In a statement to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the ICJ has welcomed the report of the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM)
The oral statement was delivered in an interactive dialogue with the IIMM, and read as follows:
“The ICJ salutes the Mechanism in setting up the necessary infrastructure for its operation despite the challenges brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the lack of genuine and independent domestic investigation and prosecution of serious human rights violations in Myanmar, the efficient establishment of the Mechanism is welcomed.
The ICJ shares its concern over the Government of Myanmar’s lack of cooperation with the Mechanism. The ICJ recalls Myanmar’s obligation to ensure accountability for serious human rights violations occurring in Myanmar, including, but not limited to, the acts against ethnic Rohingya that were the subject of the report of the Government-appointed Independent Commission of Enquiry.
Given the Mechanism’s mandate to gather and preserve evidence of any serious human rights violations committed in Myanmar from 2011 to the present, the ICJ underscores the need to investigate the widely reported accounts of killings, serious physical injury, mass displacement and destruction of property in various parts of Rakhine and Chin states in the context of the ongoing conflict between Myanmar and the Arakan Army. The Myanmar Government still refuses to hold a ceasefire despite the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in Rakhine. The parties to the conflict must be held accountable for any violation of international human rights and humanitarian law.
The ICJ would like to ask: how can States and inter-governmental organizations strengthen support for the mandate?”
For more information, contact: Kingsley Abbott, kingsley.abbott(a)icj.org