroy the Rohingya identity by systematically denying the community members to live in dignity and pursue their faith and cultural traditions. Since then a plethora of laws, regulations and administrative orders have been passed and institutions such as the infamous security force Nasaka were created—subjecting the Rohingyas to what a witness during the Kuala Lumpur trial termed as “sub-human”. Despite the absence of any looming threat, the northern Arakan region was gradually turned into a militarised zone. Its Muslim residents have been subjected to degrading treatment, discrimination, torture, forced labour, forced relocation, and arbitrary taxes, and denied opportunities to practise their faith and culture and access justice. As a logical follow-up to such “systematic weakening” another state-sponsored mass flight was orchestrated in 1992 resulting in 250,000 Rohingyas seeking refuge in neighbouring Bangladesh. The international community still chose to look the other way, remaining resolute in its denial mode. Shrewd Burmese generals by then framed the project of depopulating Arakan of Rohingyas—not by brute force (that would draw international media attention and condemnation) but by creating conditions in which sustaining life became impossible. This resulted in slow and incremental outward movement of Rohingyas in small groups since 1992. Their number cumulatively stood at 300,000 in Bangladesh until the unfolding of events following August 25, 2017. In the interim, spikes in violence in Arakan shored up the number of incoming refugees. Little effort was given to find out what prompted the cross-border movement of the Rohingyas. Compassion fatigue for the residual caseload of 23,000 registered refugees living in camps (the number by now swelled to 31,000) evoked little interest of the outside world towards the “most persecuted minority of the world”. The Rohingyas' claim to secure international protection was perhaps further constrained by the fact that unlike Iraq and Libya, Arakan remains void of black gold. In the headquarters of international agencies in New York and Geneva and national capitals of concerned countries, it was perhaps a conscious choice to not confront the bitter truth of enduring genocide since it would necessitate urgent international action. Despite the ongoing genocide, Rohingyas were left to face the vicious state forces quite like their poor cousins in Burundi and Rwanda. By foot-dragging over the issue of recognising the Burmese government's acts as genocide, powerful states and international actors—who champion rule of law, democracy and freedom, and human rights—allowed the murderous Burmese army to act with impunity in implementing its long-drawn-out genocidal agenda on the Rohingyas. The international community's denial also contributed to the Burmese military's decision for the “final solution” of the Rohingya question that the world is now faced with. There appears to be a striking similarity between Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement of Nazi Germany and that of these entities' strategy of placating the Burmese military. The heart-wrenching testimonies and video footages presented before the tribunal convinced the judges in no uncertain terms what Raphael Lemkin, the Polish lawyer who coined the term “genocide”, meant: “Destruction of a nation or an ethnic group.” The tribunal concurred with Lemkin that in the Rohingya case, the national identity of the oppressed group was destroyed and national identity of the oppressor was imposed. The Rohingya case also sufficiently meets renowned genocide scholar and Genocide Watch's President Gregory Stanton's ten conditions of genocide: classification, symbolisation, discrimination, dehumanisation, organisation, polarisation, preparation, persecution, extermination and denial. Stanton reminds us that these stages are predictable but not inexorable, and the process is not linear. Most importantly, “at each stage, preventive measures can stop it.” In their rush to embrace the once-pariah state of Myanmar, the powerful countries expediently sacrificed the Rohingyas at the altar of strategic and commercial interests, and international organisations hid behind the façade of intricacies of legal interpretations. Their usage of the term “ethnic cleansing”, a term that has no place in international law, is a scheme to not state the fact. As Daniel Feierstein, the chair judge of the PPT, poignantly reminded the court, “It's a concept created by the perpetrator Slobodan Miloseviç.” It's a shame that the world is resorting to the perpetrator's language to justify its inaction. Days ago, the UN Secretary-General, in response to a question about whether he agreed with UN Human Rights Chief Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein that what's happening in Rakhine State is ethnic cleansing, retorted back to the journalist saying, “When one-third of the Rohingya population had to flee the country, can you find a better word to describe it?” Yes, Mr Secretary-General, it's the G word. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Daily Star

When Bangladesh’s prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, spoke at the United Nations General Assembly this week, she focused on the humanitarian challenges of hosting 400,000 Rohingya Muslims from northern Rakhine State in Burma. They have arrived destitute, victims of a state-led campaign of ethnic cleansing that began after Rohingya militants attacked some 30 police outposts on August 25. Rohingya refugees carry their child as they walk through water after crossing the border by boat through the Naf River in Teknaf, Bangladesh, September 7, 2017. © 2017 Mohammad Ponir Hossain/Reuters The situation of the Rohingya refugees is dire: they live in squalid conditions, crammed into a staggering sprawl of rudimentary shelters of sticks and tarps. Many lack food, medical services, and toilets. The rainy season makes everything worse. The Bangladesh government is seeking answers on dealing with the influx. In her speech, Sheikh Hasina offered to create “safe zones” inside Burma where Rohingya refugees could return. Few details of this proposal have emerged, other than that the UN would supervise these areas. It’s not clear whether those governments intending to assist the refugees would support this, but first a word of caution. “Safe zones” rarely if ever live up to their name, even with UN peacekeepers on patrol. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the safe area of Srebrenica, protected by UN peacekeepers, was overrun by Bosnian Serb forces who promptly executed some 7,000 men and boys, and raped women and girls. In Sri Lanka, government-declared safe zones became kill zones: the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam refused to let civilians leave and the military shelled the areas, killing countless civilians. And even if such zones aren’t attacked, without effective humanitarian aid supplies and freedom of movement for those inside, conditions within “safe zones” could be as bad, if not worse, than in refugee camps across the border. Human Rights Watch has previously laid out its numerous concerns for governments and organizations when considering creating “safe zones.” Given the Burmese military’s brutal and unrelenting campaign against the Rohingya, no one should be under any illusion that it will allow a “safe zone” to actually be safe. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 human Rights Watch

A Rohingya woman travels to a hospital near Kutupalong, Bangladesh, after a landmine blew off her right leg while she was crossing the border from Burma, September 4, 2017. © 2017 Bernat Armangue/AP Photo (New York) – Burmese security forces have laid landmines during attacks on villages and along the Bangladesh border, posing a grave risk to Rohingya Muslims fleeing atrocities, Human Rights Watch said today. The Burmese government should immediately stop using antipersonnel landmines and join the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. “The dangers faced by thousands of Rohingya fleeing atrocities in Burma are deadly enough without adding landmines to the mix,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director. “The Burmese military needs to stop using these banned weapons, which kill and maim without distinction.” According to witness accounts, independent reporting, and photo and video recordings, Burmese soldiers have in recent weeks laid antipersonnel landmines at key crossing points on Burma’s border with Bangladesh. Witnesses told Human Rights Watch that Burmese military personnel also planted mines on roads inside northern Rakhine State prior to their attacks on predominantly Rohingya villages. The Burmese government has accused the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) of using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) against infrastructure and security forces. Two Rohingya refugees from inner areas of Rakhine State, one from Buthidaung and another from Rathedaung township, told Human Rights Watch they saw the Burmese military laying antipersonnel mines on roads as the military entered and attacked villagers. “Mohammad,” 39, said he saw a neighbor’s son step on one of the mines laid by the military. The mine blew his right leg off. On September 4, 2017, a landmine detonated on a path used by many refugees near the hamlets of Taung Pyo Let Yar, about 200 meters from the Bangladesh border. Human Rights Watch witnessed smoke arising from the hamlets, suggesting burning by the military that caused villagers to flee. The next day, three Rohingya men were wounded in three separate landmine explosions near the same border point. Two Rohingya refugees told Human Rights Watch that men in apparent Burmese military uniforms were seen in the northern part of Taung Pyo Let Yar performing some activity on the ground prior to the September 4 explosions. One described watching a Burmese military patrol on the road near the border on the morning of September 4. From a vantage point in so-called no-man’s land, he observed several soldiers from the patrol stop at least twice, kneel down on the ground, dig into the ground with a knife, and place a dark item into the earth. Since late August, Burmese security forces, following a coordinated attack by ARSA militants, have carried out a campaign of ethnic cleansing involving mass arson, killing, and other abuses against the Rohingya population, causing the flight of more than 420,000 people to neighboring Bangladesh. Human Rights Watch has called on members of the United Nations Security Council to hold a public meeting and adopt a resolution that condemns the Burmese military’s ethnic cleansing campaign and threatens to impose further measures, including targeted sanctions on military leaders and an arms embargo. In April 2017, news media reported that the Burmese and Bangladeshi governments agreed to remove landmines and IEDs from the border area. On September 6, the Bangladesh government protested the recent use of landmines on the border by Burmese security forces. In her September 21 address to the UN General Assembly in New York, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina accused Burma of laying landmines along the border to prevent Rohingya from fleeing the violence. According to Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) officials, at least five people have been killed and 12 injured from landmine blasts. The Landmine Monitor reported that Burmese security forces have consistently used antipersonnel mines in numerous locations along the Bangladesh-Burma border since 1999, but this use had been abating in recent years. In September 2016, Deputy Minister of Defense Maj. Gen. Myint Nwe informed parliament that the army continues to use landmines in fighting with ethnic minority armed groups. The use of antipersonnel landmines is banned by the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. Bangladesh is a party to the treaty and destroyed its landmine stocks in accordance with its treaty obligations. Although Burma is not a party to the treaty, these weapons are unlawful because they cannot discriminate between civilians and combatants, and will kill and maim civilians long after they are placed. The Burmese government has not substantively responded to the allegations, but Zaw Htay, spokesman for de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi, suggested that Rohingya militants might be responsible. Rakhine State Security and Border Affairs Minister Col. Phone Tint denied allegations that government forces were laying landmines, and blamed ARSA: “There’s no landmine planted by the military in the area. The terrorists planted the landmines. The military will never do that.” In a February 2011 statement on the landmine ban, Aung San Suu Kyi told the International Campaign to Ban Landmines: I believe everyone is aware that landmines should not be used in Myanmar, considering the serious effects that they have not only on troops in combat, but also on non-combatant civilians who are tending to their daily survival and livelihood – mothers, fathers, and their children. In order to prevent this the Tat Ma Daw [Burmese armed forces], as well as soldiers in combat – meaning all parties engaged in armed conflict – must make their decision to cease the way of mines. “Placing landmines in the path of fleeing refugees and on roads where families are likely to travel is heartless beyond words,” Ganguly said. “The Burmese government should immediately end its ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya population, including by immediately clearing landmines in northern Rakhine State.” Human Rights Watch is a co-founder and chair of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, which received the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize for its efforts to bring about the Mine Ban Treaty and its contributions to a new international diplomacy based on humanitarian imperatives. Recent Cases of Landmine Use in Rakhine State Sabikam Nahor, approximately 45, lost both of her legs below the knees after stepping on an antipersonnel landmine laid inside Burma near the Bangladesh border. She told Human Rights Watch that the incident occurred on the afternoon of September 4, 2017, after the Burmese military attacked her village, in the northern part of Taung Pyo Let Yar. Nahor said that she was in an outdoor latrine when she heard the shooting and ran toward the Bangladesh border nearby. She said that she had used the same path on many occasions before when she would go to markets across the border. Nahor said she was running when there was a sudden explosion as she stepped on the ground. She fell and, from the ground, saw one of her legs detached from her body. Several Rohingya picked her up and took her across the border, and from there she was transported to a hospital. Subir Ahmed, 55, said that on August 28, his son, Azizul Huq, 15, stepped on a landmine and was killed within 60 meters of the Bangladesh border. Subir said that his son and his brother were separated from the family on August 25, after at least 30 Burmese soldiers arrived in their home of Taung Pyo Let Yar and opened fire on villagers who had just finished morning prayers. While waiting for his son at the border at Thiang Khali in Bangladesh, Subir heard a loud blast and then saw Azizul Huq lying on the ground near his brother. Subir rushed to where his son was lying on the ground and picked him up, leaving the remains of the boy’s shattered legs behind. Subir Ahmed noted that at least once a year, he had traveled on the same path to transport fish to markets in Bangladesh. Mohammad said that the son of his neighbor, Noor Islam, was a victim of antipersonnel mines on August 29 at about midday in Buthidaung township. He said they were not aware that mines were in the area. “I saw his right leg was gone,” Mohammad said. “I saw the mines explode with my own eyes on the road.” Mohammad said he had traveled on the same road the day before the fighting broke out, and that at that time it was safe. Military Placing of Landmines The refugee who witnessed soldiers digging in the northern part of Taung Pyo Let Yar which borders Bangladesh said that he continued to monitor the activities of the military patrol, and went to several sites where he observed similar activities. He said that from September 4 to 10 he removed several antipersonnel mines from the ground, and used rocks to detonate another three mines. Senior Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) officers said that they observed similar activities by Burmese soldiers over several days before September 4. They alleged that Burmese officials acted contrary to border agreements and protocols by failing to notify their Bangladeshi counterparts in advance of entering the border area. Refugees also described seeing landmines on other paths in no-man’s land. Human Rights Watch obtained images of emplaced PMN-1 type antipersonnel blast mines along the fence on the Burma side of the border. From the images alone, Human Rights Watch was not able to determine the origins of these PMN-1 type mines, particularly whether they were copies of the Soviet design produced by China (Type 58) or by Burma (MM-2). In addition to mine-laying on the border, Human Rights Watch received credible accounts from two Rohingya who described the use of antipersonnel landmines on roads in Buthidaung township after August 25, just before the military started attacking villages, hindering flight from the villages. “Rohim,” 52, described soldiers arriving by foot and in trucks to Chut Pyin, Rathedaung, in the early morning of August 25. He said that the soldiers were working in teams and placed landmines on the road outside his large, mud-walled house. “When they are coming, some are in four-man teams, some in 10-man teams, and some were sitting, digging, and putting mines in the roads,” said Rohim. He said they only laid mines in the roads, which prevented villagers from using the roads as they fled heavy gunfire and other attacks by the military. Mohammad said that in addition to attacking his village with gunfire and other explosive weapons on the night of August 26, the military emplaced antipersonnel mines on the road in Taung Bazar, Buthidaung. He said that mines were placed near the hospital. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Human Rights Watch

A woman from Laung Don village fled her house when Myanmar soldiers came into the village, leaving behind her sister who had just given birth and her newborn baby. Later, upon her return to the village, she found their bodies, said Razia Sultana, a human rights activist and Chittagong-based lawyer who visited the Kutupalong Refugee Camp on December 21-24 last year and interviewed the woman along with 20 other female refugees. The women told her that altogether 16 of their children had been killed, injured or declared missing. Razia revealed the details in her evidence presentation on the second day of the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal held at the Law Faculty of Universiti Malaya today. "Two of their babies were burned alive, one had his throat cut while another was thrown to the ground and is now brain damaged,” she added. The women also reported seeing at least 70 women and girls being raped, taken away to be raped or were found after being raped. "They told me that most rapes took place when the women were forcibly gathered outside their villages during security operations. In Yae Khat Chaung Gwa Son village, groups of soldiers pulled young women away to be raped. Some were just 10 or 12 year olds,” she said. In her presentation, she said the women could see the girls being raped by over 30 soldiers and men in civilian shorts. "They were gang raped. Each girl was raped by five to six men in turn. They cut off their clothes and held a knife to their mouths so they would not shout," Razia said, recalling her interview. The women were then forced to deny these violations by the Myanmar police and soldiers in front of the camera. "They were rounded up in a field at a police station and guns were pointed at them. They were asked, “Who burned your houses? Was it RSO (Rohingya Solidarity Organisation)? Did RSO kill your parents and children?” Afraid they would be shot if they said no, the women had to say it was the RSO who burned their homes and committed the killing,” she said. According to Razia, in January, an interim report of the National Investigation Committee into the Maungdaw Attacks, led by the vice president and former army general, Myint Swe, found “insufficient evidence” of rape allegations. "In February, the United Nations in its Special Rapporteur after a visit to the Bangladesh border found “allegation after allegation of horrific events” having taken place in the Rakhine state. "However on March 10, the National League for Democracy-led government spokesperson in response said that the United Nations' claims of crimes against humanity in Rakhine are exaggerated,” she added. In her presentation, Razia also called on the international community to use every means, including diplomatic and economic sanctions, to pressure the Myanmar government. “We have to make sure to hold their security forces accountable for the recent atrocities in Maungdaw. We must also end the systematic persecution of the Rohingya,” she said. The tribunal, taking place today until Friday, is held to hear crimes against humanity that were carried out by the government forces in Myanmar on the Rohingya and other minority ethnic groups. The judges at the tribunal are Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, Shadi Sadr, Gill H. Boehringer, Daniel Feierstein, Helen Jarvis, Nello Rossi and Zulaiha Ismail. The findings from the tribunal will be delivered to international bodies, especially the United Nations, for further action to be taken against Myanmar and with the aim of ending the violence at the same time. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Maung Zarni

Session on State Crimes Allegedly Committed in Myanmar against the Rohingyas,Kachins and Other GroupsUniversity of Malaya, Faculty of Law18-22 September 2017, Kuala Lumpur, MalaysiaJUDGMENT I. GENERAL HISTORICAL AND JURIDICAL FRAMEWORK I.1 The competence of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) is an international opinion tribunal, independent from any state authority. It examines cases regarding violations of human rights and the rights of peoples. Promoted by the Lelio Basso International Foundation for the Rights and Liberation of Peoples, the PPT was founded in June 1979, in Bologna, Italy, by a broad spectrum of legal experts, writers and other cultural community leaders from 31 countries. The PPT is rooted in the historical experience of the Russell Tribunal on Vietnam (1966-67) and on dictatorships in Latin America (1974-1976). The importance and strength of decisions by the PPT rest on the moral weight of the causes and arguments to which they give credibility, as well as the integrity and capability to judge of the Tribunal members. While fully recognising the reference role of the institutions of the international community of states and the juridical instruments, the PPT assumed as its Statute the Universal Declaration of Peoples’ Rights (Algiers, 1976), which underlines its aim: to give visibility and legitimacy to the authority of peoples when states and the international bodies fail to protect their rights, due to geopolitical reasons or other motivations. Complaints heard by the Tribunal are submitted by the victims, or by groups or individuals representing them. The PPT calls together all parties concerned and offers the defendants the possibility to make their own arguments heard. The panel of the judges is selected for each case, combining members who belong to a permanent list and individuals who are recognised for their competence and integrity. From June 1979 to the present, the PPT has held 43 sessions whose results and judgments are available at: www.permanentpeoplestribunal.org. The permanent and increasing challenge of the original working hypothesis has been confirmed by the spectrum of cases which have requested the competence of the PPT as the instrument which could make visible and qualify the violations of their fundamental rights to self-determination and to life, in the absence of, or denial in, responses at the institutional, juridical and political level. In this sense, the verdicts and deliberations of the PPT represent a narrative of international law as seen from the side of peoples, when their status of victims is translated into that of the only legitimate subjects to whom the public and private powers are accountable, beyond their legal impunity. For the purpose of this case on the violations of the rights of peoples of Myanmar, it is useful to refer specifically to the doctrine developed by the PPT in the deliberations where state crimes have been committed against individuals and groups of the same countries, transformed from citizens into enemies, and/or “other” and, as such, exposed in full impunity to processes of discrimination leading to a genocide, recognised only too late, or even never: Argentina and its desaparecidos, 1980; East Timor, lead case of the first neo-colonial genocide, 1981; Guatemala and its indigenous populations, 1983; the determinants and the responsibility for the Armenian genocide, 1984; the peoples of the ex- Yugoslavia, 1995; victims of Islamic fundamentalism of Algeria, 2004; the communities of Colombia, 2006-08. An even more specific reference must be made to the two sessions on the case of Eelam Tamils (Dublin, 2019; Bremen, 2013) which could be considered, from a methodological and doctrinal point of view, an integral part and foundation for this deliberation. I.2 The general context After World War II, Burma, later to be known as Myanmar, formerly governed as part of British India, was recognised as a nation state and granted independence in 1948 by the United Kingdom. Within its borders were a large number of ethnic and religious minorities dominated by the majority Bamar, or Burmese, mainly Buddhists, who had been the primary beneficiaries of colonial rule. From 1962, when a military coup brought a repressive regime to power, the minorities began to suffer increasing discrimination and loss of human rights, including citizenship in varying degrees. While the undemocratic nature and loss of human rights under the military junta was obvious to the international community, little action was taken to bring about a change. Much moral support was given to the oppositionists, in particular Aung San Suu Kyi, who was a political prisoner for nearly two decades. The current situation of mass flight from the country by the Rohingya and increased human rights abuse against them and other non-Burman Buddhist minorities is not a new phenomenon. There have been similar significant, if smaller, episodes of mass flights in previous years, notably in 1978, 1992 and 2012. Nevertheless, the international community did little to avert a catastrophe although the signs were clearly there. It appears that placing an array of sanctions on the country, and supporting the National League for Democracy and its leader Aung San Suu Kyi, winner of a Nobel Peace Prize for her human rights struggle, was thought sufficient to bring about a significant change in Myanmar’s human rights record. Eventually it seemed a good result had been achieved as Aung San Suu Kyi was elected to Parliament in 2012, and made State Counsellor (effectively Prime Minister) in 2016, under the new 2008 constitution. But that constitution essentially ensured real power remained with the military. Despite the widely acclaimed “transition to democracy”, a visit by President Obama in 2012 and the lifting of sanctions, the human rights situation did not improve and was observed by many to be getting worse. In response, no effective action was taken by the United Nations (nor by other international institutions such as ASEAN), despite numerous warnings, e.g. from the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar (four reports from 