ND Burma
ND-Burma formed in 2004 in order to provide a way for Burma human rights organizations to collaborate on the human rights documentation process. The 13 ND-Burma member organizations seek to collectively use the truth of what communities in Burma have endured to advocate for justice for victims. ND-Burma trains local organizations in human rights documentation; coordinates members’ input into a common database using Martus, a secure open-source software; and engages in joint-advocacy campaigns.
Recent Posts
- Myanmar junta bombs Rohingya Muslim village killing 41, rescuers say
- Myanmar’s junta cuts filmmaker’s life sentence to 15 years as part of wider amnesty
- Close The Sky
- International condemnation of the escalating humanitarian crisis and rights violations in Myanmar
- Women in Karenni State face increasing levels of violence
YOU CANNOT IGNORE US: Victims of human rights violations in Burma
/in Press Releases and StatementsFor Immediate Release
(Yangon – 16 October, 2018) Victims of human rights violations desire government reparations and deserve to see justice for what they have suffered, said the Reparations Working Group initiated by the Network for Human Rights Documentation Burma (ND-Burma) in a new report released today. Read more
Myanmar: Human trafficking on China border can only be addressed by ending Burma Army offensives and war crimes
/in Member statementsStatement on Myanmar’s Anti-Trafficking in Persons Day
September 13, 2018
On Myanmar’s Anti-Trafficking in Persons Day, KWAT urges Burma’s government and the international community to recognize that without an end to Burma Army offensives and war crimes, the problem of human trafficking along the China border will never be solved.
KWAT has been assisting survivors of human trafficking for the past fifteen years, most of whom have been trafficked to China – some as far as east as the North Korean border. Most have been forced to marry and bear children for Chinese men, with others forced into sex work.
In this year alone, KWAT has already assisted about one hundred women who were trafficked to China, while we have learned of many others who have disappeared. Without knowing Chinese, and without legal papers, trafficked women face huge obstacles to return home.
Most of the trafficked women came from conflict affected areas of northern Burma, where the Burma Army resumed offensives against the Kachin in 2011, committing systematic war crimes, including mass destruction of villages, killing, torture and rape of civilians – as corroborated by the United Nation’s Fact Finding Mission in their report on August 27.
The conflict has displaced over 120,000 people in northern Burma, who have been staying in over 170 IDP camps, where humanitarian aid has been cut by international donors, and increasingly restricted by the Burmese government and military in the past year – in violation of international law. With no other means of feeding their families, women of all ages have risked travelling to find work in China, where they are easy prey for trafficking gangs.
KWAT urges the Burmese government to immediately end Burma Army offensives and war crimes in northern Burma and the rest of the country, and begin unconditional, inclusive political dialogue with all ethnic leaders to enable a new federal, democratic constitution to be drawn up. We urge the international community to pressure the government through measures recommended in the Fact Finding Mission’s report.
Without addressing the root causes, the human trafficking problem in Burma can never be solved.
We also call urgently on international donors to provide adequate humanitarian aid to internally displaced villagers in northern Burma. To avoid government restrictions, this aid must be provided cross-border through community-based channels.
For More Information:
Moon Nay Li (+66 88-260-6417)
San Htoi (+ 95 942 3076 625)
Email:kwat.office@gmail.com
Invited to Report Lunching
/in NewsMyanmar: creation of UN mechanism a step toward accountability
/in NewsToday’s decision by the UN Human Rights Council to create an ‘independent mechanism’ to collect evidence of crimes in Myanmar, is a significant step toward accountability for gross human rights violations, the ICJ said.
“The creation of this evidence-gathering mechanism is a welcome concrete step towards justice,” said Matt Pollard, Senior Legal Adviser for the ICJ.
“But this is a stopgap measure, effectively creating a prosecutor without a court, that only underscores the urgent need for the Security Council to refer the entire situation to the International Criminal Court, which was created for precisely such circumstances,” he added.
The Council’s decision follows on conclusions and recommendations by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar (FFM).
The FFM’s 444-page full report described large-scale patterns of grave human rights violations against minority groups in the country, particularly in Rakhine, Kachin and Shan States.
It also highlighted the need for criminal investigations and prosecutions for crimes under international law, something the FFM concluded that national courts and commissions within Myanmar could not deliver.
“National justice institutions within Myanmar lack the independence, capacity and often also the will to hold perpetrators of human rights violations to account, particularly when members of security forces are involved. The latest government-established inquiry in Rakhine State also seems designed to deter and delay justice,” Pollard said.
The Human Rights Council resolution did not create a new international court or tribunal.
Evidence held by the independent mechanism could be made available to international or national proceedings, whether at the International Criminal Court (ICC) or another ad hoc international tribunal, or to national prosecutors asserting jurisdiction over the crimes under universal jurisdiction or other grounds.
While there is no realistic prospect of effective national prosecutions within Myanmar in the near future, evidence held by the mechanism could also be available in future should national institutions eventually become sufficiently impartial, independent, competent, and capable to do so.
A preliminary examination of the situation of Rohingyas, being conducted by the ICC, may also lead to criminal proceedings but will likely be limited to those crimes that have partially occurred within Bangladesh, such as the crime against humanity of deportation.
