Top UN Court: Myanmar Must Take Steps To Prevent Genocide
ALLEN: Rohingya Muslims are celebrating their first major legal victory since the violent crackdown by Myanmar's military. On Thursday, the UN's International Court of Justice ordered Myanmar to protect the Rohingya from genocide. The final ruling may take years but it's a black eye for Myanmar which has long downplayed any wrongdoing, and it reinforces the message that the world is watching. Michael Holmes has more.</s>MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: It is the first ruling by a world court on the treatment of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, and it was unanimous. On Thursday, the International Court of Justice ordered Myanmar to enact emergency measures to protect the Rohingya people from persecution and violence and gave it a tight timetable to get it done.</s>ABDULQAWI AHMED YUSUF, JUDGE: The court considers that Myanmar must submit a report to the court on all measures taken to give effect to this order within four months.</s>HOLMES: The ruling is one of the first steps in a landmark case brought to The Hague by Gambia which accuses Myanmar of genocide. The preliminary judgment is the equivalent of an injunction against Myanmar while the courts main genocide case gets underway. That decision could still be years off. Still, Gambia's Minister of Justice hailed the outcome.</s>ABUBACARR TAMBADOU, JUSTICE MINISTER, GAMBIA: This is a historic day today not just for international law and the international community, but especially for the Rohingya.</s>HOLMES: More than 740,000 Rohingya fled Myanmar after a military crackdown by the government in 2016 and 2017. Most now live in crowded refugee camps in neighboring Bangladesh. Survivors accuse Myanmar's troops of murder, rape, torture, and widespread property destruction. A U.N. fact-finding Commission on the violence cold for a genocide tribunal. Myanmar's civilian leader and former human rights activists Aung San Suu Kyi defended the military at The Hague and asked for the case to be dropped. Suu Kyi also published an opinion piece in the Financial Times before the ruling, saying that war crimes may have been committed, but some Rohingya had exaggerated the abuses against them. The proceedings were closely watched back in Bangladesh, with most people encouraged by the findings.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We would like to thank the international community. We hope we'll be able to return home soon.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): The genocide is finally proved. I hope this court will further serve our people justice.</s>HOLMES: Justice that may only be partially fulfilled right now as the court's full decision on the question of genocide is yet to be decided. Michael Holmes, CNN, Atlanta.</s>HOWELL: To talk more about this, we now have Simon Adams. Simon, the Executive Director of the Global Center for Responsibility to Protect joining this hour via Skype from New York. It's good to have you with us.</s>SIMON ADAMS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, GLOBAL CENTER FOR RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT: Thank you. It's good to be here.</s>HOWELL: Simon, look, given this directive from the International Court of Justice, how do you see this impacting the overall situation?</s>ADAMS: Yes, look, the decision was a stark one. This is only the third time in history that a state has been taken to the International Court of Justice for breaching the Genocide Convention. And of course, the government of Myanmar has denied that a genocide is taking place. It's done everything it can to deflect and try and ignore the crimes that have taken place, the crimes that it's responsible for, but today's order really puts a line to all that and exposes the crimes and says that something has to fundamentally change in Myanmar.</s>HOWELL: Myanmar has essentially been told to prevent acts of genocide and to stop destroying evidence. This decision final and binding but at the same time, Simon, the court does not have the power to enforce its ruling.</s>ADAMS: That's right. But you know who does is the U.N. Security Council and the way that the U.N. Charter is constructed, is that those provisional measures are now relayed to the Security Council. So, the Security Council has an enormous pressure on it now, has a moral pressure, has political pressure, and it also has a legal obligation to make sure that those provisional measures are upheld, that they're fully implemented. And if they're not, it should absolutely hold Myanmar responsible.</s>HOWELL: This is an important punctuation, and of course, we'll see where it goes. But an important point, moment for the Rohingya at the same time, let's not forget about the Rohingya. Can you give us a sense of how the situation is for them? How are they being treated presently?</s>ADAMS: Yes, I mean, it's often said that the Rohingya are the most persecuted people on the face of this planet. Let's keep in mind that they've been stateless for generations, they've been stripped of every kind of civil rights and legal protection that you and I would take for granted. And the genocide that took place in 2017 with mass killings, with the destruction of entire villages, and that huge Exodus, which, you know, we all remember seeing those strings of people flooding into Bangladesh and fleeing the atrocities that were taking place, that happened in 2017. But the situation has not ended. The persecution has not ended. And now we have a situation where about one million Rohingya marooned in the biggest refugee camp in the world in the other side of the Bangladesh border. Meanwhile, those who remain inside Rakhine State are largely confined to what really amounts to concentration camps and segregated from the rest of the population. And that's again, why today's order was so important because it says, this has to change.</s>HOWELL: And, you know, just a couple of months ago, the world who saw as the former democracy icon, Aung San Suu Kyi defended Myanmar at the ICJ, this back in December saying the allegations against the army, that it acted with genocidal intent, that that was incomplete and misleading. Looking ahead at the case, which again, could play out many years from now, how do you see this playing out? What do you see happening here?</s>ADAMS: Well, first on Aung San Suu Kyi. I mean, I think we have to just, you know, it has to be remarked upon that have full free Grace is absolutely remarkable. She's gone from being a Nobel Peace Prize winner to be somebody who's become a genocide denialist and then literally turning up in a courtroom to defend Myanmar's generals against the charge of genocide. I mean, she should hand back her prize and we should probably melt it down and then use the money to maybe send some support to refugees in Bangladesh. But the case will continue. This is not the final judgment. This is essentially the equivalent of emergency measures or an injunction or a restraining order that you can relate it to a kind of a domestic context. So now the case will continue to play out, but I think the evidence is overwhelming that genocide has been perpetrated, and that those who are responsible for it must now be held accountable.</s>HOWELL: Simon Adams joining us via Skype in New York this hour. Simon, we appreciate your time. We'll, of course, continue to follow the story.</s>ADAMS: Thank you very much.</s>ALLEN: And we'll be right back with CNN NEWSROOM.