2014-2016 and another in March 2017). To what extent the current anti-Muslim and anti-terrorism beliefs that have gained strength since 9/11 have ensured sympathy for the Myanmar government and forestalled a unity of commitment to act on behalf of the people of Myanmar is not clear. It may well be that such beliefs, along with falling support in the country due to economic failures, led the government to embark on an escalation of its repression and human rights abuses. In these circumstances, the PPT moved to inquire into the situation consistent with its view that genocide prevention is also a matter for the peoples of the world to be aware of and thence to demand action. That it is now known that a Report by a UN commissioned expert who said the situation in Myanmar demanded urgent action to prevent a catastrophe was ignored and even suppressed, makes clear that peoples’ organisations such as the PPT, independent from states and from INGOs, have an important role to play in bringing a judicial spotlight to bear, albeit without power of enforcement, standing alongside the victims and letting their voices be heard in the unfulfilled task of preventing such future human tragedies so that we can finally say with confidence: Never again. I.3 The specificity and the term of reference of this session The attention of the PPT for the situation of peoples of Myanmar dates back to 2013, at a time when Myanmar’s (already ongoing) violations were hardly considered, and even less well known on the world stage. This was the hidden face of a state seen as undergoing a transformation from military to democratic control, with a woman icon of peace at the helm portrayed as an indisputable guarantee for a future in which all the citizens of the country could be recognised as inviolable subjects of their rights to a life in dignity.A clear alarm was sounded of an impending genocide at a number of events leading up to this session,including a London conference at which the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Human Rights, Tomás Ojéa Quintana stated “There are elements of genocide in Rakhine with respect to Rohingya”9 . This was followed by the Opening Session of the PPT on Myanmar State Crimes against Rohingya, Kachin and Other Groups, convened in London (Queen Mary University, 6-7 March 2017)10. The reports, the Witness testimonies and in particular the closing remarks of that session, must be considered and referred to as an integral part of this Judgment. Nevertheless, the findings of the PPT, as well as of a number of other observers from various UN bodies, national and international NGOs and research teams11 did not manage to draw the concerted attention of the international community nor of wider public opinion, let alone any concrete preventive action. The preparatory phase for this session was transformed into one of urgency due to the rapidly – even if not unexpectedly – evolving situation with the dramatic “clearance” incidents of October 2016 in Rakhine state, even more so because of the absolute invisibility to the world of what had already been characterised by the PPT and others as a drastic case requiring immediate attention. Only on the eve of this session, the suffering of the Rohingya peoples finally and belatedly seized world attention, as the increasingly perilous situation of the Rohingya burst into press coverage of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fleeing a large-scale military build-up followed by massive attacks launched by the Myanmar and police military forces as well as paramilitary and civilians, purported to be in response to a number of coordinated assaults on Myanmar border posts on 25 August 2017. As a result, within the three weeks leading up to this session, nearly half a million people crossed the border from western Myanmar into Bangladesh, telling harrowing stories of the carnage they left behind as they crammed into open fishing boats or trudged along muddy paths carrying babies and the elderly and bundles of meagre possessions, seeing plumes of smoke soar into the air as their homes and villages were burnt to the ground. Many of these refugees arrived in Bangladesh presenting serious injury from these burnings, from machete, knife and gunshot wounds, from rape and other sexual assault as well as from land mines apparently laid even during the immediate past along the paths to the border. Of particular concern London Conference on Decades of State-Sponsored Destruction of Myanmar’s Rohingya, London School of Economics, 28 April 2014. Opening Session of the PPT on Myanmar State Crimes against Rohingya, Kachin and Other Groups, convened in London (Queen Mary University, 6-7 March 2017). See https://tribunalonmyanmar.org/?s=london+session and, for the closing remarks of the panel of the judges:http://permanentpeoplestribunal.org/closing-remarks-of-the-panel-of-the-judges-opening-session-on- myanmars-state-crimes-against-rohingya-kachin-and-other-groups/. For the list of some of the most notable reports, as presented by the Prosecution to this full session, see Annex was the fact that more than half of these refugees were children12, many separated from their families, a large number of whom reported having seen their parents and siblings killed before their eyes. The consensus of many sources on the humanitarian crisis of the population of Rakhine state, both within their land and in their search for refuge, could not have been clearer, and it was openly and repeatedly underlined even by the UN Secretary-General António Guterres in his official letter to the UN Security Council on 13 September, despite the constant denial of the civil and military authorities of Myanmar. As clearly set out in the indictment, which synthesised the available overwhelming written, visual, factual and analytical documentation, together with requests from the three victim groups for the convening of a full PPT session, our task went beyond giving more visibility to what already known, to include the following, according to the terms of reference established in the London session: a) to broaden the focus from the most tragically and acutely affected population of the Rohingyas to the general policy of the Myanmar state on Kachins and other ethnic, national and religious groups; b) to document and qualify the historical and structural roots and causes of the events, to avoid considering them as occasional incidents and strictly internal affairs of a still young and “fragile democracy”, with no political, strategic, economic interactions with and impact on regional and global actors and interests; c) to qualify juridically the severity and the responsibility of the crimes not only in view of the most pertinent criminal qualification, but to stress and justify with the greatest emphasis the absolute priority for concrete responses to the urgency of the needs of the affected population. This dramatic exodus of Rohingya widened the matters to be considered by the Tribunal to include the enormous challenge to Bangladesh in receiving these refugees, in addition to the estimated 300,000 Rohingya refugees still in Bangladesh as a result of the previous waves of violence. While the Bangladesh government initially hesitated to open the border, and reportedly even forcibly returned some people to Myanmar, this policy changed in the face of the undeniable humanitarian crisis and need to assist hundreds of thousands of desperate people, as expressed by the Bangladesh Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, when she visited Kutupalong camp on 12 September. 12 Children were estimated by the International Organization on Migration (IOM) to comprise 58% of the 507,000 newly arrived re fugees, “Situation Report: Rohingya Crisis”, Cox’s Bazar: Inter Sector Coordination Group, 1 Oct 2017. The affected people are not merely victims waiting for humanitarian responses – certainly essential, though delayed and partial. They are, and must be considered first and foremost, the central subjects of rights, whose recognition and restitution should be the first, structural implication of a judgment based on the inviolable legitimacy of individual and peoples’ rights. It is hoped that the participation of the victims themselves in this Tribunal is in a small way restitutive such that they could reconstruct their lives once again. II. THE PROCEDURE FOR THIS SESSION OF THE PPT II.1 The Panel of Judges The Panel of Judges was composed of: Daniel Feierstein (Argentina), who chaired the panel Zulaiha Ismail (Malaysia) Helen Jarvis (Cambodia-Australia) Gill H. Boehringer (Australia) Nursyahbani Katjasungkana (Indonesia) Shadi Sadr (Iran) Nello Rossi (Italy) Two of the judges appointed to the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal were not able to attend: Denis Halliday (Ireland), for severe and acute health reasons, and Bellur Narayanaswamy Srikrishna (India), because a visa was unable to be arranged in time. For the professional profiles of the components of the panel, see the Annex 1. Gianni Tognoni and Simona Fraudatario assured the consistency of the procedures, the overall coordination of the session and the material editing of this text. II.2 The Prosecution The Indictment was drawn up and presented to the Tribunal by the Prosecution led by Ms Doreen Chen, and consisting of a team of lawyers from the Centre for Human Rights and Advocacy (Centhra) led by Mr Azril Mohd. Amin and including Dir Kheizwan Kamaruddin, Fahmi Abd. Moin, Luqman Mazlan, Dr Mohd Afandi Salleh, Rafna Farin Abdul B. Ra’far and Dato Rosal Azimin Ahmad, as well as Dr Thomas McManus from the School of Law, Queen Mary University, London (Annexe 2). III.3 The right to defence In strict compliance with its Statutes, all the steps and official documents related to the case of this session – from the results of the London Opening Session, to the first formal convocation of the Kuala Lumpur Session to the official program and the Indictment – were transmitted: a) to the representatives of the Myanmar civil and military authorities; b) to directly relevant international agencies and governing bodies as shown below. Myanmar authorities notified and invited to present a defence: • Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, Commander in Chief, the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Armed Forces), Naypyidaw • Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Myanmar State Counsellor • Vice President Myint Swe, Chair of the Myanmar Presidential Investigation Commission on Rakhine, Former Lt-General and former Chief of Military Intelligence • General Myat Tun Oo, Chief of Military Affairs and Security Office of the Commander in Chief • Win Mra, Chair of the Myanmar Human Rights Commission UN, EU and other authorities invited to participate: • António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations • Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights • Professor Yanghee Lee, Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Situation in Myanmar • Ahmed Shaheed, Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief • Fernand de Varennes, Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues • Adama Dieng, Special Adviser of the Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide • Federica Mogherini, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy /Vice-President of the European Commission • Kofi Annan, Chair, Rakhine Commission • Kazi Reazul Hoque, Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of Bangladesh. While no answer was received from the Myanmar representatives, a formal acknowledgment of the invitation was given by a number of the above representatives of international agencies, with a request to be kept informed of the results of the session, and Mr Kazi Reazul Hoque directly addressed the Tribunal regarding the impact of the impact of Rohingya refugees on Bangladesh. The right to defence, which is central in the Statutes of the Tribunal and has been a carefully observed practice throughout all its proceedings, was communicated to the concerned parties in this case also, in due time. As no answer was received, at the beginning of each of the three days of public audience, the Chairperson of the Panel of Judges asked if any representative of the Myanmar Government was present in the room, and no response was received. According to the Statutes, due to the absence of any response from the authorities, the PPT procedure of an ex officio defence was activated, and the resulting text was read publicly by the representative of the Secretariat of the PPT. The full text of the speech given by the State Counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi, on 19 September 2017 in an address to the assembled diplomatic corps in Naypyidaw, which had already been listened to collectively by the Panel of Judges, and which was formally and partially replayed in front of the audience, was assumed to be the most complete and updated expression of the position of the Myanmar authorities. Because of its relevance, it is considered as an integral part of this deliberation (Annex 3) . II.4. The proceedings The public hearings of the PPT took place in the Faculty of Law, University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Videos of the hearings together with press coverage and some of the supporting testimony and evidence can be found on the web site www.tribunalonmyanmar.org .The program, together with essential information on the Prosecution and Experts who gave testimonies are provided in Annex 4 II.5 Security measures The Panel of Judges assured in camera hearings for those witnesses for whom it was determined desirable to provide a close protection of their identity. III. PRESENTATION OF THE FACTS III.1. Serious violations of human rights and allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity against the Kachin people “We are still birds in a cage”... in this way, the first Kachin witness before the Peoples’ Tribunal on Myanmar in Kuala Lumpur (Mr Jimmy Hpang) summarised the condition of his people after reading a long list of specific cases of torture and execution suffered since the 2011 breakdown of the 17-year- long ceasefire between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burmese Army. Background Since achieving independence from the UK on 4 January 1948, the state of Myanmar has been at almost ceaseless war with the approximately 40% of its 55 million people who make up the country’s 135 recognised ethnic groups as well as minority religions and other unrecognised ethnic groups. Kachin State, the most northerly state of the country in the foothills of the Himalayas bordering China and India, “is one of the six, later to become seven, ethnic nationality states that were created when Burma became independent in 1948.”13 The 1947 Constitution of the Union of Burma states: “territories that were heretofore known as the Myitkyina and Bhamo Districts shall form a constituent unit of the Union of Burma and be hereafter known as “the Kachin State.”14 In the 2014 census the state’s population was reported as being 1.689 million or 3.3% of the total. 15 The Kachin people in Myanmar, who consist of six major subgroups, refer to themselves collectively as Jinghpaw Wunpawng. They number between 1 and 1.5 million and are largely resident in Kachin State but also form a substantial part of the population of the northern section of Shan State. Kachin populations also exist across the borders from Kachin State in China and India. Under British colonial rule, many of these previously animist people became Christian, now predominantly Baptist.16 13 Mandy Sadan, “History and Ethnicity in Burma: Cultural Contexts of the Ethnic Category 'Kachin' in the Colonial and Post-Colonial State, 1824-2004”, PhD, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 2004, p. 18. 14Article 6 The Constitution of the Union of Burma, 24 September 1947 (http://burmalibrary.org/docs3/CONSTTTN.47) 15 2014 Myanmar population and housing census. [Yangon]: Ministry of Information, 2014. 16 ”Mandy Sadan, Testimony given at the London opening session of the Tribunal; see also her Being and Becoming Kachin: histories beyond the state in the borderlands of Burma. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. War and increasing marginalisation have been the dominant features of life for the Kachin people since at least the early 1960s. The KIA was established in 1961, and the 1962 military coup by General Ne Win ushered in more than three decades of war, during which many previously Kachin towns and villages were destroyed and thousands of people were killed. One disturbing feature of this armed conflict is the extent to which child soldiers have been used along with forcible recruitment: “Burma is believed to have more child soldiers than any other country in the world. The overwhelming majority of Burma’s child soldiers are found in Burma’s national army, the Tatmadaw Kyi, which forcibly recruits children as young as eleven. ... Children are also present in Burma’s myriad opposition groups, although in far smaller numbers. Some children join opposition groups to avenge past abuses by Burmese forces against members of their families or community, while others are forcibly conscripted. Many participate in armed conflict, sometimes with little or no training”.17 Under the national policy of Burmanisation and substantial inwards migration that took place during that period of warfare, the Kachin progressively lost many of their customs and traditions, including competence in the six Kachin languages which were, since colonial times at least, written in Roman rather than Burmese script. The ceasefire from 24 February 1994 until 9 June 2011 brought an end to intense fighting, but led paradoxically to an ever increasing militarisation of the region with the stationing of many Burmese/Myanmar central army battalions. The introduction of an oppressive developmental model involving massive alienation of traditional lands and natural resources (notably their precious jade), accompanied by increasing dispersal and marginalisation of the Kachin through significant urban immigration of lowland Burmese people, including replacing many Kachin animist or Christian sacred places with Buddhist shrines or pagodas, generated demoralisation and a debilitating drug scourge.18 This shift is reflected in the findings of the Myanmar 2014 census that 64% of the population in Kachin state reported as Buddhist, and just 34% Christian. 17 “My gun was as tall as me”: child soldiers in Burma. New York: Human Rights Watch, 2002, p.2. See also Kai Chen, Comparative study of child soldiering on Myanmar-China border: evolutions, challenges and countermeasures. Singapore : Springer, 2014; and A Dangerous Refuge: Ongoing child recruitment by the Kachin Independence Army, London : Child Soldiers International, 2015). 18 War and peace in the borderlands of Myanmar: the Kachin ceasefire 1995-2011, edited by Mandy Sadan. Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2016. On the economic transformation, see especially, Chapter 5, Kevin Woods, “The commercialisation of counterinsurgency: battlefield enemies, business bedfellows in Kachin State” and his article “Ceasefire capitalism: military–private partnerships, resource concessions and military–state building in the Burma–China borderlands”, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38:4, 2011, p.747-770. The KIA refused to transform into a Border Guard Force (BGF) under direct control of the central Myanmar army, as stipulated in the 2008 Constitution. The KIO rejected such a process, demanding a comprehensive political dialogue prior to any disarmament or demobilisation, and this was used as the grounds for large-scale military assaults by the Myanmar Army. Since fighting resumed, it is estimated that 10% of the population has been displaced, with at least 120,000 people now in IDP camps (at least two-thirds are under KIO control and have faced numerous restrictions and denials of humanitarian aid). Testimony and evidence Written and oral testimony was presented to the Opening Session of the Tribunal by the Kachin Women’s Organisation (KWO). This related a number of incidents, including the aerial bombardment followed by shelling of Laiza (the de facto capital of the KIO-controlled zone of Kachin State) on 14 January 2013, killing three civilians and injuring others, as well as an attack on the same day on Kahtan village far away from any conflict zone; the shooting of 9th grade school pupil Ja Seng Ing in 2012 and the subsequent arrest and detention of her father when he tried to pursue the case of her death; the shooting of civilians sheltering in a church and seizure and enforced disappearance of Deacon Lum Hkwang in 2011; air and artillery attacks on many villages and churches and on three IDP camps near Lai Hpawng in 2016; rape, murder, looting, and blocking of humanitarian assistance to IDP camps. The KWO’s written report described destruction of indigenous cultural and religious sites in addition to Christian churches: “In northern Kachin State, the Tatmadaw [Myanmar/Burmese military] has also shown a total disregard for Kachin cultural heritage in Putao. In 2014, at a popular site at Machyang Baw known as the ‘rock dragon’ and regarded as sacred in the folklore of spirit-worshipping Kachin, a local army commander commissioned construction work to attach a painted dragon head to the natural rock formation and built a pagoda at the top of the site against the wishes of local people. A similar incident took place the following year when a pagoda was constructed at National Jawng, an island in the Mali Hka River, famous in Kachin cultural heritage as the gathering place of ancestral spirits.”20 Protection Sector Kachin, “Humanitarian Access in Kachin State, Protection Sector (PWG – GBV SS – CP SS) Update Note,” November 2016. 20 War crimes and crimes against humanity: voices from the Kachin people of northern Burma. London: KWO, 2017, p. 7. The Kuala Lumpur session likewise received both written and oral testimony from further witnesses, including from the Kachin National Organisation (KNO) and the Kachin Women’s Association of Thailand (KWAT). Mr Jimmy Hpang and his colleague of the Kachin National Organisation (KNO) presented details and supporting photographs of 20 cases of alleged war crimes of “Shelling, Killing and Torturing and arbitrary arrest”, and ten cases of “Burning Houses, ransacking and blocking aids for IDPs”. Ms Nang Htoi Rawng from the Kachin Women’s Association of Thailand (KWAT) presented evidence on widespread sexual violence, including a detailed report on the rape and murder of two volunteer teachers in Kawng Kha village in northern Shan State on 20 January 2015 (see further below). 21 Original video footage, including a detailed analysis of a military attack by Myanmar Army battalions 74 and 276 on Nam Lim Pa village, Shwigu District, Kachin State, from 8 to 11 October 2011, and the attack on Laiza on 14 January 2013 mentioned above, screened and was introduced as supporting evidence to his Expert testimony by Mr Ryan Roco. In addition, a number of witnesses testified in camera of crimes that they had suffered personally and who had felt compelled to leave their homeland in fear for their lives, following forced labour serving as porters for the Myanmar Army, sexual violence, beatings, torture, execution or jailing and enforced disappearance of friends and relatives and/or military attack on their villages. The direct testimony presented to the Tribunal corroborated a wealth of information given in a number of substantial written reports by various human rights organisations and researchers that were also submitted to the Tribunal by the Prosecution regarding, inter alia, the following acts against the Kachin people: Arbitrary detention One Witness [name withheld] described the arbitrary arrest of her younger brother alleged to be a KIA spy. After the family was unable to raise the demanded payment of 300,000 kyat to secure his release, he was sent to trial and sentenced to 10 years’ detention. The Witness herself was then closely followed and pressed to become involved in collection of drug money on behalf of soldiers or face a similar allegation of KIA involvement. In fear of a fate similar to her brother she decided to flee Myanmar and is now resident in Malaysia. 21 Justice delayed, justice denied: seeking truth about sexual violence and war crime case in Burma, with a special focus on the Kawng Kha case, in Kachin Land. Legal Aid Network and KWAT, January 2016. The acts detailed in her testimony were echoed by others, and support documentation in a special dossier of 36 cases brought under the 1908 Unlawful Associations Act against people accused of contact with the Kachin Independence Army researched and compiled in 2012 by independent human rights defenders in Burma. Forced labour One Witness [name withheld] told the Tribunal that she had five times been pressed into serving as a porter for Myanmar military units. This experience was recounted by a number of other witnesses, including one who reported in camera that at 15 years of age on 10 November 2015 he was seized at night and taken from his family tent in their field. Together with two other young men, he was forced to carry a heavy basket of arms and ammunition, fed only scraps of food and forced to drink from a stream which soldiers upstream had used for bathing and as a toilet. He managed to escape during a fire fight and fled to Malaysia. At least eight men from Nam Lim Pa were unlawfully arrested, detained and forced to serve as porters for the Burma Army. Except for one who managed to escape, the fate and whereabouts of the remaining men are unknown. An additional 35 porters were alleged to have been called from neighbouring villages on 16 October 2011.23 Torture Even as the Tribunal’s KL hearings were taking place, military officers reportedly confessed at a court martial hearing on 19 September 2017 to torturing and murdering three Kachin civilians, who were collecting firewood near their Mai Hkwang displaced persons camp in Mansi township on 25 May, when they were detained by the 319th Light Infantry Battalion. Their mutilated bodies were found three days later. The Prosecution submitted to the Tribunal a report detailing the systematic use of torture and other cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment or punishment (“ill treatment”) of more than 60 civilians by Myanmar authorities from June 2011 to April 2014 by members of the Myanmar Army, Myanmar Police Force, and Military Intelligence. 