International court to rule on Rohingya genocide case

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ANKARA (AA) – The International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Thursday will deliver its verdict on a case related to genocide of the Rohingya filed by Gambia against Myanmar.

In a public sitting at the Peace Palace in The Hague, ICJ President Judge Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf will read the court’s order at 10:00 am local time (0900GMT).

The ICJ heard the arguments presented by Gambia and Myanmar in December of last year.

The West African country has asked the ICJ for "provisional measures" to stop further violence against the Rohingya, a persecuted minority Muslim community in Myanmar.

Aboubacar Tambadou, Gambia’s attorney general and justice minister, is representing the Rohingya. Myanmar’s State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi defended the actions of her country’s army.

ICJ is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations and is based in The Hague, Netherlands.

- Persecuted people

According to Amnesty International, more than 750,000 Rohingya refugees, mostly women and children, fled Myanmar and crossed to Bangladesh after Myanmar forces launched a crackdown on the minority Muslim community in August 2017, pushing the number of persecuted people in Bangladesh above 1.2 million.

More than 34,000 Rohingya were also thrown into fires, while over 114,000 others were beaten, said the OIDA report titled Forced Migration of Rohingya: The Untold Experience.

Some 18,000 Rohingya women and girls were raped by Myanmar’s army and police and over 115,000 Rohingya homes were burned down and 113,000 others vandalized, it added.