GENEVA—UN investigators on Thursday said serious international crimes had been committed in the four years since Myanmar’s military coup, warning that the violence would only worsen unless the perpetrators faced justice.
Nicholas Koumjian, head of the United Nations’ Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM), said impunity was emboldening the perpetrators to commit further violence.
Myanmar’s ruling junta seized power in a coup on Feb. 1, 2021 that ousted Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government, ending a 10-year experiment with democracy and plunging the Southeast Asian nation into bloody turmoil and a humanitarian crisis.
“Since then, according to substantial evidence collected and analyzed by the IIMM, serious international crimes have been committed across the country,” Koumjian said in a statement.
Myanmar has been rocked by fighting between the military and numerous ethnic rebel groups. The civil war has displaced more than 3.5 million people, according to the UN.
“Protests against the military regime were suppressed with often lethal violence. Thousands of perceived opponents have been unlawfully imprisoned, where many have suffered torture, sexual violence and other abuses,” said Koumjian.
“Increasingly frequent and indiscriminate air strikes, artillery and drone attacks have killed civilians, driven survivors from their homes, and destroyed hospitals, schools and places of worship.”
He said that while most of the evidence collected so far concerned crimes committed by the military, investigators were also probing “disturbing” reports of atrocities committed by other armed groups, including rape, killings and torture.
ICC arrest warrant
The IIMM was established by the UN Human Rights Council in 2018 to collect evidence of the most serious international crimes and prepare files for criminal prosecution.
In November, the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor requested an arrest warrant for junta chief Min Aung Hlaing for alleged crimes against the Rohingya minority in 2016 and 2017.
However, there are no judicial proceedings under way for any serious international crimes committed since the military takeover, said Koumjian.
“Impunity for crimes emboldens perpetrators to commit more violence, and ending this impunity is necessary,” he said.
“The mechanism stands ready to assist authorities who are willing and able to investigate and prosecute these cases. Until the perpetrators are brought to justice, violence will continue to spiral.”
The UN estimates that 19.9 million people, or more than a third of Myanmar’s population, will need humanitarian aid in 2025.
Slaughter and ‘sham’ elections
Meanwhile, Tom Andrews, the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, said four years of military oppression, violence and incompetence had cast the country into an abyss.
Calling the fourth anniversary of the coup a time to mourn the thousands of innocent lives lost, he said the international community needed to offer the country’s people “a genuine partnership to help end this nightmare”.
“Junta forces have slaughtered thousands of civilians, bombed and burned villages, and displaced millions of people,” the former US congressman said.
“More than 20,000 political prisoners remain behind bars. The economy and public services have collapsed. Famine and starvation loom over large parts of the population.
“The junta’s plans, including holding sham elections this year in a backdrop of escalating armed conflict and human rights violations, are a path to ruin.”
UN special rapporteurs are mandated by the body’s Human Rights Council but are independent experts who do not speak for the United Nations itself.