2Cases under the Unlawful Associations Act 1908 brought against people accused of contact with Kachin Independence Army. Hong Kong, distributed by the Asian Human Rights Commission & Asian Legal Resource Centre, January 2013 (http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs14/AHRC-Unlawful_Assoc_Act-Kachin.pdf). Crimes in northern Burma: results from a fact -finding mission to Kachin State, [n.p.], Partners, November 2011, p.25-27. “Tatmadaw officials admit to killing Kachin villagers”, Burma News International, 20 September 2017. “I thought they would kill me”: ending wartime torture in Northern Myanmar. Bangkok: Fortify Rights, 2016. Enforced disappearance A number of witnesses described how their relatives or friends have not been see again after being arrested or taken by force to serve as porters by Myanmar military or other authorities. The well- known case of Su Ja Roi, taken in 2011, was also recounted.26 In December 2016 two ethnic Kachin Baptist leaders, who had guided journalists reporting on Burmese airstrikes that allegedly severely damaged a Catholic church, were apparently forcibly disappeared in Northern Shan State, and were last seen on 24 December being taken to a military base. Rape and other forms of sexual abuse Witness Ms Nang Htoi Rawng reported that KWAT had documented more than 600 cases of rape and sexual violence against Kachin women and girls, including in front of their family members, also gang rape and detention with repeated rape over a period of time. She reported that these incidents have not decreased since the formation of the new NLD-led government. Two sp ecific incidents were described in detail:  the rape and murder of Ms Maran Lu Ra (20 years) and Ms Nan Tsin (21 years), two volunteer teachers in Kawng Kha village in northern Shan State on 20 January 2015, alleged to have been committed by a soldier from Light Infantry Battalion 503, who had occupied a house within 200 metres of the crime scene inside a church compound. Despite considerable physical and circumstantial evidence, no person has been prosecuted28;  the rape of a 73 year-old bedridden widow, on 13 April 2015 by a soldier from Light Infantry Battalion 438 who was caught by neighbours. Despite the crime not being committed as part of his active duty, the case was taken to a military court for adjudication. The perpetrator was convicted and sentenced to seven years’ detention, but it is not known whether he was indeed gaoled or released as subsequent enquiries to Myanmar’s National Human Rights Commission have been ignored. Extra-judicial killing One particularly harrowing account given by Expert Mr Ryan Roco, and summarised in the Prosecution’s Closing Statement, described one incident in the aftermath of the Nam Lim Pa attack in Paul Vrieze, “Finding Roi Ja”, Frontier Myanmar, 2 December 2016 (https://frontiermyanmar.net/en/finding- roi-ja). “Burma: Kachin Christians Feared ‘Disappeared’https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/01/16/burma-kachin- christians-feared-disappeared Justice delayed, justice denied: seeking truth about sexual violence and war crime case in Burma, with a special focus on the Kawng Kha case, in Kachin Land. Legal Aid Network and KWAT, January 2016. which “a boy’s mother who, when she heard her son had been killed by mortar fire in the village, went to retrieve his body from a group of Burmese soldiers, and then brought the body home to clean it and prepare for burial. When she woke up the next morning, a group of 14 Burmese soldiers were in her house, and they pointed at her son’s body and told her, ‘This is because of KIA soldiers, not because of us. Instead of your husband dying, your boy died for him. Why don’t you agree to a peace agreement, why don’t you ask your leaders for peace?’ “Because of this, she had no choice but to carry her son’s body out of her house and could not return, as the Burmese soldiers remained in her house and freely helped themselves to her food. The soldiers also committed theft when they stole 800,000 kyat (approximately 590 USD) worth of gold jewellery and jade stones from her that fateful day.” Confiscation of property and destruction of buildings One Witness stated, “Every precious thing belongs to cronies and armies, not to us”, following his presentation of the following summary list of minimum figures for damage inflicted: 367 villages burned down or destroyed; also 254 schools, more than 70 local churches, 18 monasteries, 100 kindergartens, 42 primary schools, 15 elementary schools, 15 secondary schools, 29 high schools, 230 local clinics, 14,980 houses, 354 rice or vegetables barns, 120 rice mills, 1,289 pieces of farm machinery, 42 small generators, 107 solar panels, 17,109 power generators, 148 sewing machines, 19,241 telephones, 457 radios, 169 VCD/DVD players, 16 TV satellite dishes, 140 carts, 269 bicycles, 552 motor bikes and 33 cars. A detailed account of the losses inflicted in the military attack on Nam Lim Pa village on 8-11 October 2011 was submitted (together with photographic and video documentation), specifying “at least 297 households, a township office, a United Nations Development Program (UNDP) clinic and a Roman Catholic church were looted and vandalized by Burma Army battalions 74 and 276. At least one house was destroyed by fire. At least seven cows, one buffalo and one chicken were killed. At least two cows, two pigs, one buffalo and one elephant were injured. Total damage to civilian property is estimated by Nam Lim Pa residents to exceed 15,000,000 kyat (15,000 USD). The scope of the destruction of vacated civilian properties, primarily homes and home storefronts, suggests the damage was not inflicted for military purpose. Forced displacement The detailed account of the military attack on Nam Lim Pa village on 8-11 October 2011 reported the following: 29 Crimes in northern Burma: results from a fact -finding mission to Kachin State, [n.p.], Partners, November 2011, p. 35. “Victim interviews confirm there to be at least 49 people that were forcibly relocated from their homes by Burma Army battalions 74 and 276. At least 1,564 people, 767 male and 797 female, were displaced from their homes between 8 October 2011 and 11 October 2011. Although at least 49 civilians were directly ordered by soldiers to evacuate their properties, the majority of those displaced chose to flee from fear of persecution and general conflict. The sounds and sights of guns, bombs and general pandemonium were the most common reasons found as to why villagers fled. Eighty households that fled were found hiding in the surrounding jungle, living in crude shelters of bamboo, plastic and leaves.” Denial of humanitarian aid United Nations agencies reports that some 50% of the 120,000 Kachin IDPs are receiving very little humanitarian assistance due to restrictions, checkpoints and cumbersome travel authorisation procedures, often amounting to an effective denial of access, especially to Kachin-controlled areas in violation of humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality and impartiality endorsed in General Assembly resolution 46/182, which was adopted in 1991. In addition to loss of life, property and livelihood, war and displacement have other serious impacts on access to education, health services etc. by the Kachin people. While Kachin are considered one of the indigenous national races of Burma/Myanmar, and appear not to have been prevented from acquiring citizenship documents, loss of papers needed to prove identity and places of residence and inability to travel across conflict zones to secure such documentation have consequential impact on their lives. 32 Persecution on ethnic and religious grounds Witnesses testifying at both London and Kuala Lumpur sessions recounted being verbally insulted and abused. One Witness stated: “We are not considered as human beings; not even sub-humans”. A report submitted to the Tribunal described: “Torture sessions were also typically infused with elements of ethnic and religious discrimination. Survivors explained to Fortify Rights how soldiers, police officers, and Military Intelligence officers verbally denigrated the Kachin ethnicity and Christian religious identity during torture sessions. In several cases, these statements included Crimes in northern Burma: results from a fact -finding mission to Kachin State, [n.p.], Partners, November 2011, p.29 Protection Sector Kachin, “Humanitarian Access in Kachin State, Protection Sector (PWG – GBV SS – CP SS) Update Note,” November 2016. "Education takes a hit in Myanmar’s Kachin State," IRIN Humanitarian News and Analysis, 23 April 2013. threats that the authorities would destroy the Kachin ethnicity. A Kachin survivor described the threats he received from an army official during an interrogation session where torture was employed: “You [Kachin] are our soldiers’ leftover kids, the products of our military expeditions. We will eliminate all you Kachin.” Another survivor was told, “We will kill you, and we will burn the children in the fire and then crush them”; and another was told, “You are Kachin, and we will kill all the Kachin. Even if the women are pregnant, we will kill them.” Impunity One Witness told the Tribunal “The law is not for us”. In many cases presented to the Tribunal, no action has been taken against alleged perpetrators, even when detailed circumstantial and physical evidence has been presented to the authorities. Indeed, in some cases those reporting the crimes were instead themselves detained. The widespread practice of trying any military or police under military rather than civilian courts (often closed to the public) and then detaining any convicted persons under military control also effectively shields alleged perpetrators. Forced exile All the Kachin personal witnesses who testified before the Tribunal indicated that they had left their native country of Myanmar due to a well-founded fear of persecution and indeed in many cases fear for their life. III.2. Serious violations of human rights and allegations of crimes against humanity and genocide against Rohingya Background The Rohingya are an ethnic, linguistic and religious minority of Myanmar that has been subjected to prolonged, institutionalised and systematic denial of identity, suffering serious violations of their human rights for many decades. Indeed, they have been widely referred to as the world’s most persecuted people. The integral and fundamental parts of their identity, such as language, culture, religion and history have been criminalised by the government and banned from the education curriculum, generally suppressed and contradicted and refuted in public discourse. The word Rohingya is not officially 33 “I Thought They Would Kill Me”: Ending Wartime Torture in Northern Myanmar. [Bangkok] : Fortify Rights, 2016, p. 14. recognised by the government nor used in general discourse in Myanmar. Even the Annan Rakhine Commission was prohibited from using the word Rohingya. The Rohingya mainly live in the north of Rakhine State which borders Bangladesh. They represent about one-third of the population of that state. The majority of them are Muslim with a minority of Hindus. In Myanmar’s diverse population of about 51 million the Rohingya are a small minority. Their number is impossible to verify since they were not allowed to participate in the 2014 census unless they registered themselves as ‘Bengali’, which many people refused to do, either on principle or because they feared this would automatically disqualify them from eligibility for citizenship. It is estimated that well over a million Rohingya were living in Myanmar prior to 1978, but that pogroms in 1978, 1991-92, 2012-15, 2016-early 2017 and now in the latter half of 2017, have reduced the current population of Rohingya in Myanmar to about 500,000, while 1.5 million have been driven outside the country, according to the testimony to the Tribunal by Expert Dr. Maung Zarni (See Annex 6). The government of Myanmar has progressively denied the right to nationality of Rohingya through different laws and policies which have caused the deprivation of almost all civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. In particular, the 1974 Emergency Immigration Act and the 1982 Burmese Citizenship Law (which classified citizens of Burma as 1. Full citizens 2. Associated citizens 3. Naturalised citizens) have been used to strip the Rohingyas of their nationality and render them, in the eyes of the government and the majority Buddhist population, merely foreigners. As a result of the above-mentioned laws and policies, the Rohingya people have been subjected to different and arbitrary verification processes which have gradually turned them into mere residents with few rights. However, until the last general election in 2015, the Rohingya population were eligible to vote and in the 1990s, they enjoyed the right to form political parties and elect their representatives. Witnesses told the Tribunal that the denial of the Rohingya the right to nationality has caused institutionalised deprivation or restriction of other basic rights. The 1988 Rohingya Extermination Plan outlines a government policy to deny the Rohingya any access to higher education, the right to property and to own land, buildings and shops, as well as other economic rights. It stated that "any such properties under their existing ownership must be confiscated for distribution among the Buddhists." Moreover, the Rohingyas’ right to worship has been subjected to many restrictions such as the prohibition of construction or renovation of mosques, Islamic schools (madrasa) as well as the deliberate destruction of places of religious gatherings. As a result of a military offensive in 2012, as reported to the Tribunal by Expert Dr. Zarni, the Rohingya were driven from public visibility in the cities and towns of Rakhine State. Some 100,000 fled across the border into Bangladesh, while an estimated 120,000 people were forcibly detained in internal camps suffering food deprivation and very poor living conditions34. The denial of humanitarian aid has been also widely reported against the Rohingya IDPs, and is continuing in the present crisis. According to the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Burma, since 1996 the government has imposed severe restrictions on travel by the Rohingya population (restrictions which have gradually included other Muslims), violating their basic rights to freedom of movement and making their villages and places of living into virtual detention centres The Tribunal heard from a Witness that due to the restrictions on movement, the way to Rakhine State for Muslims is “a one-way street”. In other words, Muslims can travel from the other parts of the country to Rakhine but they are not permitted to return(Witness Testimony of Myanmar Muslim: Thuzar Maung, session 2, Day 3, 20 September 2017, Kuala Lumpur hearing). The findings of the Tribunal on the crimes against Rohingya under International Law will be addressed in the following section. However, before examining them, the Tribunal would like to stress that these crimes have occurred in a political context full of hate speech and what is essentially supremacist propaganda produced by both state and national officials and Buddhist leaders. Such Buddhist nationalist discourse denies the very existence of a Myanmar ethnic group called Rohingya, and labels them as ‘Bengali illegal immigrants’ despite the fact that they have lived in Myanmar for generations. Furthermore, the government, taking the advantage of the global discourse of the ‘war on terror’, dehumanises the Rohingya and desensitises the international community towards the victims by framing them as ‘Islamic terrorists’. This has been exemplified by the use of the terrorist label to explain the military crackdown in mid-August after the alleged attacks on military outposts by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), apparently a small group, poorly armed, that has sought to protect the Rohingya from attacks on them by the military and other armed forces loyal to the state. Expert Dr. Razia Sultana provided the Tribunal with a report of an attack in October 2016 by the military, in which they raped women, killed some of the residents and burned a Rohingya village in Maungdaw. Surviving villagers were called to the police station and forced by the military to falsely testify before the camera that the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO) had burned their houses in October 2016. Such narratives are often picked up by the media and used as fabricated news reports and propaganda, supplementing the official narrative which has alleged that Rohingya women are too dirty and unattractive to be raped by the Myanmar soldiers. Towards a peaceful, fair and prosperous future for the people of Rakhine: final report of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, [n.p.]: Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, August 2017, p.35; Mixed movements in South-East Asia. [n.p.]: UNHCR Office for South-East Asia, 2016. The gross human rights violations in Myanmar have been massively documented by the UN, International NGOs and Myanmar human rights and civil society organisations. The Prosecution presented several fact-finding reports to the Tribunal as evidence (See Annex 5). They confirm the testimonies which were heard by the Tribunal in London and Kuala Lumpur hearings as the following crimes: Arbitrary arrest, detention and torture The Tribunal both in London and Kuala Lumpur sessions heard several accounts of the frequency of arbitrary arrests of civilians by government armed forces. They included children and young people. Several witnesses testified before the Tribunal about the different types of physical and mental torture which they had been subjected to while in detention. During the 2016 crackdown, introduced by the government as a “clearance operation”, the security forces arrested more than 600 civilians accused as terrorists. The government said later that eight of them had died in custody. Their bodies showed clear signs that they had been tortured. None of their families were notified. (Testimony of U Ba Sein, London hearing). Enforced disappearances Both Experts and Witnesses testified before the Tribunal about many cases of those who had been arrested by the government forces who have been disappeared in recent years and the families still do not know their fate or whereabouts. The survivors of the recent crisis have also reported many thousands of cases of missing family members. Rape and other forms of sexual abuse The Tribunal heard first-hand horrific accounts of Rohingya women who had been raped in their homes, their villages and the IDP camps by the military forces. They also witnessed other women being raped or gang-raped in front of their eyes. Many incidents were reported in which a group of young girls have been selected, kidnapped and gang-raped by the military forces. The evidence presented at the London hearing confirmed a case of 15 girls of a Rohingya village murdered after being taken into the forest and gang-raped. (Muhammad Faris Bin Hussain Ahmed testimony, London hearing). Four survivors of rape gave in camera testimony to the Tribunal on their ordeal, adding that the perpetrators usually used vulgar terminology and sexual insults, while combining such words with calling them as ‘kalar’ which is a derogatory word referring to their so-called non-Burmese and foreign origin. One woman said: “when they were raping me, they kept saying bad words which I cannot repeat and then something like you, kalar, you do not belong to this country, go away!” The memories of the victims of rape are usually combined with horrendous stories of the killings, disappearances and injuring of their family members, often including babies and young children, and neighbours, as well as the burning of their homes, and destruction of their belongings. The use of rape and gang-rape is a widely practiced military tactic historically and in many parts of the world and is today being used in Rakhine State, taking place in front of the eyes of the relatives or even neighbours in public. It clearly aims to terrorise the community and create an atmosphere of fear, part of the plan to eliminate the Rohingyas’ presence in the country. It is an instrument of terror, as the Tribunal found its scars on both minds and bodies of the Witnesses even years after the incident. These Rohingya women also reported being subjected to other forms of physical and psychological sexual violence such as violation of their bodies' integrity by groping of their private parts during body searches as well as forcing them to undress in public. The four survivors' testimonies also presented a horrific pattern of physical abuse as they tried to flee. Having been raped by the soldiers of the Myanmar army, they were raped again several times, in some cases many times over a period of months, by smugglers and others who took advantage of the situation as they travelled from Rakhine to Thailand and Malaysia. Furthermore, they reported that, traumatised and impaired, they often do not receive the support they are in desperate need of. Evidence presented to the Tribunal by the Prosecution, including the expert testimony of Dr Razia Sultana, as well as the UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights’ report, demonstrated clearly that in Rakhine State, rape has been used against Rohingya women and girls in a widespread and systematic manner, particularly since the 2016 crisis. Extra-judicial killing and causing bodily harm The survivors of the Rohingya persecution shared with the Tribunal unimaginable experiences of their relatives, friends and neighbours being severely injured or even shot dead, slaughtered with knives or burned alive. Several massacres in different villages across Rakhine State were reported to the Tribunal by the Experts. These reports also included some details of throwing the bodies of the victims into mass graves, namely at Kyauk Pyin Seik and Kanyin Tan Myoma villages during the 2016 offensive “clearance” operation. (Testimony of U Ba Sein, London hearing). In a video testimony, obtained by an Expert a few days before the Kuala Lumpur hearing, a survivor of the Tola Toli village massacre said she saw 200-250 women and children being killed. Her husband having been killed, she escaped alone with their children. She said many had already been shot dead, and those lying on the ground were picked up, chopped, and later thrown into the river. Mutilated bodies were piled up and set on fire, while bodies of many small children were thrown into the fire. Expert Professor Chowdhury Abrar drew the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that among the refugee flows that have been recently arriving in Bangladesh, one major component of the population was missing. This missing component was young people and the middle-aged, with a particular emphasis on men, which would be a sign to that the Rohingya male people had been more targeted for extra-judicial killing. Confiscation of property and destruction of buildings Several accounts presented to the Tribunal described looting, confiscation of property and destruction of homes, shops, workplaces, mosques and other buildings and numerous entire villages in the locations where Rohingya people had lived. In many cases that were brought to the Tribunal, armed government forces or non-state actors were reported to have taken all valuable belongings of the Rohingya people and subsequently burned or destroyed the buildings. There were several accounts of confiscation of land and other properties by either the government or ultra-religious Buddhist groups. (Testimony of U Ba Sein, London hearing). The video evidence showed Rohingya villages all along the western shore of Rakhine State in flames, while satellite imagery gave graphic before and after images revealing total destruction of these villages, with adjacent Rakhine villages intact. In addition to causing terror among the population, causing their flight, these arson attacks may serve an ulterior motive, as openly declared by the responsible Myanmar government minister: "According to the law, burnt land becomes government- managed land," Minister for Social Development, Relief and Resettlement Win Myat Aye told a meeting in the Rakhine state capital of Sittwe, the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported. Internal displacement and forced exile Over the course of only three weeks in August-September 2017, more than 400,000 Rohingya, mostly women, children and elderly had to flee their homes and entered Bangladesh. However, the number of Rohingya refugees who have had to escape persecution over the past few decades is even higher, in the several significant waves of Rohingyas fleeing their homeland in 1978 (290,000), in 1992 (260,000), again in 2012 (100,000 refugees and 120,000 IDPs) and 2016 (100,000), as Expert Dr. Maung Zarni presented to the Tribunal in his testimony (see Annex 7). 35 Simon Lewis, Reuters, 27 Sept, 2017, 10:11 AM. The Tribunal heard several testimonies of Rohingya refugees forced to leave their homes and their country by border guards and other army forces accompanied by Rakhine Buddhist mobs, sometimes including, and even led by, Buddhist monks. According to the testimonies and other evidence, forced exile from Myanmar occurs as a result of direct physical pressure on Rohingya communities and villages, often terrorising them by burning their homes, seizing their belongings, killing their relatives and other villagers, or indirectly through imposing severe and intolerable hardship on them. In 2012, “the military and the border police suddenly came and forced us from our home. We had to go without carrying anything with us.” (Testimony of Jamilah, London hearing). “They even forcibly drag us to board a boat. One of the boats is already overloaded with people. There were 180 people on that boat”. (Testimony of Hidayat bin Abdul, London hearing) Impunity According to witness testimonies and other evidence brought before the Tribunal, the perpetrators of crimes against Rohingya people enjoy absolute impunity. Paragraph 10 of the 1988 Rohingya Extermination Plan states: "whenever there is a case between Rakhine and Muslim, the court shall give verdict in favour of Rakhine; when the case is between Muslim themselves, the court shall favour the rich against the poor Muslim so that the latter leaves the country with frustration." In such situation, the Rohingya victims of human rights violations are left completely unprotected by the legal system from “law enforcers” through to courts and upward to those in positions with supervisory responsibility such as Cabinet ministers. The witnesses identified for the Tribunal two categories of perpetrators: State perpetrators State perpetrators of the crimes in violation of International Law in Rakhine State mainly consist of government armed forces including the Myanmar Army, the Myanmar Border Force Guards and the Police. However, it is noteworthy that almost all government offices are involved with the wide range of denial and deprivation of the basic rights of Rohingya people. Non-state perpetrators The Witnesses repeatedly referred to the monks, the Buddhists and Rakhine people as non-state perpetrators. Describing events prior to the latest wave of the crackdown, the non-state actors reported as unarmed people who would usually follow the military operation by acts such as beating people, looting, destructing the building etc. In recent statements obtained in the aftermath of the August 2017 events, witnesses testified about non-state perpetrators who were not uniformed but were armed and participated in military operations alongside regular troops. The dramatic escalation of the persecution, with mass reprisals wreaked on the Rohingya population, purportedly in response to the 25 August 2017 attacks, was outlined in the Prosecution’s Opening Statement, which provided a substantial amount of real-time testimony, video and other evidence to the Tribunal to support the evidence prepared in advance for the Kuala Lumpur hearings. This video testimony focused on the extent of the damage inside Rakhine State, including notably satellite imagery of the burned out villages and interviews on the manner in which this destruction was caused, including the use of incendiary rocket launchers. There were also individual accounts of massacres and rapes. All these violations continued to occur long after the statement of State Counsellor Daw Aung San Syu Kyi of 18 September 2017 in which she declared that so-called “clearance operations” had ceased on 5 September. The Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of Bangladesh, Mr Kazi Reazul Hoque, responded positively to the invitation issued by the PPT to participate in the Kuala Lumpur hearings, addressing the Tribunal and providing information on the extent of the challenges faced by Bangladesh in carrying the burden of the Rohingya genocide. He informed the Tribunal that on 12 September 2017, the Bangladesh Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, visited Kutupalong camp, saying “We gave them shelter in our country on humanitarian grounds. Our houses were also burnt down in 1971. Our people fled to India when they had nowhere to go. So we are doing everything in our power to help the Rohingya”.