Bangladesh is a State Party to the Rome Statute of the ICC whilst Myanmar is not.
The Security Council also has authority to refer the entire situation to the International Criminal Court.
“The Myanmar government should stop denying the truth and should work with the international community, and particularly the United Nations, to improve the horrific conditions facing the Rohingya and other ethnic minorities whose rights have been violated so brutally by the security forces, as documented by the Fact Finding Mission,” Pollard said.
“Myanmar’s international partners, including neighbours like India, China, and members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), should exercise their influence to help ensure that Myanmar addresses this serious threat to the stability of the country and the region, by ensuring respect, protection and fulfillment of the full range of civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights of the affected minorities,” he added.
The Council resolution makes several other substantive recommendations, including a call on the Government of Myanmar to review the 1982 Citizenship Law, and a recommendation for the United Nations to conduct an inquiry into its involvement in Myanmar since 2011.
Contact:
Matt Pollard, ICJ Senior Legal Adviser (Geneva), e: matt.pollard@icj.org, +41 79 246 54 75.
Frederick Rawski, ICJ Asia Pacific Regional Director (Bangkok), e: frederick.rawski@icj.org
Read also:
Why an IIIM and Security Council referral are needed despite the ICC ruling relating to Bangladesh (13 September 2018)
Government’s Commission of Inquiry cannot deliver justice or accountability (7 September 2018)
ICJ releases Q & A on crime of genocide (27 August 2018)
Myanmar: reverse laws and practices that perpetuate military impunity (16 January 2018)
Summary report of the Fact Finding Mission (12 September 2018)
Full report of the Fact Finding Mission (published 18 September 2018)
Text of the Resolution (unofficial version tabled in advance of the vote)
ICJ
AAPP’s statement on the arrest of Nang Mo Hom by Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA)
/in Member statements27th September 2018
It has been over one month since Nang Mo Hom, a Shan woman living in Ho Naung Ward, Namhkam City in Muse District, Shan State, was arrested at gunpoint from her home by the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) on August 17, 2018. Read more
Tatmadaw snubs UK’s Hunt, who stresses accountability
/in NewsTop Tatmadaw (military) officers refused to meet with British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, who underscored the need for Myanmar to hold accountable those officers suspected of committing human rights abuses against Muslims in northern Rakhine State.
Hunt arrived in Myanmar on Thursday for a two-day official visit, during which he met with State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and visited northern Rakhine.
Hunt underscored the need for accountability and justice for any atrocities that have been perpetrated in the restive state. He said that if there is no accountability and justice in Myanmar, then the international community needs to look at all options, including referring the case to the International Criminal Court.
‘’The latter would need the support of the (UN) Security Council, which it may not get, so we need to look at other options too,” Hunt said.
He confirmed that he will discuss what the international community should do with the Rakhine issue at the UN general assembly.
‘’Britain can’t act alone. We need to act in concert with other countries – we are a believer in the international rules-based order. It’s incredibly important for all of us that the perpetrators face justice,’’ Hunt said.
On Monday, the UN general assembly’s high-level meeting and general debate begins, and the Rakhine issue is likely to be among the top agenda items.
Earlier this month, a UN fact-finding mission on Myanmar released a report that called for Myanmar military leaders to be investigated for crimes against humanity. Most of UN’s member countries have backed its proposals, and Hunt has said Britain will use all the tools at its disposal to try to make sure there is accountability.
‘’What is essential now is that the perpetrators of any atrocities are brought to justice, because without that, there can be no solution to the huge refugee problem,’’ Hunt said.
President’s Office spokesperson Zaw Htay talks about the northern Rakhine crisis during a press briefing on Friday. Photo – EPA
U Aung Myo Min, executive director of social advocacy group Equality Myanmar, said Myanmar can have wider access to the international community through the ICC.
“The government should consider whether to continue placing itself into a tighter situation,” he said.
He added that the government should start cooperating with the international missions in dealing with the Rakhine crisis.
U Thein Than Oo, a lawyer, said the government took the wrong approach of making blanket denials when faced with the possibility of an ICC referral by the international community.
“Under the procedures of the UN, it’s not easy for the case to reach the ICC. However, the situation is in flux, so the government needs to be careful,” he said.
However, U Nandar Hla Myint, spokesperson of the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party, described Hunt’s actions as interference in the country’s internal affairs. ‘’We reject what [Hunt] said when he met with the State Counsellor. This is interference,” he said.
He added that the Rakhine crisis is an internal matter that must be solved through cooperation between the government, military and political parties under the country’s laws.
At a press conference on Friday, President Office’s spokesperson U Zaw Htay said the fact-finding mission’s report on northern Rakhine was issued unilaterally, was aimed at the dissolution of Myanmar, and did not follow accepted international procedures.
“Tremendous pressure is being put on the government, which might hinder our democratic transition,” said U Zaw Htay.
On August 25 last year, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army launched deadly attacks on government security outposts in northern Rakhine, prompting a brutal military crackdown that was considered by the international community as “overkill.” It accused government forces of perpetrating massive human rights abuses against the Muslim minority in the state.
The United Nations and other international humanitarian agencies estimated that the crackdown forced over 700,000 Muslims from northern Rakhine to flee to neighbouring Bangladesh.
Myanmar Times