“If we can feed 160,000,000 people we can also feed an additional 500,000 to 700,000 people at their time of distress. If necessary, we will eat one meal a day and share another meal with theses distressed people.”36 At the same time she pressed for urgent international assistance in this task, and for pressure to be put on Myanmar. The Commissioner reiterated Bangladesh’s urgent call for assistance in meeting these needs, and concluded by saying: ‘human dignity and respect is the very fabric of human rights - each one of us, as a member of humanity must continue to weave this fabric to make it stronger so human rights will not fall through its loops’. III.3. Serious violations of human rights and allegations of crimes against humanity against Myanmar Muslims Background The PPT received its third complaint from the Myanmar Muslim community in July 2017, and while allegations of persecution have been somewhat less catastrophic, tragic and severe in intensity 36 “PM Hasina stands up for the Rohingya”, and “Bangladesh PM: if necessary we will eat one meal a day to feed the Rohingya”, Dhaka Tribune, 12 September 2017. compared to the Rohingya community, they nevertheless demonstrate a purposeful institutional strategy of outright abuse towards other Muslims in Myanmar. Records of human rights abuses of the Muslim community in Myanmar became conspicuous with the coup under General Ne Win in 1962, which established the superiority of the Burman (Bamar) Buddhists over other groups. Since 2012 the situation has deteriorated further and, much to the disappointment of the Muslim community, the transition to the joint NLD-military rule in 2015 has seen instead the acceleration of human rights abuses plus documented evidence of crimes against humanity towards Muslims in general. The Burma Human Rights Network, BHRN has documented compelling evidence of the ongoing institutional persecution of Muslims under the new civilian government since March 2016. In the closing session of this Tribunal hearing in London in March 2017, the panel of judges found identity framing by exclusion – the process of creating Myanmar as a supreme Burman Buddhist entity – to be the prime ideological cause of ensuing allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity towards other ethnic communities in Myanmar. From a historically pluralistic society of diverse ethnicities and religions, Myanmar underwent a demographic transformation process that was buttressed by the passing of its Citizenship Law in 1982. In targeting the Muslim community, which had traditionally been accorded equal citizenship rights, the new law required all Muslims to show proof of ancestry dating back to 1824. Those who held National Registration Cards (NRC), had to surrender them when the enforced renewal deadlines (at ages 12, 18 and 35) came up as it was an unwritten law that a ‘full citizen’ cannot be a Burmese and a Muslim at the same time. In return they were asked to obtain National Verification Cards, signalling a lower status ID that does not acknowledge full citizenship, rendering the holder ineligible for passports and the loss of freedom of movement. Alienation cum rejection of the Burmese Muslims in the political, economic and social sectors has then become a corollary to their much reduced status. Currently there are no Muslims in Parliament. Neither the military-allied Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) nor Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD fielded a single Muslim candidate in the 2015 election, and many Muslims (including non Rohingya) were disenfranchised. Further, according to a number of testimonies given to the Tribunal by both Experts and Witnesses, Muslims are reportedly being effectively excluded from senior levels of the civil and military services, including the police and academia. This picture of the situation of the Burmese Muslims is corroborated in the Justice Delayed Justice Denied report which documents Persecution of Muslims in Burma: BHRN Report. Burma Human Rights Network, 2017. the pattern of police and judicial operations . Instead of enforcing the ‘Rule of Law’ in which they exercise neutrality, they practise ‘Rule by Law’ in which government authorities are above the law or even, as remarked by Expert Dr Maung Zarni, mock the rule of law. The expert testimonies revealed a calculated strategy with intent and knowledge to persecute the Muslims. The absence of adequate accountability mechanisms has resulted in gross impunity, thereby eroding further the rule of law and making the road to sustainable peace an impossible goal. From the research reports as well as testimonies of five Experts and Witnesses, this systematic and institutionalised persecution of Burmese Muslims can be demonstrated in numerous ways: 1. Increased difficulties in securing an NRC As mentioned earlier, this forms the crux of all ensuing abuses since failure to provide proof of the NRC subjects the individual to harassment and the possibility of a penalty, consisting of a fine or arrest or both. Such institutional denials of the right to nationality, which is a fundamental human right, further translate into much reduced exercise of civil and political rights, as well as job opportunities and much reduced financial standing for the individual, and fundamentally contravenes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Myanmar’s treaty obligations under the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child since the individual is thereby placed in a situation that is interpreted as being rendered “stateless”. 2. Increasingly acute restrictions on access to education and healthcare Following the violence in Rakhine state in 2012, all Muslims in Myanmar faced severe restrictions on access to education and healthcare. The inability to produce the NRC compounded the problem even further in the case of tertiary education and access to emergency and life-saving care in public hospitals. 3. Institutionalised forms of religious intolerance The testimonies received clearly attest to cases of outright religious intolerance, and in many instances, verging on religious persecution. a) Restrictions on building and repairing mosques 30 Justice delayed, justice denied : seeking truth about sexual violence and war crime case in Burma, with a special focus on the Kawng Kha case, in Kachin Land. Legal Aid Network and KWAT, January 2016. 31 Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 24; Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, art. 12; Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, art. 25. Prohibition on building new places of worship for both Muslims and Christians, along with targeted destruction of mosques and confiscation of such properties have seen the Muslims facing reduced access to communal prayer services, in contravention of Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The testimonies of both the Expert and one Witness corroborated the findings of available documentation on the subject, which noted that this had been carried out to some extent in the wake of Cyclone Nargis in 2008, but seems to have been employed more widely since the 2012- 2013 anti-Muslim attacks. The Witness, who kept meticulous personal records with photographs that were shown to the Tribunal, added that when mosques were destroyed or confiscated, they were either sealed off, the land resold for profit or converted into another facility. She reported that in one town, some 11 of the existing 14 mosques had been shut down, and only four mosques were allowed to operate, and that several madrasah (religious schools) were sealed off, while the communities were prohibited from performing their communal daily prayers in places other than the existing mosques. b) Creation of ‘Muslim-free zones’ The concocted perceived threat of Muslims to the majority Buddhist community has seen the creation of Muslim-free villages by various local authorities. Some 21 such villages have been identified with signboards warning Muslims from entering. Some of the signboards displayed derogatory remarks about the Muslims, referring to them as ‘kalar’. c) Ongoing highly organised boycott of Muslim owned businesses This rigorous campaign, led by several Buddhist monks using various forms of social media, has even infiltrated the public school system with the slogan “Do not buy from Muslim shops”. Muslim retail businesses in the cities of Yangon and Mandalay have been severely affected. d) Increased evidence of hate speech and discriminatory campaigns Two siblings who have since fled to Malaysia, testified to the barrage of discrimination and referred to continual verbal harassment as ‘kalar’. They also reported their difficulties in securing ID cards. Unlike other students in their high school, one had to travel some distance to the regional capital of Mandalay and, since the other could not afford to pay the stipulated ‘fine’ of 50,000 kyats, he was denied an ID card. 4. Evidence of Religious Persecution Since the 1990’s ultra nationalist Buddhist organizations like the Ma Ba Tha have actively promoted messages of intolerance against Muslims and other religious minorities. On 15 May 2001, anti- Muslim riots broke out in Taungoo, Pegu division, resulting in the deaths of about 200 Muslims, in the destruction of 11 mosques and the setting ablaze of over 400 houses. After the violence, many local Muslims moved away from Taungoo to nearby towns and to Yangon. From March 2013, violent riots have flared up in various cities in central and eastern Myanmar. The violence has coincided with the rise of the 969 movement, a Buddhist nationalist movement opposed to what it sees as the influx of Islam into traditionally Buddhist Myanmar. The sporadic cases of violence between Muslims and Buddhists led by ultra-nationalist monk Sayadaw U Wirathu of 969 appear to have given the monks additional license to pursue their acts of impunity. The common trigger event is frequently an allegation of rape or other honour crime by Muslim perpetrators against Buddhist victims, as was the case with Mandalay riots of July1-2 2014.33 Reports of such allegations are disseminated rapidly through 969’s extensive social media network. A Witness testified that Wirathu continues to enjoy patronage of the highest levels of authority in Myanmar, particularly the military. Two instances of religious persecution were specifically presented to the Tribunal: a) Forced evacuation of an entire village to a Buddhist cemetery after a mosque was bulldozed, February 2000 One Witness testified about the forced elimination of the Muslim part of Ta Khwet Hpoe village which consisted of 400 households. The community religious leader received a notice on 23 February 2000 from the most influential monk in the area which gave only two choices: to evacuate the village or risk being attacked by outraged religious followers and militia (See Annex 8). Abbot Reverend Thuzana reasoned his notice with the fundamental difference between the two faiths, the fact that the Muslims eat beef and that their mosque is very close to the Buddhist temple in the village.34 The Muslim community leaders sent an appeal to the government but the reply was that nothing could be done, and that the Muslim villagers should comply with the chief monk’s order. A few days after that, the Buddhist militia troops entered the village, bulldozed the mosque overnight and threatened the Muslim villagers that if they did not evacuate their homes, they would face the same fate as the mosque. They were eventually forced to leave the village and move to the other side of the river to a designated plot for them, as directed by the monk. That area was a former Buddhist cemetery. The Buddhist monk then distributed the lands and farms of the Muslims in Ta Khwet Hpoe among Buddhist families and gave no compensation whatsoever to the Muslim villagers. The monk's Burma, planned religious and Racial Riots Against Muslims: A Historical Overview. www.thestateless.com, July 2012 Hidden Hands Behind Communal Violence in Myanmar: Case Study of the Mandalay Riots. Justice Trust Policy Report, March 2015. See Annex 8 for the translated version of the letter from the Chief Monk. people then put the sign 'No Kalar allowed here' in all public places of the village and the river became the border between the new location of the Muslims and their old village. This forced transfer shattered the community as they were forced to stay in cramped living conditions and had lost their heritage. Some families remained in the designated area and sought ways to make a living since they were deprived of their farmlands; some went to other places where they had relatives. Some, like the Witness, decided to leave the country and went to Malaysia. It has been reported that they were have been denied permission to build a mosque in their new location. b) The Meikhtila Massacre, March 2013 The episode that has been widely documented, and known as the Meikhtila Massacre in Mandalay, was further elaborated by an eye Witness who saw an argument between a Muslim couple who owned a jewellery store and a Buddhist deteriorating into a fist fight. In a matter of minutes a mob came running down the street calling for the killing of all ‘Kalar’. This eye Witness saw a woman and her baby being killed in full view of police officials. He also saw Buddhist monks killing students, and observed police standing by watching the attacks but doing nothing to stop them or to protect the victims. He had to run for his life after being injured by a machete, managing to escape only by saying “I am Burmese, not Muslim”. His testimony was corroborated by that of his brother who concluded that sooner or later they would be exposed as Muslims, so they took a train bound for Yangon. From there they had to subject themselves to profiteering by traffickers before they finally arrived in Malaysia more than a year later While the Witnesses believed that the number of Muslims slaughtered was much higher, Reuters reported that up to 44 Muslims were killed, and their corpses set on fire or butchered in a swamp, with a further 13,000 driven from their homes and businesses. It was further reported that the bloodshed here was followed by Buddhist-led mob violence in at least 14 other villages, fitting a pattern of Buddhist-organised violence and governmental inaction.35 BBC news also released video footage of such atrocities. 5. Forced exile All the five witnesses who gave testimony before the Tribunal reported that they fled the country fearing persecution and retaliation from the Myanmar authorities. They are all now seeking refugee status and support abroad, but reported that this is frequently denied. They see access to justice as 35 “Special Report: Buddhist Monks Incite Muslim Killings in Myanmar”, www.reuters.com, 8 April 2013. 36 BBC news, http://dai.ly/x2u6nez, 16 June 2015. victims of human rights violations and religious persecution as almost impossible, given the widespread negligence of international bodies to impose accountability on perpetrating states. IV. THE STATE OF MYANMAR AND THE QUESTION OF IDENTITY The state of Myanmar: purported to be a limited democracy under military guardianship, but displaying continuing extreme intolerance, persecution and lack of justice Even after the notional return of the country to democracy, the 2008 Constitution has preserved a dominant and privileged role for the military, guaranteeing them 25 per cent of the seats in Parliament, creating what is presented to the world as a developing democracy under military guardianship. However, on closer scrutiny a different picture emerges. The heads of the Myanmar/Burmese Army – who have spent the last 70 years at war with the country’s ethnic minorities – retain effective control over the economy, natural resources and the riches of the country, and appear strongly interested in maintaining a degree of internal conflict in order to legitimate the idea that only the military can preserve the state and, consequently, their dominant position. Furthermore, these ongoing conflicts give the rationale for these same military leaders (whether still in uniform, or as newly minted civilians) to present themselves in the international arena as the only true representatives of the country. Therefore most observers stress that the Myanmar/Burmese military remains the major obstacle to achieving key democratic and human rights reforms and to carrying out the perspective of becoming a state that acknowledges its ethnic diversity, chooses to be really federal in structure and favours religious tolerance. The misleading picture of Myanmar as an emerging democracy can be seen not only in specific provisions in the 2008 Constitution but in the day to day life of its citizens who are not Bamar Buddhists, as documented in some detail above with regard to the three groups who brought their cases to the Tribunal. In the much-touted 2015 “democratic election”, for example, it is estimated that some 1 million people were disenfranchised (500,000 from recognised ethnic/national groups and a further 500,000 Muslims, mainly but not exclusively, Rohingya) . The framework of a limited democracy is completed by the absence of an independent and authoritative judicial power. During its 31st Session (March 2016), the Asian Legal Resources Centre 37 The 2015 General Election in Myanmar: What Now for Ethnic Politics? Amsterdam: Transnational Institute, 17 December 2015 (Myanmar Policy Briefing), esp. p.5 stated that Myamar and its people are “for all practical purposes still under the influence of militarisation that has gripped the country since 1959” and recalled that “the people of Myanmar and their institutions do not have a memory of independent justice institutions. Concepts like presumption of innocence, right to silence, and independent adjudication of disputes have never been given a chance to take root in the country”. This state of affairs contributes strongly to the abuse of power and to the crimes against minorities and guarantees the impunity of the powerful. Identity and citizenship The 2008 Constitution38 keeps alive Myanmar’s incredibly restrictive approach to citizenship, inspired by the idea that only those ethnicities which are considered nationals of Myanmar (namely, Arakanese, Burmese, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon or Shan as enumerated in the Election Act of 1948) are able to have citizenship and to give that citizenship to their children, and that any other group outside those nationalities has to prove their presence in the territory of Burma back to 1823, even if in 1990 an official list of 135 different ethnic groups in Myanmar was made public. The Advisory Commission on Rakhine State (led by Kofi Annan, whose report was issued in August 2017) also drew attention to this question, stating: The 1982 Citizenship Law explicitly states that those who prior to its enactment were already citizens would retain their citizenship rights. But the law – and the way it was implemented – significantly narrowed the prospects of citizenship for the Muslims in Rakhine. In 1989, a citizenship inspection process was carried out across Myanmar, and those found to meet the new requirements had their National Registration Cards (NRCs) replaced with new “Citizenship Scrutiny Cards” (CSCs). The majority of Muslims in Rakhine with NRCs surrendered their documents, but were never issued with CSCs, rendering them de facto stateless. From 1995, the authorities began issuing Temporary Residency Card (TRCs, or “white cards”) to Muslims in Rakhine State who did not have identity documents, as well as to returning refugees. In early 2015, the Government invalidated all TRCs, and the Constitutional Tribunal ruled that TRC-holders were ineligible to vote. In the so-called democratic elections in November 2015, Muslims from Rakhine were neither allowed to participate as candidates, nor as voters – unlike in all previous elections since independence in 1948. 38 Constitution of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (2008). [Yangon]: Ministry of Information, September, 2008, especially Chapter VIII: “Citizen, fundamental rights and duties of the citizens”. Through this process of gradual marginalization, Muslims in Rakhine have ended up in a particularly vulnerable position, almost entirely deprived of political influence or representation and living under severe restrictions which affect basic rights and many aspects of their daily lives. While some of these restrictions are based on legislation, others derive from local orders and regulations, often issued by local security officials. Some 120,000 members of the community – including some who hold valid citizenship documents – remain confined to IDP camps. The 1982 law and the accompanying 1983 procedures define a hierarchy of different categories of citizenship, where the most important distinction is that between “citizens” or “citizens by birth” on the one side, and “naturalised citizens” on the other. “Citizenship by birth” is limited to members of “national ethnic races”, defined as the Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Chin, Burman, Mon, Rakhine and Shan and ethnic groups which have been permanently settled in the territory of what is now Myanmar since before 1823 (in 1990, an official list of 135 “ethnic races” was made public). For both categories, the transmission of citizenship to a child depends on the status of both parents. However, while the child of a “citizen” automatically qualifies for “citizenship” unless the other parent is a foreigner, the child of a “naturalised citizen” only acquires “citizenship” if the other parent is a “citizen”, or if this parent is the child of two “naturalised citizens”. In all other circumstances, the child of a “naturalised citizen” will have to apply for “naturalised citizenship”, for which the applicant needs to fulfill the following criteria: being over the age of 18; being able to speak one of the national languages well; being of good character; and being of sound mind. However, children’s names may be added to a parent’s naturalized citizenship certificate when the child’s birth is registered. Even with this possibility, the distinction remains that eligibility for “naturalized citizenship” is not automatic. Moreover, “naturalized citizenship” may be revoked more easily than “citizenship”, for instance for committing offences involving “moral turpitude” (such as theft, adultery, rape or drugs offences). Although Myanmar is not the only country that has different categories of citizenship, in other countries more than one category is only allowed for very specific circumstances. Having just one citizenship category is generally preferable. It meets the important objective of equal rights for all citizens. Unlike previous citizenship legislation, the law of 1982 provides limited possibilities of acquiring citizenship based on residence. Individuals who do not have at least one citizen parent can only acquire citizenship if they or their ancestors entered the country prior to 1948, or they were legal residents in Myanmar and married to a citizen before the law came into force. On this basis, full membership of the country has been denied until now to the Rohingya, exemplified by the use of the name “Muslims of Rakhine” in the Annan Rakhine Commission Report. Indeed, the use of the name Rohingya was forbidden by the government when the Commission was established. The government’s policy has been, and remains, to refuse to name the Rohingya according to the name that they, and others, have used for decades and which they rightfully recognise as their own." The policy ignores the substantial documentation of their presence in the area now known as Rakhine State from at least the 18th century40 (other sources assert their presence even from the 8th century). Such a policy is certainly lacking in reasonableness and is in violation of the 1961 United Nations Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, which states in Article 1: “A Contracting State shall grant its nationality to a person born in his territory who would otherwise be stateless”. These laws and governmental decisions on identity have also affected other Muslim groups. The Tribunal was informed by several different Witnesses of their experience that to be accepted as citizens of the country they were given the choice of either keeping their Muslim religion and recording a foreign ethnicity (such as Malay, Bengali or Indian or another of the recognised nationalities like Shan or Karen) or renouncing their religion and being recorded as Buddhist with Burmese ethnicity. Even if the Rohingya are the ones in the worst position, the whole question of managing identities in the state of Myanmar is a matter of deep concern and, in the opinion of this Tribunal, is one of the main causes of the conflicts and atrocities which are under scrutiny and which we will analyse below. Two different analyses of genocidal social practice both establish the construction of identity as its first stage (“stigmatisation and construction of negative otherness” in Feierstein ́s model,41 “classification” in Stanton ́s model42). 39 Towards a peaceful, fair and prosperous future for the people of Rakhine: final report of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, [n.p.] : Advisory Commission on Rakhine State, August 2017, p. 30-31. 40 Francis Buchanan, “A comparative vocabulary of some of the languages spoken in the Arakan Empire”, Asiatic Researches, vol. 5, 1799, p.219-240, reprinted in SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research, Vol. 1, No., 1, Spring 2003 (http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/8050/1/BuchananComparativeVocabulary.pdf). 41 Daniel Feierstein, Genocide as social practice. New Brunswick NJ and London : Rutgers, 2014, p.109-121, and Daniel Feierstein “The concept of genocide and the partial destruction of the national group”, Logos: a journal of modern society & culture. Winter 2012 ( http://logosjournal.com/2012/winter_feierstein) 42 Gregory H. Stanton, Expert testimony at the Kuala Lumpur Session of the People’s Tribunal on Myanmar. Also at: http://genocidewatch.org/genocide/tenstagesofgenocide.html In the state of Myanmar there is a permanent process of classification, stigmatisation and construction of negative otherness against different groups: firstly, the various groups that were not recognised as nationals of the country, if they cannot prove their presence back to 1823, which is an almost impossible task. Then, even other Muslims who were previously considered members of the accepted nationalities. And later, even with the non-Burmese accepted nationalities, as testified in evidence before this Tribunal regarding the case of the Kachin group, and probably also the case regarding other non-Burmese groups that did not have a chance to present their cases before this Tribunal but for which some information was provided during the proceedings, albeit not in an explicit and documented way. Ethnicity and religion have played a very important role in this construction of negative otherness as a tool to divide the population. The state of Myanmar has more and more developed a nationalistic and racist understanding of its constituency as a Burmese Buddhist community instead of the original Union of Burma plurinational and multireligious community. In our analysis, this was the first step for legitimising and fuelling the atrocities described in the previous section and that will be qualified below regarding the alleged commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Following the 1982 Citizenship Law, a whole process of persecution has been advanced in recent years, as described in the Final Report of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State: Based on the 1982 Citizenship Law, a citizenship verification process has been advanced by both the former and current governments. According to government figures, approximately 4,000 Muslims (as well as 9,000 Kamans43) have been recognized as citizens or naturalized citizens – out of a population of around one million stateless Muslims in the state. Around 10,000 Muslims have also received National Verification Cards (NVC), considered a preparatory step for applying for citizenship. For the benefit of all communities in Rakhine – and in order to provide clarity on the legal status of all – the verification process should be accelerated. The process was first introduced in the shape of a pilot project in Myebon Township in 2014, where Temporary Resident Card (TRC)-holders were allowed to apply for citizenship on the condition that they listed their ethnicity as “Bengali”. The process was suspended following protests from both communities, but was restarted and expanded to all of Rakhine State in January 2015. After announcing the cancellation of the TRCs in February 2015, the Government started issuing its replacement – Identity Cards of National Verification (ICNV) – in June 2015. 43 Kaman are another Muslim minority predominantly living in Rakhine State. Unlike Rohingya, Kaman are among the 135 officially recognised ethnic groups mentioned above. To obtain this card, applicants were again required to register as “Bengali” in the application form. A year later, the NLD Government restarted the process, issuing National Verification Cards (a renaming of the ICNV), which no longer required applicants to indicate their ethnicity or religion in the application form (although the Commission has received complaints that ethnic references have still been included on some occasions). The sporadic implementation of the process – as well as the general lack of communication, consultation and outreach from the Government – has undermined public trust in the exercise within both communities. On the Rakhine side, many fear that corrupt officials may allow a high number of unqualified Muslims to obtain citizenship – a fear strengthened by alleged reports of non-Kaman Muslims posing as Kamans in the verification process. Some fear that the Government may eventually succumb to pressure from the international community, which they see as biased in favour of Muslim citizenship. Muslims, on the other hand, object to the NVC as an interim step that will subsequently qualify holders to apply for citizenship at some point in the future. They are worried that this procedure follows a familiar pattern of successive Myanmar governments issuing documents with a promise that citizenship will follow, with the latter repeatedly failing to materialize. Many are also reluctant to hand in their existing documents for fear of being left undocumented. Others have lost their previous identification documents, and are apprehensive that a process which is not based on bona fide will simply be used against them. Trust is also undermined by the lack of tangible benefits for those who successfully go through the process, as verified Muslim citizens continue to face travel restrictions and other forms of discrimination. Even if the Commission accepted as valid the fear that the process could result in identity cards being given to “unqualified Muslims” (one wonders what else could by meant by the term “unqualified Muslim” than a way to legitimate negative otherness?), the description of the process and the numbers recognised by the government (a couple of thousand people verified among a population of more than one million) make clear that the objective of the system is not to give citizenship to the people who are being persecuted but, on the contrary, to make them stateless, without any possibility to enjoy any kind of rights. Rakhine Commission Report, op cit, p. 26-27. Moreover, the growing anti-Muslim understanding of identity was quickly brought into the picture in the widespread connection made in the media between Islam and terrorism. Indeed, Aung San Suu Kyi’s speech made during the proceedings of the Tribunal (included as a part of the Defence Case) qualified attacks against police and outpost stations as “terrorist attacks” and invoked the Antiterrorist Act to persecute them. Use of that label has served to justify forced displacement, massive attacks on civilians, burning of villages and other actions committed by Myanmar security forces, other para- military groups or by Rakhine nationalists, which were on two separate occasions (October 2016 and August 2017) presented only as a consequence of those attacks even if many of those persecutions were committed long before the attacks took place. It is clear that amongst the Burman Buddhist majority there is a long standing antipathy toward the Rohingya that has been instrumentalised through the military and its paramilitaries, as well as nationalist Buddhist gangs. But it would be wrong to ignore the economic conditions that also enter into the complex of motives and other causes of the social process of genocide to which the Rohingya, and others, are being subjected. Social conditions are not uni-dimensional. They are overdetermined, arising from multiple causes. To understand why a pogrom of genocidal proportions occurs in a certain period, it is unlikely to be an adequate analysis that sees the situation as resulting from a “natural” enmity toward a group with an ethno-religious background differing from the perpetrators. Such an analysis is just descriptive; furthermore, it is for the perpetrators -- and perhaps in the minds of many watching from afar -- a justifying explanation, it being “only natural” that like should live amongst like. Such analyses are not only highly misleading, they are dangerous. However, we learn from history that diverse populations have lived peacefully for long periods in the past. In the specific case before the Tribunal, we received convincing evidence that the Rohingya, as well as other minority groups, have lived in the area now known as Myanmar, for several centuries and in some cases much longer. Certainly they suffered discrimination, and were largely relegated to the over-whelming number of poor in the country by the operation of an economic system that produced massive inequality between a very small elite and the vast majority. But they have only recently been targeted as a group deserving elimination. As we have seen in recent decades, when authoritarian states begin to open up their economies and attempt a degree of democratisation, internal conflicts often follow, including attacks on minorities accompanied by an upsurge of extreme nationalism and supremacist ideology. This process seems to have occurred in recent years in Myanmar. In times of national economic hardship and political tensions such as exist in contemporary Myanmar, governments have generally found it extremely useful to target the “Other” as the cause of problems afflicting the majority. Given the situation in Myanmar, with an authoritarian government challenged to provide democracy and an effective economic performance failing to meet either challenge, it is not surprising that extreme measures have been put in place by the government to target minorities, thereby diverting attention from its own failures. It is important to consider that the failure of the NLD-military government to solve the country’s social, political and economic problems has resulted in placing groups already discriminated against such as the Rohingya, other Muslims and the Christian Kachin in the position of scapegoats. In this way, not only do they seek to divert attention from their failings but also to divide opposition to and mobilise support for, its continuance in power. V. QUALIFICATION OF THE FACTS Preliminary Note on the term “ethnic cleansing” In this judgment we have not used the term “ethnic cleansing” for several reasons. In general, it is a euphemistic expression used to avoid the use of the term genocide when it (and other terms recognised in law) are appropriate in the circumstances of mass violations of human rights that meet the requirements of international law. The expression “ethnic cleansing” has no formal status in international law. It has been and still is used by perpetrators of genocide (inter alia), most notably by President Milosevic in the former Yugoslavia, to rationalise and justify acts in the hope of avoiding the stigma and potential sanctions that adhere to committing genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The term “ethnic cleansing” has been used to qualify the current persecution of the Rohingya by the United Nations, nation states and international civil society organisations. This avoids confronting the reality on the ground: a social process of genocide and commission of crimes against humanity. In such cases the use of language is political. “Ethnic cleansing” misleads and allows those who use it to describe a genocidal situation to do little or nothing in response. For the use of the term genocide would, indeed should, necessitate absolute condemnation of the perpetrators, strong action to prevent further human rights violations and a commitment to undertake costly and politically awkward programs for rehabilitation and reparations. The Tribunal also rejects the expression “ethnic cleansing”, in that it implies that a society having a diversity of ethnic and/or religious minorities is somehow dirty and needs to be cleansed. It thereby appeals to extremist nationalism and supremacist ideology. The importance of avoiding such usage is manifest in a Tribunal concerned with the actions of the Myanmar government against the Rohingya, non-Rohingya Muslims and the predominantly Christian Kachin. Accordingly, we present our findings below qualified in terms of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. V.1. War crimes From the full and detailed documentation admitted during the Tribunal session and described in Part III above, in the presentation of the cases, the accusations advanced in the indictment regarding war crimes against the Kachin people of northern Burma, as defined by Article 8 c) of the Rome Statute for armed conflicts not of an international character, have been fully proved, including the following acts: (i) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; (ii) Committing outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment; (iii) Taking of hostages (such as the use of prisoners as “human shields”); (iv) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all judicial guarantees which are generally recognised as indispensable. The Rome Statute (Article 8 d) also includes other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in armed conflicts not of an international character, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts: (i) Intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities (such as the murder of Kachin civilians by military forces); ... (iv) Intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science or charitable purposes, historic monuments, hospitals and places where the sick and wounded are collected, provided they are not military objectives (such as the destruction of houses, churches and other monuments, that is, the human and cultural heritage of Kachin); (v) Pillaging a town or place, even when taken by assault; (vi) Committing rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilisation and other forms of sexual violence, also constituting a serious violation of article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions (reported in many Kachin testimonies); (vii) Conscripting or enlisting children under the age of 15 years into armed forces or groups or using them to actively participate in hostilities; (viii) Ordering the displacement of the civilian population for reasons related to the conflict, unless the security of the civilians involved or imperative military reasons so demand; (ix) Killing or wounding treacherously a combatant adversary; (xii) Destroying or seizing the property of an adversary unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of the conflict. In particular, the Tribunal believes that systematic targeting of civilians and other acts committed by the Burmese/Myanmar Army must be qualified, for all legal purposes, as war crimes committed as part of a plan or policy or as part of a large-scale commission of such crimes. The course of historical events demonstrates that for many years in the state of Kachin there has been an ongoing internal armed conflict – war of self-determination – to which is applicable the Geneva Convention of 12 August 1949, according to the explicit recognition of the 1973 General Assembly Resolution 3103. The perpetrators of the crimes above enumerated are combatants; the victims are not combatants; the criminal acts of military soldiers may be said to serve the ultimate goal of a wide military campaign. In other words, the attack is intentionally directed against the civilian population or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities and against civilian objects, that is, objects which are not military objectives. The Tribunal watched on the screen the shelling of Kachin villages, was shown photographic evidence of dead bodies and of tortured persons and heard accounts of violence from witnesses and victims. From the foregoing testimonies and documents submitted, the Tribunal is of the view, beyond reasonable doubt, that the state of Myanmar is guilty of war crimes perpetrated against the Kachin people. V.2. Crimes against humanity From the full and detailed documentation admitted during the Tribunal session and described in Part III above, the accusations advanced in the indictment regarding crimes against humanity against the Rohingya, other Muslim civilian populations in Myanmar and the Kachin people have been fully proved, including the following acts, as defined by the Rome Statute: (a) Murder: the Tribunal heard testimony from a number of witnesses that they had witnessed murders and received reports that murders had been carried out by the Myanmar military and Buddhist gangs against the Rohingya, Kachin, and non-Rohingya Muslims; (b) Extermination: such as the 2013 Meikhtila massacre of Muslims; the numerous extrajudicial killings of Kachin and Rohingya; several massacres of Rohingya people in different villages across Rakhine state, with a dramatic escalation starting in August 2017; the extermination or murder of Kachin civilians, including women, children and the elderly, by military forces; ... (d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population: as in the case of the Kachin people, the creation of a large number of IDP, now estimated at over 120,000; the internal displacement and forced exile of more than 400,000 Rohingya, mostly women, children and elderly, who had to flee their homes and entered Bangladesh only during the last three weeks, joining hundreds of thousands forcibly displaced in several earlier waves; (e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law: such as the forcible confinement of Rohingya in camps, suffering from starvation and very poor living conditions, denial of citizenship rights which had earlier been accorded to them, arrests of Rohingya civilians, including children and young people, by armed government forces without providing any reason; (f) Torture: such as the different types of physical and mental torture which the Rohingya have been subjected to while in detention; (g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilisation or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity: as reported in numerous Rohingya and Kachin testimonies; (h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender ... or other grounds that are universally recognised as impermissible under international law, in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court: such as the persecution against the Burmese Muslims on ethnic and religious grounds during the Meikhtila massacre, the confiscation of property and destruction of buildings; (i) Enforced disappearance of persons: as reported in the case of the Kachin and the Rohingya; (j) The crime of apartheid (such as the project to create “Muslim-free villages”), as well as the different practices of discrimination against the Rohingya and other Muslim groups. From the foregoing testimonies and documents submitted, the Tribunal is of the view, beyond reasonable doubt that crimes against humanity were committed against the Rohingya, other Muslim civilian populations in Myanmar and the Kachin. V.3. Genocide The term genocide was coined by the Polish jurist Raphael Lemkin, who wrote, “By genocide we mean the destruction of a nation or an ethnic group”. Lemkin went on to argue that “Genocide has two phases: one, the destruction of the national identity of the oppressed group, the other, the imposition of the national identity of the oppressor.”45 The concept of genocide was codified in the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (approved in 1948 and ratified by the state of Myanmar in 1956, later included in the Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court in 1998) which defines genocide as any of enumerated acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such (as outlined below in section V.3.2). : The distinctive feature of genocide, according to Lemkin and to the Convention, is that it aims to destroy a group rather than the individuals who make up the group. The ultimate purpose of genocide is to destroy the group’s identity and impose the identity of the oppressor on the survivors. This idea gives us a useful insight into the workings of power systems in the modern era and, particularly, in the case of the state of Myanmar, which is under scrutiny in this judgment. Lemkin also wrote that nation states have tended to destroy the identities of ethnic and religious minorities within their boundaries and impose a new identity on them: the national identity of the oppressor. That is the intent of the process which started in Myanmar decades ago regarding the different non-Burmese groups, even if it has not developed at the same pace with all of them. V.3.1. General intent Many sociological works have shown that genocide is a process that involves different kinds of actions and, so, different stages, even if they are neither linear nor exclusive. Professor Gregory Stanton, founding president of Genocide Watch and former president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, testified in this Tribunal analysing that process in ten different stages. The report Countdown to Annihilation46 referred explicitly to the case of the Rohingya population in Myanmar and presented before the Tribunal in the London hearings (and provided to the Judges by the Prosecution in the current procedures) applied Feierstein’s six-stage model of the genocide process 45 Raphael Lemkin, Axis rule in occupied Europe. Washington, DC : Carnegie E ndowment for International Peace, 1944, Chapter IX Genocide, p. 79-95. Penny Green, Thomas McManus and Alicia de la Cour Venning, Countdown to annihilation: genocide in Myanmar. London : International State Crime Initiative, School of Law, Queen Mary University, 2015. to the case of the Rohingya group. It found that the first four stages had been reached in the then current situation of the Rohingya in Myanmar: stigmatisation, harassment, isolation and systematic weakening, and that the stages of extermination and symbolical enactment could happen at any moment. Moreover, the 1988 Peace and Development Council (SPDC)’s Rohingya Extermination Plan, also submitted by the Prosecution in evidence and cited by the International State Crime Initiative, precisely articulated a government policy not to provide Rohingya with citizenship cards. The Tribunal found that the denial of the Rohingyas’ right to nationality has caused institutionalised deprivation or restriction of their other basic rights, such as the right to education and health services. The 1988 Rohingya Extermination Plan outlined the government policy of denying the Rohingya any access to higher education, right to property and other economic rights, stating “any such properties under their existing ownership must be confiscated for distribution among the Buddhists”. From all of these analyses and from the other evidence presented before this Tribunal, it is clear that the general intent of the government of Myanmar has been to destroy (and in the case of the Rohingya population and the Burmese Muslims also to deny) the identity of these different groups as a part of the Myanmar community. That intent applied not only to the three groups under scrutiny (Kachin, Rohingya and other Muslims of Myanmar) but also probably to other groups that were not part of these proceedings (some references about their situation were provided to the Tribunal). The stages of the execution of that general objective of identity destruction have been different, but it is important to highlight that all the “non-Burmese” groups and the Muslim Burmese are suffering a common process. The stages which that process has reached at present are not the same, which only means that some groups could suffer in the near future the same process other groups are suffering today. Accordingly, we believe that combining in a single Tribunal the analysis of these various genocidal practices developed by the state of Myanmar against different parts of its community could be a way to strengthen the ties among those communities in order to confront the genocidal aims of the state of Myanmar. “SPDC Rohingya Extermination Plan”, English translation reproduced in Countdown, p.36, described as having been “adopted in 1988 on the basis of the proposals submitted by Col. Tha Kyaw (a Rakine), Chairman of the National Unity Party.” V.3.2. Implementation of genocide Even if the general objective of destruction of the group is applied to all the non-Burmese groups, the implementation of it is in different stages regarding each of the groups. First of all, even in the legal structure of the state of Myanmar, the Rohingya group has been deleted and is now excluded entirely. In the current situation, the Rohingya cannot be Myanmar citizens as Rohingyas. That group is not recognised as part of the community, and it is even prohibited to use the word Rohingya to refer to them. That is the last stage in any analysis of genocidal social processes as either “denial” or “symbolical enactment”, which means not only that the group is attacked in a material form with the intention to annihilate it, but even its symbolic existence is also denied. In the case of other Muslims, if they state their religion as Muslim, that is recognised and recorded, but then is interpreted to mean they cannot be recognised as ethnic Burmese and are forced to add a second qualifying ethnicity/nationality, such as Karen, Shan, Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, regardless of whether they have any such ancestry. Moreover, if the group is not one of the recognised ethnic groups, they have to prove their origins in the land back to 1823. In the case of the Kachin, because they are one of the recognised nationalities, they seem not to have experienced denial of their identity to the same extent. Nevertheless, the Tribunal was informed that Kachin identity, especially as revealed in names, has over time gradually led to increasing discrimination, such as blocking of employment, appointments and promotion. After proving the general intention of destruction of the three groups under scrutiny (even if at different stages) and qualifying the facts as genocide under the Genocide Convention, the Tribunal went on to identify three of the five practices of the UN Genocide Convention applied with the specific intent to destroy the Rohingya population in whole or in part, namely: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. 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 Myanmar Muslims. Further, the state of Myanmar is guilty of the crime of genocide against the Rohingya. Moreover, that genocide against the Rohingya is now taking place with ongoing acts of genocide. There is a strong possibility that the number of casualties of that genocide will be even higher in the future if nothing is done to stop it. Regarding the other Myanmar Muslims and the Kachin, even if the implementation of the genocide is not yet taking place, the Tribunal hereby issues a clear alert that the continuation of the persecution, together with the crimes against humanity and war crimes, could amount to the implementation of genocide in the near future. To make matters worse, the wholesale lack of justice leads to systematic impunity of perpetrators of the crimes so far specified, since it is impossible or useless to make a complaint to police, judiciary or military authorities. All these unpunished crimes have been committed and are currently being committed – with an intent to commit the same – by the Myanmar/Burmese Army and by the regime in power in the state of Myanmar, and seem to be part of a plan: to deny every expression of autonomy and self-government of the people of Kachin state and, more generally, to humiliate and to destroy the ethnic and cultural identity of minorities living in the country. The limited and incomplete democracy of a Myanmar still heavily dependent on military power, shows intolerance and lack of respect of human rights, revealing its negative and dark side which conflicts with the principles of civilisation and with the religious beliefs of most of its people. This unacceptable and dangerous state of things can no longer be described and justified as the inevitable result of a difficult transition to a full and mature democracy, as claimed by State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi as recently as 19 September 2017, but must be defined as a regime of oppression and of denial of fundamental rights of the Kachin people, Rohingya and other Muslim groups. Even an imperfect form of democracy requires an adequate protection of ethnic and religious minorities, of all minority groups and of the weak, that now does not exist in the state of Myanmar. This absence of protection and of respect for fundamental human rights of minorities living in Myanmar appears to be the common denominator among the different conditions of Kachin, Rohingya and other Muslim groups of that country. VI. RECOMMENDATIONS Numerous reports on the situation in Myanmar have appeared in recent months, each making significant recommendations. It is not the intention of the PPT simply to repeat what is already a substantial list of well-informed and valuable recommendations. In making our recommendations we intend to indicate what in our view, based on the evidence we have considered, needs to be done under conditions that exist currently, as well as longer term actions that need to be taken to heal the wounds suffered by the people of Myanmar and to prevent further injury to them. We do this, cognisant of the State Counsellor’s invitation to “friends of Myanmar”, as we consider ourselves, to join with her government in helping to restore peace, to achieve reconciliation and to point the way to social, political and economic development toward a fair, just and prosperous Myanmar under the rule of law. We also are aware that, despite the best intentions of the international community in establishing the United Nations and bringing forth the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the shadow of dreadful events such as the Holocaust in World War II, genocide and other atrocious crimes have been repeated time and again since 1948. Therefore, we have taken this opportunity to make some general suggestions that we believe will aid in the universally desired end, unfulfilled since 1948: Never Again. The recommendations that follow are articulated with attention to their potential for being implemented in the current intense period of international debates and proposals accompanying the events of Myanmar: 1) to stress the urgency of and the need for concreteness to face effectively the immediate-short term needs of the humanitarian crisis; 2) to protect and promote the struggles for democracy of the communities most affected by discriminatory and persecutory measures and policies; 3) to assert that the failure of key national and international actors to assume effective measures in this instance would contribute to the growing crisis of credibility on the role of international laws and principles in providing peaceful solutions for conflicts where regional or global political and economic 51 interests prevail over fundamental rights universally recognised as indicators of a sustainable democracy. Measures for the government and people of Myanmar Urgent measures to minimise further harm 1. A ceasefire package and de-militarisation should be negotiated by government and ASEAN representatives with all armed groups in Rakhine State and the Myanmar military, including a de- militarised zone along the border in the northern region of Rakhine State. 2. The “verification process” proposed by Aung San Suu Kyi and others should, without any further delay, guarantee that all persons born or naturalised in Myanmar are considered full citizens of Myanmar and are issued national identity cards, with all the rights of full Myanmar citizenship. 3. Myanmar must grant visas and full access to the fact-finding mission of the UN Human Rights Council and others in order to investigate and document human rights abuses against the Rohingya, other Myanmar Muslims, Kachin and other groups. Democracy, participation and citizenship 4. Myanmar must end its official discrimination and persecution of the Rohingya, Kachin, Myanmar Muslims and other groups. Myanmar must repeal or amend the 2008 Constitution, the 1982 Citizenship Law and other discriminatory law and policies in order to extend full citizenship to the Rohingya and other groups, ensuring all rights guaranteed by the treaties and conventions to which Myanmar is a party as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 5. Military representation in Parliament should be abolished, and all members of Parliament should be democratically elected. Minorities should not be barred from representation in Parliament. 6. The 2008 Constitution should be amended in order to place the armed forces and police under full civilian authority. Justice and the rule of law 7. Myanmar must prosecute in its courts perpetrators of human rights abuses, hate crimes, genocidal massacres, rape, torture, arson and ethnic and religious violence against the Rohingya, 52 Kachin, Myanmar Muslims and other groups. There must be no more impunity for military personnel, police or militias. Human rights and accountability 8. An independent, non-governmental Commission should be established to develop a program for rehabilitation and compensation to all those injured through violation of human rights. Transformation, inclusion and equality 9. Recognition of the capacity of the peoples in the different states to administer their own affairs consistent with commitment to a united, federal Myanmar. The reality of internal colonialism and the policy of Burmanisation need to be confronted and transformed. Measures for the government of Myanmar and its neighbouring countries 10. Myanmar and neighbouring nations must allow humanitarian, human rights and religious organisations as well as journalists unobstructed access to Rakhine State and Rohingya refugees, and to areas with Kachin and other national groups. 11. There is a tendency to view the refugee flow through a security lens. Such a perception is not only flawed but may also result in improper policy responses. We urge all concerned to view refugees with compassion and humanity, and thus to highlight threats to the human security of refugees rather than viewing them as a national security threat. We recognise and applaud the efforts of the Bangladesh authorities in dealing with the unprecedented challenge of receiving almost half a million people in just over three weeks, and which appears to be continuing. As it discharges its stated commitment to provide sanctuary for those people, we urge the Bangladesh government to: a) issue a temporary identity document that will protect the Rohingya refugees, including those arriving in previous years, from detention for illegal entry. b) ensure treatment of the wounded and in due course put in place psychological support to the refugees, especially affected children and abused women. Measures for ASEAN and other members of the international community 12. ASEAN nations are encouraged to share responsibility for the emigration crisis and open their borders to Rohingya asylum seekers in accordance with the ASEAN Charter, and permit them to settle in refugee camps until Rohingya are granted full citizenship rights in Myanmar. 53 13. The EU, USA, Japan, China and other prosperous nations should provide the financial and material resources necessary to support the burden borne by Bangladesh, Malaysia and other nations that welcome Rohingya refugees. 14. The hosting countries’ law enforcement agencies and community organisations must remain vigilant, while NGOs and the media should be encouraged to raise awareness about traffickers’ methods and the consequences of trafficking. Women and unaccompanied children are particularly vulnerable to both internal and cross-border trafficking. Measures for international and regional institutions 15. Impose an immediate arms embargo on the government of Myanmar. 16. Targeted sanctions should be imposed on Myanmar government officials and perpetrators of human rights abuse, e.g. freezing of overseas bank accounts, a ban on travel outside Myanmar and a plan to escalate sanctions should the government fail in its general duty to protect its people and to stop the human rights violations by the military and by private persons and organisations. 17. An independent, international non-governmental Commission should be established in order to investigate the causes of and responsibility for the harms about which the world has now been made aware. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Permanet Peoples Tribunal

UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova and the Founder and President of Yahad-In Unum(link is external), Father Patrick Desbois, have signed a partnership agreement to strengthen cooperation between the two organizations in the field of Holocaust and genocide education. “Through this partnership, UNESCO wishes to acknowledge and lend its support to the outstanding work of Patrick Desbois and Yahad-In Unum in identifying, documenting, and preserving sites where Jews and other victims of the Nazi regime were assassinated,” said Ms Bokova. “This initiative is about bringing dignity to the victims and strengthening prevention. With the spread of violent extremist ideologies, and genocide and atrocity crimes still being realities in several parts of the world, such initiatives have never been so urgent and important.” The organizations will work together, mostly in the Latin America and Caribbean region, to present the traveling exhibition The Holocaust by Bullets, displayed for the first time at UNESCO Headquarters in January 2015 and placed under the patronage of UNESCO. They will also join efforts to organize an international symposium on Holocaust education and research that will take place in 2018 at the Holocaust Museum of Guatemala, created by Yahad-In Unum in Guatemala City. Yahad-In Unum is a Paris-based humanitarian organization founded in 2004 by Father Patrick Desbois, a Catholic priest who devoted his life to researching the Holocaust, fighting against anti-Semitism, and furthering relations between Catholics and Jews. Yahad is dedicated to identifying and commemorating the sites of mass executions of Jews and Roma by Nazi killing squads in Eastern Europe during World War II. It is also active in various parts of the world where genocide and atrocity crimes have occurred, such as Guatemala, Iraq and Syria. The partnership will build on UNESCO’s mandate for peacebuilding and tolerance through historical awareness and understanding, and its programmes to educate about the history of the Holocaust and genocide. It will especially contribute to deepen its action in the Latin America and Caribbean region and strengthen public and education stakeholders outreach on issues pertaining to the prevention of genocide. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 UNESCO

President Faustin Archange Touadéra of the Central African Republic addresses the general debate of the General Assembly’s seventy-second session. UN Photo/Cia Pak The President of the Central African Republic (CAR), Faustin Archange Touadéra, reaffirmed today at the United Nations General Assembly his determination and that of his Government to make the peace efforts succeed, but stressed that the country suffers from limited capacity as it continues to cope with a raft of post-conflict challenges. In addition to the weak State response to the violence of armed groups, Mr. Touadéra regretted that even the staff of the UN Multi-Dimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission, known by its’s French acronym, UNMISCA, is not sufficient to cope to the challenges of protecting civilian populations. “The increase in security threats due to violence imposed by armed groups required that steps be taken to curb the risks of widespread crisis," he told UN Member delegations attending the Assembly’s annual general debate. With this in mind, he called on the international community to increase the military strength of MINUSCA, particularly in view of the immensity of the territory it must cover. Mr. Touadéra also urged that the operation’s mandate, which is coming to an end very soon, be revised to assist the Government in regaining control over areas with natural resources. He went on to welcome the unprecedented mobilization of international solidarity in for CAR towards the implementation of the Rehabilitation and Peacebuilding Programme (RCPCA), after the November 2016 Brussels Donor Conference. "To follow up on the implementation of this plan, we have concluded an Agreement serving as a new framework for mutual engagement between the Central African Republic and the international community," said Mr. Touadera. He outlined his hope that steps would be taken in 2017 to establish dialogue with the armed groups, noting that other major efforts would focus on implementing the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programme. He would also seek greater dialogue with regional actors in hopes they would provide political support for the road map for peace and national reconciliation. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 UN News Centre

PERMANENT PEOPLES’ TRIBUNAL Founder: LELIO BASSO (ITALY) President: FRANCO IPPITO (ITALY) Vicepresidents: LUIZA ERUNDINA DE SOUSA (BRASIL) JAVIER GIRALDO MORENO (COLOMBIA) HELEN JARVIS (AUSTRALIA) PHILIPPE TEXIER (FRANCE) Secretary General: GIANNI TOGNONI (ITALY) Session on State Crimes Allegedly Committed in Myanmar against the Rohingyas, Kachins and Other Groups University of Malaja, Faculty of Law 18-22 September 2017, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia JUDGMENT General Secretariat: VIA DELLA DOGANA VECCHIA 5 - 00186 ROME - TEL:0039 0668801468 E-mail:ppt@permanentpeoplestribunal.org www.tribunalepermanentedeipopoli.fondazionebasso.it CONTENTS I. GENERAL HISTORICAL AND JURIDICAL FRAMEWORK II. THE PROCEDURE FOR THIS SESSION OF THE PPT III.- PRESENTATION OF THE FACTS IV.- THE STATE OF MYANMAR AND THE QUESTION OF IDENTITY V.- QUALIFICATION OF THE FACTS VI.- RECOMENDATIONS General Secretariat: VIA DELLA DOGANA VECCHIA 5 - 00186 ROME - TEL:0039 0668801468 E-mail:ppt@permanentpeoplestribunal.org www.tribunalepermanentedeipopoli.fondazionebasso.it I. GENERAL HISTORICAL AND JURIDICAL FRAMEWORK The competence of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) is an International opinion tribunal, indipendent from any state authority. It examines cases regarding violations of human rights and the rights of peoples. Promoted by the Lelio Basso International Foundation for the Rights and Liberation of Peoples, the PPT was founded in June 1979, in Bologna, Italy, by a broad spectrum of legal experts, writers, and other cultural community leaders from 31 countries. The PPT is routed in the historical experience of the Russell Tribunal on Vietnam (1966-67) and on dictatorships in Latin America (1974-1976). The importance of strength of decisions by the PPT rest on the moral weight of the causes and arguments to which they give credibility, as well as the integrity and capability to judge the Tribunal members. While fully recognizing the reference role of the Institutions of the international community of the States and the juridical instruments, the PPT assumed as its Statute (and in its denomination) the Universal Declaration of Peoples’ Rights (Algiers, 1976), which underline its aim: to give visibility and legitimacy to the authority of Peoples when the States and the International Bodies failed to protect their right, due to geopolitical reasons or other motivations. Complains heard by the Tribunal are submitted by the victims, or by groups or individuals representing them. The PPT calls together all parties concerned and offers the defendants the possibilities to make their own arguments heard. The panel of the judges is selected for each case by combining members who belong to a permanent list and individuals who are recognized for their competence and integrity. From June 1979 to the present the PPT has held 43 Sessions whose results and judgments are available at: www.permanentpeoplestribunal.org. The permanent and increasing challenge of the original working hypothesis has been confirmed by the spectrum of cases which requested the competence of the PPT as the instrument which could make visible and qualify the violations of their fundamental rights to self-determination and to life, in the absence of, or denial by, institutional, juridical and political level of response. The verdicts and deliberations of the PPT represent in this sense a narrative of international law as seen from the side of peoples, when their status of victims is translated into that of the only legitimate subjects to whom the public and private powers are accountable, beyond their legal impunity. For the purpose of this case on the violations of the rights of peoples of Myanmar, it is useful to refer specifically to the doctrine developed by the PPT in the deliberations where State crimes have been committed against individuals and groups of the same countries, transformed from citizens into enemies, and/or “other”, and as such exposed in full impunity to processes of discriminations leading to a genocide, only too late, or never recognized: Argentine and its desaparecidos, 1980; East Timor, lead case of the first neo-colonial genocide, 1981; Guatemala, and its indigenous populations, 1983; the determinants and the responsible of the Armenian genocide, 1984; the peoples of the ex-Yugoslavia, 1995; victims of Islamic fundamentalism of Algeri, 2004; the communities of Colombia, 2006-8. An even more specific reference must be made to the two Sessions on the case of Tamil (Dublin, 2019; Bremen, 2013) which could be, from the methodological and doctrinal point of view, considered an integration and support of this deliberation. 1.2 The specificity of this Session The attention of the PPT for the situation of peoples of Myanmar dates back in 2013, when Myanmar was hardly considered, and even less known, as a case where the (already ongoing) violations could be seen as the other face of a state undergoing a militarily controlled democratic transformation, and a woman icon of peace was portrayed as an indisputable guarantee for a future where all the citizens of the country could be recognized as inviolable subjects of their rights to a life in dignity. The rapidly – not unexpectedly – evolving situation with the dramatic incidents of October 2016, transformed the preparatory phase into a procedure of urgency, even more because of the absolute world invisibility of what appeared to be a dramatic “case”. An Opening Session of the PPT was convened in London (Queen Mary University, 6-7 March 2017). The reports, the witnesses , the closing remarks of that Session , must be considered and referred to as an integral part of this Judgment. Despite the clear alarm of an evolving genocide, the findings did not however draw the attention of the international community nor of the public opinion. Only on the eve of this Session, the suffering of the Rohingya peoples finally and belatedly seized world attention, for the consistent accumulation of increasingly dramatic information reports from NGOs and international UN agencies. Within tthree weeks, nearly half a million people crossed the border from western Myanmar into Bangladesh, telling harrowing stories of the carnage they left behind as they crammed into open fishing boats or trudged along muddy paths carrying babies and elderly and bundles of meagre possessions, seeing the plumes of smoke soar into the air as their homes and villages were burnt to the ground. The consensus of many sources, specifically on the humanitarian crisis of the population of the Rakhine State, in their land and in their search for refuge, could not be clearer, beyond the permanent denial of the civil and military authorities of Myanmar, and it was in this sense openly and repeatedly underlined even by the UN Secretary General António Guterres. As clearly set out in the indictment which synthesized the available overwhelming written, visual, factual and analytical documentation, the request and the task for the PPT, went beyond giving more visibility to what already known but, according to the terms of reference established in the London Session: a) to broaden the focus from the most tragically and acutely affected population of the Rohingyas to the general policy of the Myanmar State on Kachins and other ethnic-religious groups; b) to document and qualify the historical and structural roots and causes of the events, to avoid considering them occasional incidents, and strictly internal affairs of a still young and “fragile democracy” , with no political, strategic, economic interactions and interests with regional and global actors and interests; c) to qualify juridically the severity and the responsibility of the crimes not only in view of the most criminally pertinent qualification, but to stress and justify with the greatest emphasis the absolute priority of concrete responses to the urgency of the needs of the affected population. Affected Myanmar people are not victims waiting for – certainly essential, though delayed and partial – humanitarian responses: they are, and must be considered, the central subject of the rights whose recognition and restitution should be the first, structural implication of a judgment based on the inviolable legitimacy of individual and peoples’ rights. II. THE PROCEDURE FOR THIS SESSION OF THE PPT 2.1 The Panel of the Judges The Panel of the Judges was composed by: Daniel Feierstein (Argentina), who chaired the panel Zulaiha Ismail (Malaysia) Helen Jarvis (Cambodia-Australia) Gill H. Boehringer (Australia) Nursyahbani Katjasungkana (Indonesia) Shadi Sadr (Iran) Nello Rossi (Italy) Two of the judges convened by the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal could not attend: Denis Halliday (Ireland), for severe and acute health reasons, Bellur Narayanaswamy Srikrishna (India), because of the refusal of his request for Visa. 2.2 Communication to the parties and right to defence In strict compliance with its Statutes all the steps and official documents relates to the case of this Sessions – form the results of the London Opening Session, to the first formal convocation of the Kuala Lumpur event to the official program and the Indictment - have transmitted: a) to the representatives of the Myanmar civil and militant authorities; b) to the more directly convened international agencies and governing bodies. Myanmar authorities notified and invited to present a defence: • Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, Commander in Chief, The Tatmadaw (Myanmar Armed Forces) Naypyidaw • Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Myanmar State Counsellor • Vice President Myint Swe, Chair of Myanmar Presidential Investigation Commission on Rakhine, Former Lt-General and former chief of Military Intelligence • General Myat Tun Oo, Chief of Military Affairs and Security Office of the Commander in Chief • Win Mra, Chairman, Myanmar Human Rights Commission UN, EU and others authorities invited • António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations Executive • Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights • Professor Yanghee Lee, Special Rapporteur on Human Rights situation in Myanmar • Ahmed Shaheed, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, • Fernand de Varennes, Special Rapporteur on Minority issues, • Adama Dieng, United Nations Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect • Federica Mogherini, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy /Vice-President of the European Commission • Kofi Annan, Chair, Rakhine Inquiry Commission While no answer was received from the Myanmar representatives, a formal acknowledgment of the invitation has been received from various of the above mentioned international agencies, with a request to be kept informed of the results of the Session. The right to defence, which is central in the Statutes of the Tribunal and has been a carefully observed practice throughout all its proceedings, has been regularly communicated to the concerned parties in due time. As no answer was received, at the beginning of each of the three days of public audiences, the Chairperson of the Panel of the Judges asked if any representative of the Myanmar Government was present in the room and no response was received. According to the Statutes, in the absence of any response, the PPT procedure of an ex officio defence was activated, and the resulting text was read publicly by the representative of the Secretariat of the PPT. The full text of the speech given by the State Counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi on 19 September 2017 in an address to the assembled diplomatic corps in Naypyidaw, which had already been listened to collectively by the Panel of the Judges, and which was formally and partially replayed in front of the audience, was assumed to be the most complete and updated expression of the position of the Myanmar authorities. Because of its relevance, it is considered as an integral part of this proceedings (Annexe X). 2.3. The proceedings The public hearing of the PPT took place in the University of Malaya Faculty of Law in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The program, together with essential information on the Judges, Prosecution and witness and expert testimonies are provided in Annexe X. 2.4 Security measures The Panel of the Judges assured in camera hearings for those witnesses for whom it was determined desirable to provide a close protection of their identity. III.- PRESENTATION OF THE FACTS III.1.- Situation of the Kachin People: “We are still birds in a cage” So the first Kachin witness before the People’s Tribunal on Myanmar in Kuala Lumpur summarised the condition of his people after reading a long list of specific cases of torture and execution suffered since the 2011 breakdown of the 17-year long ceasefire between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and the Burmese Army. Since achieving independence from the UK on 4 January 1948 the state of Myanmar has been at almost ceaseless war with the approximately 40% of its 55 million people who make up the country’s 135 recognised nationalities as well as minority religions and other unrecognised ethnic groups. Kachin State, the most northerly state of the country in the foothills of the Himalayas bordering China and India, “is one of the six, later to become seven, ethnic nationality states that were created when Burma became independent in 1948.” In the 2014 Myanmar Population and Housing Census the state’s population was reported as being 1.689 million or 3.3% of the total. The Kachin people number between 1 to 1.5 million, are largely resident in Kachin State but also form a substantial part of the population of the northern section of Shan State. Under British colonial rule, many of the previously animist people became Christian, now especially Baptist. War and increasing marginalisation have been the dominant features of life for the Kachin people since at least the early 1960s. The KIA was established in 1961, and the 1962 military coup by General Ne Win ushered in more than three decades of war during which time it is estimated that many previously Kachin towns and villages were destroyed and people were killed, and under the national policy of Burmanisation and inwards migration the Kachins have progressively lost many of their customs and traditions, including competence in the six Kachin languages. The ceasefire from 24 February 1994 until 9 June 2011 brought an end to the hot fighting, but led paradoxically to an ever increasing militarisation of the region (with the stationing of many Burmese/Myanmar central army battalions) and the introduction of an oppressive developmental model involving massive alienation of traditional lands and natural resources (notably their precious jade), accompanied by increasing dispersal and marginalisation of Kachins through significant urban immigration of lowland Burmese people, including replacing many Kachin animist or Christian or sacred places with Buddhist shrines or pagodas, generating demoralisation and a debilitating drug scourge. This shift is reflected in the findings of the Myanmar 2014 census that 64% of the population in Kachin State reported as Buddhist, and just 34% Christian. Since fighting resumed in Kachin State and northern Shan State with the indiscriminate targeting of civilian areas and military airstrikes, it is estimated that 10% of the population has been displaced, with at least 120,000 people now in IDP camps (at least two-thirds are under KIO control which have faced numerous restrictions and denials of humanitarian aid). Written and oral testimony was presented to the Opening Session of the Tribunal by the Kachin Women’s Organisation (KWO) . The Kuala Lumpur session received both written and oral testimony from further witnesses from the Kachin National Organisation (KNO) and the Kachin Women’s Association of Thailand (KWAT). Expert testimony, including original video footage of the military attacks was also presented. In addition, a number of witnesses who testified in camera of crimes that they had suffered personally and who had felt compelled to leave their homeland in fear of their lives, following forced labour serving as porters for the Myanmar Army, beatings, torture, execution or jailing and enforced disappearance of friends and relatives and/or military attack on their villages. The direct testimony presented to the Tribunal corroborated information given in a number of substantial written reports by various human rights organisations and researchers that were also submitted to the Tribunal by the Prosecution. III.2.- Persecution of Rohingya- a summary The Rohingya are an ethnic minority of Burma/Myanmar which who have been subjected to prolonged, institutionalised and systematic denial of identity and rights for decades. The integral and fundamental parts of their identity, such as language, culture, religion and history have been criminalised, prohibited to be educated, suppressed and contradicted. The government of Myanmar has denied progressively the right to nationality of Rohingya through different laws and policies which has subsequently caused the deprivation of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. The gross human rights violations in Myanmar/Burma have been massively documented by the UN, International NGOs and Myanmar human rights and civil society organisations. The Prosecution presented several fact-finding reports to the Tribunal as evidence. They confirmed the testimonies which were heard by the Tribunal in London and Kuala Lumpur hearings as the following crimes: 1. Arbitrary detention and torture The Tribunal both in London and Kuala Lumpur sessions heard several accounts of the arrests of civilians by the armed government forces. They included children and young people. Several witnesses testified before the Tribunal about the different types of physical and mental torture which they had been subjected to while in detention. 2. Enforced disappearances Both the fact and expert witnesses testified before the Tribunal about many cases of those who had been arrested by the government forces have been disappeared since then and the families do not know their fate or whereabouts. The survivors of the recent crisis have also reported about missing family members. 3. Rape and other forms of sexual abuse The Tribunal heard first-hand horrific accounts of Rohingya women who had been raped in their homes, their villages and the IDP camps by the military forces. They also witnessed the other women were raped or gang-raped in front of their eyes. The memories of the victims of rape are usually bonded with horrendous scenes of the killings, disappearances and injuring of their family members, their children and neighbours, burning their homes, and destruction of their belongings. The four survivors' testimonies also presented a horrific pattern that the Rohingya women who had been raped by the military were raped again several times and for months by the smugglers and other people who took the advantage of the situation, in all their way from Rakhine to Thailand and Malaysia. As a matter of fact, traumatized and impaired, they do not often receive the support they are in desperate need of from the UNHCR in Malaysia. These Rohingya women were also subjected to other forms of physical and psychological sexual violence such as violation of bodies' integrity by groping their private parts of their bodies during body search as well as forcing them to undress in public. 4. Extra-judicial killing and causing bodily harm The survivors of the Rohingya persecution shared beyond -imagination experiences with the Tribunal their fellows who had been severely injured, shot dead or slaughtered with knives or burned alive. Several massacres in different villages across Rakhine state were reported to the Tribunal by the expert witness. These reports also included some details about throwing the bodies of the victims in mass graves. 5. Confiscation of property and destruction of buildings Several accounts presented to the Tribunal clearly described looting, confiscation of property and destruction of homes, shops, workplaces, mosques and other buildings and entire villages in the locations where Rohingya people had lived. In many cases that were brought to the Tribunal, armed government forces or non-state actors were reported to have taken all valuable belongings of the Rohingya people and subsequently burned or destroyed the buildings. There were several accounts of confiscation of land and other properties by either the government or ultra-religious Buddhist groups. 6. Internal displacement and Forced exile Over only the course of three weeks in August-September 2017, more than 400,000 Rohingya, mostly women, children and elderly had to flee their homes and entered Bangladesh. However, the number of Rohingya refugees who have had to escape state prosecution over the past few decades is much higher than that, with Bangladesh alone, soon hosting 1 million Rohingya refugees in total. The Tribunal heard several testimonies of Rohingya refugees were forced to leave their homes and their country, Myanmar, by border guard and other army forces accompanied by Rakhine Buddhist mobs, sometimes including monks. According to the testimonies and other evidence, forced exile occurs as a result of direct pushing the populations of the border's villages out of the country often by terrorizing them by burning their homes and seizing their belongings and killing their relatives and other villagers, or indirectly through imposing severe and intolerable hardship on them. III.3.- Serious Violations of Human Rights and Allegations of Crimes Against Humanity of the Myanmar Muslims Introduction The PPT received its third complaint from the Myanmar Muslim community in July 2017, and while allegations of persecution have been somewhat less catastrophic, tragic and severe in intensity compared to the Rohingya community, they nevertheless demonstrate a purposeful institutional strategy of outright abuse towards other Muslims in Myanmar. Records of human rights abuses of the Muslim community in Myanmar became conspicuous with the coup under General Ne Win in 1962 which established the superiority of the Burmese Buddhists over other ethnic groups. Since 2012 the situation has deteriorated further and much to the disappointment of the Muslim community, the transition to the joint NLD-military rule in 2015 has seen instead the acceleration of human rights abuses plus documented evidence of crimes against humanity towards Muslims in general. In the closing session of this Tribunal hearing in London in March 2017, the panel of judges found identity framing by exclusion – the process of creating Myanmar as a supreme Burman Buddhist entity -- to be the prime ideological cause of ensuing allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity towards other ethnic communities in Myanmar. From a historically pluralistic society of diverse ethnicities and religions, Myanmar underwent a demographic transformation process that was buttressed by the passing of its Citizenship Law in 1982. In targeting the Muslim community which had traditionally been accorded equal citizenship rights, the new law required all Muslims to show proof of ancestry dating back to 1824. Those who held full citizenship cards called the NRC, had to surrender them when the enforced renewal deadlines (at ages 12, 18 and 35) came up as it was an unwritten law that a ‘full citizen’ cannot be a Burmese and a Muslim at the same time. In return they were asked to obtain National Verification Cards, signalling a lower status ID that does not acknowledge full citizenship, rendering the holder ineligible for passports and the loss of freedom of movement. The alienation cum rejection of the Burmese Muslims in the political, economic and social sectors then becomes a corollary to the reduced status of the Burmese Muslims. It was reported that currently there are no Muslims in Parliament, the military service, the police service, administration and academia. From the researched reports presented to the Tribunal and the testimonies of expert witnesses and 4 witnesses, this systematic and institutionalised persecution of Burmese Muslims could be examined in several ways: 1. Increased difficulties in securing an NRC Such institutional denials also translate into reduced job opportunities and reduced financial standing for the individual. 2. Institutionalised forms of religious intolerance contravening Universal Declaration of Human Rights. a. Restrictions in building and repairing mosques, sealing off Muslim schools b. Reduced access to communal prayer services. c. Creation of Muslim- Free Villages indicating characteristics of an apartheid system. d. Increased evidence of hate speeches & discriminatory campaigns for example, boycott Muslim owned business. e. Sporadic cases of violence initiated by ultra nationalist monks. f. Forced evacuation of an entire village to a Buddhist cemetery after a mosque was bulldozed g. The Meikhtila Massacre, March 2013 saw the brutal murder of 32 Muslim students and 2 teachers followed by pillaging and looting and the displacement of 12,000 villagers. From the foregoing testimonies and documents submitted, the Tribunal is of the view beyond reasonable doubt that Crimes Against Humanity were committed against the Muslim civilian population in Myanmar. IV.- THE STATE OF MYANMAR AND THE QUESTION OF IDENTITY The State of Myanmar: a limited democracy under military guardianship . Intolerance and lack of justice Even after the notional return of the country to democracy, the 2008 Constitution has preserved, a dominant and privileged role for the power of the military, guaranting them 25 per cent of the seats in Parliament and creating de facto a democracy under the military guardianship. The heads of Burmese Army – who have spent the last seventy years at war with country’s ethnic minorities - retain effective control over the economy, over natural resources and over the riches of the country and appear strongly interested in mantaining a degree of internal conflict in order to legitimate the idea that only the military can preserve the state and, consequently, their dominant position. Furthermore, these ongoing conflicts ensure that the military leaders can be seen as the only true representatives of the country in the international arena. Therefore most observers stress that the Burmese military remains the major obstacle to achieving the key democratic and human rights reforms and to carrying out the perspective of becoming a state that acknowledges its ethnic diversity, chooses to be really federal in structure and favors religious tolerance. This role of the military as an agent of discrimination between the ethnicities can be better understood in a historical perspective . As Azeem Ibrahim recalls in his book The Rohingyas : inside Myanmar’s hidden genocide there is ample evidence that “in the Burmese legal framework and in practical decisions …the Rohingya were not seen as being especially different in the period of democratic rule up to to 1962”. This relative tolerance started to change once the military came to power. In that year the military leaders decided “if they could not have an ethnically pure state (which have meant giving up all the wealth in the border areas to the north and east) they would use being “Buddhist” as a test for being a proper citizen of the state… adopting the logic of equating being Burmese with being Buddhist “ (ibidem). The Buddhist extremists adopted this approach and unfortunately the democratic opposition did not adequately oppose this sectarian definition of what is meant by being Burmese with the consequence that the Myanmar governement could play politics by using race, religion and nationality “ and then almost all Myanamar ethnic have started hatred against Rohingya and hatred against Islam, and accusing collectively, ‘These people are illegal migrants’. ” ( Interview with Rohingya politician, then sitting in parliament , 2015, left anonymous for safety). The framework of a limited democracy is completed by the absence of an independent and authoritative judicial power. During its 31st Session (March 2016), the Asian Legal Resources Centre stated that Myamar and its people are “for all practical purposes still under the influence of militarisation that has gripped the country since 1959” and has recalled that “the people of Myanmar and their institutions do not have a memory of independent justice institutions. Concepts like presumption of innocence, right to silence, and independent adjudication of disputes have never been given a chance to take root in the country". This state of affairs contributes strongly to the abuse of power and to the crimes against the minorities and guarantees the impunity of the powerful. Identity and citizenship The 2008 Constitution keeps alive Myanmar’s incredibly restrictive approach to citizenship, inspired by the idea that only those ethnicities which are considered nationals of Myanmar (Arakanese, Burmese, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon or Shan as enumerated in the Election Act of 1948) are able to have citizenship and to give that citizenship to their children, and that any other group outside those nationalities has to prove their presence in the territory of Burma back to 1823, even if in 1990 an official list of 135 different ethnic groups in Myanmar was made public. The Advisory Commission on Rakhine State (led by Kofi Annan, whose Report was issued in August 2017) also drew attention to this question stating that: The 1982 Citizenship Law explicitly states that those who prior to its enactment were already citizens would retain their citizenship rights. But the law – and the way it was implemented – significantly narrowed the prospects of citizenship for the Muslims in Rakhine. In 1989, a citizenship inspection process was carried out across Myanmar, and those found to meet the new requirements had their National Registration Cards (NRCs) replaced with new “Citizenship Scrutiny Cards” (CSCs). The majority of Muslims in Rakhine with NRCs surrendered their documents, but were never issued with CSCs, rendering them de facto stateless. From 1995, the authorities began issuing Temporary Residency Card (TRCs, or “white cards”) to Muslims in Rakhine State who did not have identity documents, as well as to returning refugees. In early 2015, the Government invalidated all TRCs, and the Constitutional Tribunal ruled that TRC-holders were ineligible to vote. In the democratic elections in November 2015, Muslims from Rakhine were neither allowed to participate as candidates, nor as voters – unlike in all previous elections since independence in 1948. Through this process of gradual marginalization, Muslims in Rakhine have ended up in a particularly vulnerable position, almost entirely deprived of political influence or representation and living under severe restrictions which affect basic rights and many aspects of their daily lives. While some of these restrictions are based on legislation, others derive from local orders and regulations, often issued by local security officials. Some 120,000 members of the community – including some who hold valid citizenship documents – remain confined to IDP camps. The 1982 law and the accompanying 1983 procedures define a hierarchy of different categories of citizenship, where the most important distinction is that between “citizens” or “citizens by birth” on the one side, and “naturalised citizens” on the other. “Citizenship by birth” is limited to members of “national ethnic races”, defined as the Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Chin, Burman, Mon, Rakhine and Shan and ethnic groups which have been permanently settled in the territory of what is now Myanmar since before 1823 (in 1990, an official list of 135 “ethnic races” was made public). For both categories, the transmission of citizenship to a child depends on the status of both parents. However, while the child of a “citizen” automatically qualifies for “citizenship” unless the other parent is a foreigner, the child of a “naturalised citizen” only acquires “citizenship” if the other parent is a “citizen”, or if this parent is the child of two “naturalised citizens”. In all other circumstances, the child of a “naturalised citizen” will have to apply for “naturalised citizenship”, for which the applicant needs to fulfill the following criteria: being over the age of 18; being able to speak one of the national languages well; being of good character; and being of sound mind. However, children's names may be added to a parent’s naturalized citizenship certificate when the child’s birth is registered. Even with this possibility, the distinction remains that eligibility for “naturalized citizenship” is not automatic. Moreover, “naturalized citizenship” may be revoked more easily than “citizenship”, for instance for committing offences involving “moral turpitude” (such as theft, adultery, rape or drugs offences). Although Myanmar is not the only country that has different categories of citizenship, in other countries more than one category is only allowed for very specific circumstances. Having just one citizenship category is generally preferable. It meets the important objective of equal rights for all citizens. Unlike previous citizenship legislation, the law of 1982 provides limited possibilities of acquiring citizenship based on residence. Individuals who do not have at least one citizen parent can only acquire citizenship if they or their ancestors entered the country prior to 1948, or they were legal residents in Myanmar and married to a citizen before the law came into force. On this legal basis, membership of the country has been denied until now to Rohingya (treated in the Commission’s Report as "Muslims of Rakhine", as the government did not accept even to name them with the name they had used for decades and they recognise as their own), even though their presence was documented from at least the 18th century in the área of what is now Rakhine State, in open breach of reasonableness and of the 1961 United Nations Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, which states in Article 1: “A Contracting State shall grant its nationality to a person born in his territory who would otherwise be stateless”. These laws and governmental decisions on identity have also affected other Muslim groups. The Tribunal was informed by several different witnesses of their experience that to be accepted as citizens of the country they were given the choice of either keeping their Muslim religion and recording a foreign ethnicity (Malay, Bengali, Indian) or possibly another of the other nationalities like Shan or Karen or renouncing their religion and be recorded as Buddhist with Burmese ethnicity. Even if the Rohingya are the ones in the worst position, the whole question of managing identities in the State of Myanmar is a matter of deep concern and, in the opinion of this Tribunal, is one of the main causes of the conflicts and atrocities which are under scrutiny and which we will analyse below. Two different analyses of genocidal social practice both establish the construction of identity as its first stage (stigmatisation and construction of negative otherness in Feierstein´s periodisation, classification in Stanton´s periodisation). In the State of Myanmar there is a permanent process of classification, stigmatisation and construction of negative otherness against different groups: firstly, the various groups that were not recognised as nationals of the country, if they can not prove their presence back to 1823, which is an almost impossible task. Then, even other Muslims who were members of the accepted nationalities. And later, even with the non-Burmese accepted nationalities as testified in evidence before this Tribunal regarding the case of the Kachin group, and probably also the case regarding other non-Burmese groups that did not have a chance to present their cases before this Tribunal but for which some information was provided, albeit not in a explicit and documented way, during the proceedings. Ethnicity and religion have played a very important role in this construction of negative otherness as a tool to divide the population. The State of Myanmar has more and more developed a nationalistic and racist understanding of its constituency as a Burmese Buddhist community instead of the original Union of Burma plurinational and multireligious community. In our analysis, this was the first step for legitimising and fuelling the atrocities described in the previous section and that will be qualified below regarding the alleged comission of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. But despite the 1982 Citizenship Law, a whole process of persecution started in recent years, as described in the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State: Based on the 1982 Citizenship Law, a citizenship verification process has been advanced by both the former and current governments. According to government figures, approximately 4,000 Muslims (as well as 9,000 Kamans) have been recognized as citizens or naturalized citizens – out of a population of around one million stateless Muslims in the state. Around 10,000 Muslims have also received National Verification Cards (NVC), considered a preparatory step for applying for citizenship. For the benefit of all communities in Rakhine – and in order to provide clarity on the legal status of all – the verification process should be accelerated. The process was first introduced in the shape of a pilot project in Myebon Township in 2014, where Temporary Resident Card (TRC)-holders were allowed to apply for citizenship on the condition that they listed their ethnicity as “Bengali”. The process was suspended following protests from both communities, but was restarted and expanded to all of Rakhine State in January 2015. After announcing the cancellation of the TRCs in February 2015, the Government started issuing its replacement – Identity Cards of National Verification (ICNV) – in June 2015. To obtain this card, applicants were again required to register as “Bengali” in the application form. A year later, the NLD Government restarted the process, issuing National Verification Cards (a renaming of the ICNV), which no longer required applicants to indicate their ethnicity or religion in the application form (although the Commission has received complaints that ethnic references have still been included on some occasions). The sporadic implementation of the process – as well as the general lack of communication, consultation and outreach from the Government – has undermined public trust in the exercise within both communities. On the Rakhine side, many fear that corrupt officials may allow a high number of unqualified Muslims to obtain citizenship – a fear strengthened by alleged reports of non-Kaman Muslims posing as Kamans in the verification process. Some fear that the Government may eventually succumb to pressure from the international community, which they see as biased in favour of Muslim citizenship. Muslims, on the other hand, object to the NVC as an interim step that will subsequently qualify holders to apply for citizenship at some point in the future. They are worried that this procedure follows a familiar pattern of successive Myanmar governments issuing documents with a promise that citizenship will follow, with the latter repeatedly failing to materialize. Many are also reluctant to hand in their existing documents for fear of being left undocumented. Others have lost their previous identification documents, and are apprehensive that a process which is not based on bona fide will simply be used against them. Trust is also undermined by the lack of tangible benefits for those who successfully go through the process, as verified Muslim citizens continue to face travel restrictions and other forms of discrimination. Even if the Commission accepted as valid the concern the fear that the process could result in identity cards being given to "unqualified Muslims" (one wonders what else could by meant by the term "unqualified Muslim" than a way to legitimate negative otherness?), the description of the process and the numbers recognised by the government (a couple of thousand people verified among a population of more than one million) make clear that the objective of the system is not to give citizenship to the peoples who are being persecuted but, on the contrary, to keep them stateless, without any possibility to enjoy any kind of rights. Moreover, the growing anti-Muslim understanding of identity was quickly linked in the widespread connection made in the media between Islam and terrorism. Indeed, Aung San Suu Kyi´s speech made during the proceedings of the Tribunal (included as a part of the Defence Case) qualified attacks against police and outpost stations as "terrorist attacks" and invoked the Antiterrorist Act to persecute them. Use of that label served to justify forced displacement, massive attacks on civilians, burning of villages and other actions committed by Myanmar security forces, other para-military groups or by Rakhine nationalists, which were on two separate occasions (October 2016 and August 2017) presented only as a consequence of those attacks even if a lot of those persecutions were committed long before the attacks. V.- QUALIFICATION OF THE FACTS V.1.- War Crimes From the full and detailed documentation admitted during the Tribunal Session and described about in Part III on presentation of the cases, the accusations advanced in the indictment - regarding war crimes against the Kachin people of Northern Burma as defined by the Rome Statute have been fully proved. The list includes the following acts: (i) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; (ii) Committing outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment; (iii) Taking of hostages (such as the use of prisoners as "human shields");; (iv) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgement pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all judicial guarantees which are generally recognized as indispensable. And the list of the Rome Statute also includes other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in armed conflicts not of an international character, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts, like: (i) Intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities (such as the murder of Kachin civilians by military forces); (iv) Intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science or charitable purposes, historic monuments, hospitals and places where the sick and wounded are collected, provided they are not military objectives (such as the destruction of schools, churches and other monuments including sacred sites); (v) Pillaging a town or place, even when taken by assault; (vi) Committing rape, sexual slavery and other forms of sexual violence also constituting a serious violation of article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions (charged in many cases by Kachin testimonies); (viii) Ordering the displacement of the civilian population for reasons related to the conflict, unless the security of the civilians involved or imperative military reasons so demand; (ix) Killing or wounding treacherously a combatant adversary; (xii) Destroying or seizing the property of an adversary unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of the conflict; In particular, the Tribunal believes that systematic targeting of civilians and all of the other acts committed by the Burmese Army must be qualified, for all legal purposes, as war crimes committed as part of a plan or policy or as part of a large-scale commission of such crimes. The course of historical events demonstrates that Kachin State has undergone for many years a kind of internal armed conflict – war of self determination – to which is applicable the Geneva Convention of 12 August 1949, according to the explicit recognition of the 1973 General Assembly Resolution 3103. In actual fact, the perpetrators of the crimes enumerated above are combatants; the victims are not combatants; the criminal acts of military soldiers may be said to serve the ultimate goal of a broad military campaign; the crimes are committed in the context of official duties. In other words the attack is intentionally directed against the civilian population or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities and against civilian objects, that is, objects which are not military objectives. The Tribunal watched, on the screen, the images of shellings on wretched villages; was shown photographic evidence of dead bodies and of tortured persons and heard accounts of violence of witnesses and of victims. The victims were not combatants. From the foregoing testimonies and documents submitted, the Tribunal is of the view beyond reasonable doubt that the State of Myanmar is guilty, therefore, of war crimes perpretated against the Kachin people. V.2.- Crimes against humanity From the foregoing testimonies and documents submitted, the Tribunal is of the view beyond reasonable doubt that Crimes Against Humanity were committed against the Rohingya, other Muslim civilian populations in Myanmar and the Kachin, amounting to the following: (a) Murder and (b) extermination (such as the Meikhtila massacre of muslims, the numerous extra-judicial killings of Kachin and Rohingya populations, several massacres of Rohingya people in different villages across Rakhine State, the extermination or murder of Kachin civilians, including women, children and the elderly by military forces); (d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population (in the case of the Kachin people, the creation of a large number of IDPs, now estimated over 120,000, the internal displacement and forced exile of more than 400,000 Rohingya, mostly women, children and elderly who had to flee their homes and entered Bangladesh during only the last three weeks, joining hundreds of thousands forcibly displaced before in a number different waves); (e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of the fundamental rules of international law (such as the forcibly confinement of Rohingya in the camps, suffering from starvation and very poor living conditions, the severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of the fundamental rules of international law – denial of citizenship rights, which had earlier been accorded to them, arbitrary arrests of Rohingya civilians by the armed government forces, including children and young); (f) Torture (such as the different types of physical and mental torture to which the Rohingya and the Kachin had been subjected to while in detention); (g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilisation, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity (such as the cases of rape, sexual violence and other forms of abuse charged in the Rohingya and Kachin testimonies); (h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender as defined in paragraph 3, or other grounds that are universally recognised as impermissible under international law, in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court (such as the persecution against the Muslims on ethnic and religious grounds during the Meikhtila massacre, the confiscation of property and destruction of buildings); (i) Enforced disappearance of persons (denounced in the case of the Rohingya and the Kachin); (j) The crime of apartheid (like the project to create "Muslim-free villages", the different practices of discrimination either of the Rohingya and other Muslim groups); V.3.- Genocide The term genocide was coined by the Polish jurist Raphael Lemkin, who wrote that “By genocide we mean the destruction of a nation or an ethnic group”. Lemkin went on to argue that “Genocide has two phases: one, the destruction of the national identity of the oppressed group, the other, the imposition of the national identity of the oppressor.” The concept of genocide was later codified in the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (approved in 1948 and ratified by the State of Myanmar in 1956, later included in the Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court in 1998) which defines genocide as any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such. The distinctive feature of genocide, according to Lemkin and to the Convention, is that it aims to destroy a group rather than the individuals that make up the group. The ultimate purpose of genocide is to destroy the group’s identity and impose the identity of the oppressor on the survivors. This idea gives us a useful insight into the workings of power systems in the modern era and, particularly, in the case of the State of Myanmar which is under scrutiny in this judgment. Lemkin wrote also that the nation state has tended to destroy the identities of ethnic and religious minorities within its boundaries and impose a new identity on them: the national identity of the oppressor. That is the objective of the process which started in Myanmar decades ago in respect to the different non-Burmese groups, even if it was not developed at the same pace with all of them. V.3.1.- General Intent Many sociological works have shown that genocide is a process which involves different kinds of actions and, so, different stages, even if they are neither linear nor exclusive. Prof. Greg Stanton, past president of Genocide Watch and former President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, testified before this Tribunal analysing that process in ten different stages. The Report "Countdown to Annihilation", referring explicity to the case of the Rohingya population in Myanmar, which was presented before the Tribunal in the London Opening Session (and provided to the Judges in the current proceedings as a Document) applied the six-stage model of Feierstein´s periodisation of genocide to the case of the Rohingya group. They found that first four stages had been reached in the then current situation of the Rohingya in Myanmar (stigmatisation, harrasment, isolation and systematic weakening, and that the stages of extermination and symbolical enactment could take place at any moment). Moreover, the 1988 Peace and Development Council (SPDC)’s Rohingya Extermination Plan, submitted by the Prosecution in evidence and also verified by the International State Crime Initiative, precisely articulated a government policy not to provide the Rohingya with citizenship cards. The Tribunal found that the denial of the Rohingyas´ right to nationality has caused them institutionalised deprivation or restriction of the other basic rights such as the right to education and health services. The 1988 Rohingya Extermination Plan outlined the government policy on denying the Rohingya any access to higher education, right to property and own land, building and shop or other economic rights. Stating "any such properties under their existing ownership must be confiscated for distribution among the Buddhists." In all of these analyses and from other evidence presented before this Tribunal it is clear that the general intent of the government of Myanmar has been to destroy (and in the case of the Rohingya population and the Burmese Muslims also to deny) the identity of these different groups as a part of the Myanmar community. That intent applied not only to the three groups under scrutiny (Kachin, Rohingya and other Muslim groups of Myanmar) but also probably to other groups which were not part of this proceedings (even if few references about their situation were provided to the Tribunal). Although the forms of implementation of that general objective of identity destruction have been different, it is important to highlight that all the "non-Burmese" groups and the Muslim Burmese are suffering a common process in Myanmar. The stages at which that process has been reached at the present time are not the same, which only means that some groups could suffer in the near future the same process other groups are suffering today. Accordingly, we believe that combining in a single Tribunal the analysis of these various genocidal practices developed by the State of Myanmar against different parts of its community could be a way to strengthen the ties among those communities in the face of the genocidal aims of the State of Myanmar. V.3.2.- Implementation of genocide Even if the general objective of destruction of the group applies to all the non-Burmese groups, the implementation has reached different stages regarding each of the groups. First of all, even in the legal structure of the State of Myanmar, the Rohingya group has been wiped out. In the current situation, the Rohingya can not be Myanmar citizens as Rohingyas. That group is not recognised as part of the community and it is even prohibited to use the word Rohingya to refer to them. That is the last stage in any analysis of genocidal social processes as either "denial" or "symbolical enactment", which means not only that the group is attacked in a material form with the intention to annihilate it but even its symbolical existence is also denied. In the case of other Muslims, if they state their religion as Muslim, that is recognised and recorded, but then is interpreted to mean they can not be recognised as ethnic Burmese (and they are forced to add a second qualifying ethnicity/nationality, such as Karen, Shan, Indian, Pakistani, Bengladeshi, regardless of whether they have any such ancestry). Moreover, if the group is not one of the accepted nationalities but a foreign group they have to prove their origins in the land back to 1823. In the case of the Kachin, because they are one of the recognised nationalities, they seem not to have experienced denial of their identity to the same extent. Rather, Kachin identity, especially as revealed in names, has over time gradually led to increasing discrimination, such as blocking of employment, appointments and promotion. After proving the general intention of destruction of the three groups under scrutiny (even if at different stages) and qualifying the facts as genocide under the Genocide Convention, the Tribunal went on to identifu three of the five practices of the UN Genocide Convention as having been applied against the Rohingya population, such as: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. 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. Further, the State of Myanmar is guilty of the crime of genocide against the Rohingya group. Moreover, that genocide against the Rohingya is now taking place with ongoing acts of genocide and the possibility the casualties of that genocide could be even higher in the future if nothing is done to stop it. Regarding the other Muslim groups and the Kachin group, even if the implementation of the genocide is not yet taking place, the Tribunal needs to issue a clear alert warning that the continuation of the process of persecution, together with crimes against humanity and war crimes, could amount to the implementation of a genocide in the near future. To make matters worse, the wholesale lack of justice leads to systematic impunity of perpetrators of the crimes so far specified, since it is impossible or useless to make a complaint to police or to judiciary or to military authorities. All these unpunished crimes have been committed and are currently committed - with intent to commit the same - by the Burmese Army and by the regime in power in the State of Myanmar and seem to be part of a plan: to deny every expression of autonomy and self government of the people of Kachin state and , more generally, to humiliate and to destroy the ethnic and cultural identity of minorities living in Burma . The limited and incomplete democracy of Myanmar, yet strongly dependent on military power , shows , in this conflict, intolerance and lack of respect of human rights and reveals it’s negative and dark side, conflicting with the principles of civilization and with the religious beliefs of it’s most people. This unacceptable and dangerous state of things can no longer be described and justified as the inevitable result of a difficult transition to a full and mature democracy as claimed even on the 19th of September 2017, but must be defined as a regime of oppression and of denial of fundamental rights of Kachin people. Even an imperfect form of democracy requires an adequate protection of ethnic and religious minorities, of all minority groups and of the weak, that now does not exist in the State of Myamar. This absence of protection and of respect of fundamental human rights of minorities living in Myamar appears to be the common denominator among the different conditions of Kachin people, Rohingya and other Muslim groups of the country. VI.- RECOMENDATIONS Numerous reports on the situation in Myanmar have appeared in recent months, each making significant recommendations. It is not the intention of the PPT to simply repeat what is already a substantial list of well-informed and valuable recommendations. In making our recommendations we intend to indicate what in our view, based on the evidence we have considered, needs to be done under conditions that exist currently, as well as longer term actions that need to be taken to heal the wounds suffered by the people of Myanmar and to prevent further injury to them. We do this, cognizant of the State Counsellor’s invitation to “friends of Myanmar” as we consider ourselves, to join with her government in helping to restore peace, to achieve reconciliation and to point the way to social, political and economic development toward a fair and just, prosperous Myanmar under the rule of law. We also are aware that despite the best intentions of the international community in establishing the United Nations and bringing forth the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the shadow of dreadful events such as the Holocaust in World War II, that genocide and other atrocious crimes have been repeated time and again since 1948. Therefore, we have taken this opportunity to make some general suggestions that we believe will aid in the universally desired end, unfulfilled since 1948: Never Again. The recommendations which follow are articulated with attention to their potential for being implemented in the current intense period of international debates and proposals which is accompanying the events of Myanmar: 1) to stress the urgency and the need of concreteness to face effectively the immediate-short term needs of the humanitarian crisis; 2) to protect and promote the struggles for democracy of the communities most affected by discriminatory and persecutory measures and policies; 3) to assert that the failure of key national and international actors to assume effective measures in this instance would contribute to the growing crisis of credibility on the role of international laws and principles in providing peaceful solutions for conflicts where regional- global political and economic interests prevail over fundamental rights universally recognized as indicators of a sustainable democracy. Recommendations Measures for the government and people of Myanmar Urgent measures to minimize further harms 1. A ceasefire package and de-militarization should be negotiated by government and ASEAN representatives with all armed groups in Rakhine state and the Myanmar military, including a de-militarized zone along the border in Northern region of Rakhine state. 2. The “verification process” proposed by Aung San Suu Kyi and others should without any further delay guarantee that all persons born or naturalized in Myanmar are considered full citizens of Myanmar and they should all be issued national identity cards and all the rights of full Myanmar citizenship. 3. Myanmar must grant visas and full access to the fact-finding mission of the UN Human Rights Council and others in order to investigate and document human rights abuses against the Rohingya, other Myanmar Muslims, Kachin and other groups. Democracy, participation and citizenship 4. Myanmar must end its official discrimination and persecution of the Rohingya, Kachin, Myanmar Muslims, and other groups. Myanmar must repeal or amend the 2008 Constitution, the 1982 Citizenship Law and other discriminatory law and policies in order to extend full citizenship to the Rohingya and other groups ensuring all rights guaranteed by the treaties and convention to which Myanmar is a Party as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 5. Military representation in Parliament should be abolished and all members of Parliament should be democratically elected. Minorities should not be barred from representation in Parliament. 6. The 2008 Constitution should be amended in order to place the Armed Forces and Police under full civilian authority. Justice and the rule of law 7. Myanmar must prosecute perpetrators of human rights abuses, hate crimes, genocidal massacres, rape, torture, arson and ethnic and religious violence against the Rohingya, Kachin, Myanmar Muslims, and other groups in its courts. There must be no more impunity for military personnel or militias. Human rights and accountability 8. An independent, non-governmental Commission should be established to develop a program for rehabilitation and compensation for victims of harms to all those injured through violation of human rights. Transformation, inclusion and inequality 9. Recognition of the capacity of the peoples in the different states to administer their own affairs consistent with commitment to a united, federal Myanmar. The reality of internal colonialism and the policy of Burmanization needs to be confronted and transformed. Measures for the government of Myanmar and its neighbouring countries 10. Myanmar and neighbouring nations must allow humanitarian, human rights, religious organizations, and journalists unobstructed access to Rakhine state and Rohingya refugees, and to areas with Kachin and other national groups. 11. There is a tendency to view the refugee flow from security lens. Such perception is not only flawed but may also result in the improper policy responses. We urge all concerned to view refugees with compassion and humanity, and thus to highlight threats to human-security of refugees rather than view them as national security threat. We urge the Bangladesh government to: a) issue a temporary identity document that will protect the Rohingya refugees including those arriving in previous years from arbitrary detention for illegal entry. b) Ensure treatment of the wounded and in due course put in place psychological support to the refugees, especially affected children and abused women; Measures for the ASEAN and other members of the international community 12. ASEAN nations are encouraged to share responsibility for the emigration crisis and open their borders to Rohingya asylum seekers in accordance with the ASEAN Charter, and permit them to settle in refugee camps until Rohingya are granted full citizenship rights in Myanmar. 13. The EU, USA, Japan, China and other prosperous nations should provide the financial and material resources necessary to support the burden borne by Bangladesh, Malaysia, and other nations that welcome Rohingya refugees. 14. The hosting countries’ law enforcement agencies, community organizations must remain vigilant, while NGOs and the media should be encouraged to raise awareness about traffickers’ methods and consequences of trafficking. Women and unaccompanied children are particularly vulnerable to trafficking, internal and cross border. Measures for international and regional institutions 15. Impose an immediate arms embargo on the government of Myanmar. 16. Targeted sanctions be imposed on Myanmar government officials and perpetrators of human rights abuse e.g. freezing of overseas bank accounts, a ban on travel outside Myanmar, and a plan to escalate sanctions should the government fail in its general duty to protect its people and to stop the human rights violations by the military and private persons and organisations. 17. An independent, international non-governmental Commission be established in order to investigate the causes and where responsibility lies for the harms about which the world has now been made aware. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Permanent Peoples Tribunal

Yet again, Kalma camp for displaced persons—just outside Nyala, capital of South Darfur, has been the scene of deadly violence by Khartoum’s security forces—on this occasion, in connection with a speech my President and Genocidaire-in-Chief, Omar al-Bashir, who was speaking in Nyala. According to Radio Dabanga, al-Bashir “addressed a mass public rally in Nyala yesterday, where he spoke of the return of the displaced to their villages of origin, and encouraged the state to develop formal housing for those who are eligible.” Predictably, al-Bashir made no mention of the many thousands of villages that have been destroyed by his army and militia forces—or the countless farms that have been violently expropriated by militia forces, some from outside Sudan (e.g., Chad, Niger, Mali). Nor did al-Bashir mention the intolerable insecurity in most of Darfur that faces those attempting to return to their lands: violence in the form of raping girls and women (see | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1QG/), murder, extortion, and further destruction of property are the norm (see | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1P4/)—and UNAMID’s ongoing deployment out of Darfur ensures that insecurity in Darfur will only grow. It is at this moment that the Trump administration is making its final decision to lift sanctions on the al-Bashir regime permanently—this in the interests of securing putative counter-terrorism intelligence from men who could hardly be more dishonest, and will abandon all terms specified for the permanent lifting of sanctions, once the decision is announced. There is no meaningful provision for the re-imposition of sanctions, no matter how egregiously offensive Khartoum’s behavior, in Darfur—or South Kordofan and Blue Nile. Despite the U.S. insistence on improved humanitarian access as a condition for lifting sanction, Khartoum maintains a humanitarian blockade on areas of the two regions controlled by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army-North (SPLM/A-N). The violence at Kalma has many precedents (see especially my Wall Street Journal oped with Mia Farrow, below, on the terrible violence of August 2008; below the Radio Dabanga dispatch on the present Kalma violence). The international community seems not to care. The UN’s World Health Organization refuses to label the disease that has taken hold in Kalma as cholera, even as that is clearly the case. This, too, is at Khartoum’s behest, but WHO’s silence represents despicable, and deadly, cowardice. Kalma is the emblem of Darfur, our clearest present picture of what the Khartoum regime has in store for the people of Darfur. And if the dismantling of camps such as Kalma—announced with emphatic insistence by the regime on a number of occasions—the final stage of the Darfur genocide will have begun. ****************************** South Darfur camp protest turns deadly, UNAMID calls for restraint Radio Dabanga [ https://www.dabangasudan.org/en ] September 22, 2017 | NYALA At least three people died in protests against a visit of the Sudanese president in Kalma camp in South Darfur. The African Union-United Nations peacekeeping mission in Darfur said it is deeply concerned about clashes between Sudanese government forces and displaced people. Approximately 26 others were wounded, according to the UNAMID peacekeeping mission in a press statement received by Radio Dabanga. The Kalma camp coordinator released a statement earlier today reporting that five people were killed this morning, and 26 people sustained injuries. The coordinator provided the names of the deceased and said that the wounded are being treated in the UNAMID base in the camp. UNAMID urges all conflicting parties to exercise utmost restraint and “is doing everything it can to deescalate the situation. “I call upon everyone involved in this situation to restore calm as soon as possible. A peaceful resolution of differences is the only way forward for the Darfuri people,” said UNAMID Joint Special Representative, Jeremiah Mamabolo. A medical team from UNAMID is currently in Kalma camp to assist local authorities in treating the injured. Furthermore, the mission engages with the state government and leaders of the displaced communities in an attempt to peacefully resolve the issue. The deadly incident reportedly occurred this morning after forces of the Sudanese government dispersed a group of displaced people who were protesting against the visit of the Sudanese president Omar Al Bashir to South Darfur. Al Bashir addressed a mass public rally in Nyala yesterday, where he spoke of the return of the displaced to their villages of origin, and encouraged the state to develop formal housing for those who are eligible. [These are villages that in many thousands of cases have been destroyed by al-Bashir’s army and militias—ER] UNAMID protection On Monday, dozens of representatives of the camps for displaced people met in Kalma and handed a letter to UNAMID with the request to secure the peaceful marches that displaced people plan to hold, without the risk of being subjected to repressive or violent actions by riot police. The statement continues explaining that displaced decided to hold peaceful marches for a period of three days from today until Thursday – for this, they called on UNAMID to provide security during these days. The request of the representatives to UNAMID to provide protection during the days of protests in Sept. 2017 ‘Not welcome’ Representatives of the displaced in South Darfur have been unambiguous in their rejection of Al Bashir’s visit. Sheikh Ali Abdelrahman El Tahir, the head of camp Kalma which has seen four days of protests, told Radio Dabanga yesterday that “President Al Bashir is not welcome in the South Darfur camps for the displaced,” he said. “We don’t want to see his face here.” Yagoub Abdallah Furi, the Coordinator of the Darfuri Camps, confirmed to Radio Dabanga that “the demonstrations will continue with the same force on Friday in conjunction with the announced visit of Al Bashir so that both local and international opinion will know what Kalma is talking about.” [Date-stamped photos of victims of the attack, from Radio Dabanga and also as conveyed to me by a highly reliable source and taken at the scene, appear below—ER] ************************* “Now Sudan Is Attacking Refugee Camps,” The Wall Street Journal, 6 September 2008 Eric Reeves and Mia Farrow http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122065894281205691.html?mod=googlenews_wsj At 6am on the morning of August 25 [2008] Kalma camp, home to 90,000 displaced Darfuris, was surrounded by Sudanese government forces. By 7am, 60 heavily armed military vehicles had entered the camp, shooting and setting straw huts ablaze. Terrified civilians—who had previously fled their burning villages when they were attacked by this same government and its proxy killers the Janjaweed—hastily armed themselves with sticks, spears and knives. Of course, these were no match for machine guns and automatic weapons. By 9am, the worst of the brutal assault was over. The vehicles rolled out leaving scores dead and over 100 wounded. Most were women and children. The early morning attack ensured that no aid workers were present as witnesses. Doctors Without Borders did manage to negotiate the transportation of 49 of the most severely wounded to a hospital in the nearby town of Nyala. But beyond this, aid workers have been blocked from entering the camp. Military vehicles have now increased in number and massed around Kalma. They have permitted no humanitarian assistance to reach the wounded. People already hard hit by recent floods and deteriorating sanitary conditions have received no food, water or medicine since Monday. The dead cannot even be buried with the white shrouds requested by the families of the victims. How can such brazen cruelty be inflicted upon our fellow human beings? How is it that a military assault on displaced civilians in a refugee camp creates barely a ripple in the news cycle? How does such outrageous human destruction prompt so little outrage? How is it that those who have been tasked with protecting the world’s most vulnerable population have failed—and failed, and then failed yet again—in their central responsibility? What does this say about the United Nations and the powerful member states? How have we come to such a moment? Such questions can be answered by looking at our response to Darfur’s agony over the past six years. Any honest assessment would be as shocking and dispiriting as the assault on Kalma itself. The international response to massive crimes by Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and his cabal has been simply this: We accommodate and acquiesce, with the contrived hope that these tyrants might grow weary of their task, or that paper agreements can somehow have meaning without a sustained and powerful international commitment backing them. The Kalma massacre is a part of Khartoum’s larger genocidal campaign. Since 2003, 80% – 90% of Darfur’s African villages have been destroyed, and more than 2.5 million survivors have fled to squalid camps across Darfur, eastern Chad and the Central African Republic. Hundreds of thousands have died. Khartoum’s next goal is to shut down camps in Darfur, and force people out into the desert where they cannot survive. The homes and fields that once sustained so many of Darfur’s people are ashes now, or they have new occupants—Arab tribes from Darfur and as far away as Chad, Niger and Mali. The message of the Kalma massacre is chillingly clear for Darfuris. But this assault on civilians in full view of the international community raises the question of what the massacre says about the rest of us. The only message we have sent to the Sudanese government is that they can now attack the camps and the world will watch and do nothing. [Ms. Farrow has just returned from her 10th trip to the Darfur region. Mr. Reeves is author of “A Long Day’s Dying: Critical Moments in the Darfur Genocide” (The Key Publishing House, 2007)] __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 SUDAN Research, Analysis, and Advocacy