U.N. investigator says Facebook has not shared ‘evidence’ of Myanmar crime

REUTERS

Poppy McPherson

August 11, 2020

 

(Reuters) - The head of a U.N. investigative body on Myanmar said Facebook has not released evidence of “serious international crimes”, despite vowing to work with investigators looking into abuses in the country, including against the Rohingya Muslim minority.

FILE PHOTO: People demonstrate outside the International Court of Justice (ICJ), before the arrival of Myanmar's leader Aung San Suu Kyi for the second day of hearings in a case filed by Gambia against Myanmar alleging genocide against the minority Muslim Rohingya population, in The Hague, Netherlands December 11, 2019. REUTERS/Yves Herman

 

 

Nicholas Koumjian, head of the Independent Investigative Mechanism on Myanmar (IIMM), told Reuters the social media giant was holding material “highly relevant and probative of serious international crimes” but had not shared any during year-long talks.

He declined to give details of the material the IIMM had asked for.

Facebook has said it is cooperating with the IIMM and a representative on Tuesday declined to immediately comment further.

U.N. investigator says Facebook has not shared ‘evidence’ of Myanmar crime

WTVB
Tuesday, August 11, 2020
EDT by Thomson Reuters
By Poppy McPherson

FILE PHOTO: A 3D-printed Facebook logo is seen placed on a keyboard in this illustration taken March 25, 2020. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustrati

(Reuters) - The head of a U.N. investigative body on Myanmar said Facebook has not released evidence of “serious international crimes”, despite vowing to work with investigators looking into abuses in the country, including against the Rohingya Muslim minority.

Nicholas Koumjian, head of the Independent Investigative Mechanism on Myanmar (IIMM), told Reuters the social media giant was holding material “highly relevant and probative of serious international crimes” but had not shared any during year-long talks.

UN Investigator Wants Myanmar Brought Before International Criminal Court

VOA

Lisa Schlein

March 10, 2020 

FILE - U.N. Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee speaks during a press conference in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Jan. 23, 2020.

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND - A U.N. investigator is calling for Myanmar to be referred to the International Criminal Court and tried for alleged international crimes, including the persecution of ethnic minorities that have forced millions to flee, fearing for their lives. The investigator has submitted a report on Myanmar to the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Investigator: UN, International Community Fail to Hold Myanmar Accountable for Crimes Against Rohingya

VOA

By Lisa Schlein
July 3, 2019 

Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Yanghee Lee gives her report to the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 11, 2019. 

GEVENA, SWITZERLAND - A U.N. investigator says the United Nations and international community have failed to hold the government of Myanmar accountable for decades of persecution and repression against the minority Rohingya Muslims. The report from the special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar is under discussion at the U.N. Human Rights Council.

More than one million Rohingya refugees have fled to Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh to escape violence, persecution and death in Myanmar. U.N. investigator Yanghee Lee says she is concerned the international community is beginning to overlook their situation.

U.N. investigator reports possible fresh war crimes in Myanmar

REUTERS

Stephanie Nebehay

July 2, 2019 

(This July 2 story removes incorrect reference to “Yangon government” in paragraph three. Yangon is not the capital.)  

A stranded boat which was used by Rohingya Muslims is seen at the Thande village beach outside Yangon, Myanmar November 16, 2018. REUTERS/Myat Thu Kyaw

GENEVA (Reuters) - Myanmar security forces and insurgents are committing human rights violations against civilians in restive western states that may amount to fresh war crimes, a United Nations investigator said on Tuesday.

A 2017 military crackdown drove more than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee to Bangladesh. U.N. investigators have said that Myanmar’s operation included mass killings, gang rapes and widespread arson and was executed with “genocidal intent”.

Burmese forces may be committing fresh war crimes against Rohingya, UN investigator says

The Telegraph

Gaia Caramazza 

3 July 2019

 

 Rohingya refugee children learn the Koran in a madrasa, or Islamic school, in a Rohingya refugee camp in Ukhia Credit: AFP

Burmese security forces are committing fresh human rights violations that may amount to new allegations of war crimes, a United Nations investigator said on Tuesday.

These claims surfaced with the deployment of thousands of Burmese troops fighting ethnic rebels in Rakhine and Chin, the conflict-ridden Western states of the country.

After a 2017 military crackdown, 730,000 Rohingya Muslims fled from Western Burma, and sought refuge in neighbouring Bangladesh.

Myanmar must give Rohingya 'pathway to citizenship' - U.N. investigator

REUTERS

Emma Batha

June 26, 2019  

LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Myanmar must grant citizenship to stateless Rohingya with roots in the country, a senior U.N. investigator said on Wednesday, as she urged the country’s leader Aung San Suu Kyi to “be the democrat she once told us she was”.

Buddhist-majority Myanmar does not recognize the Muslim Rohingya as citizens despite a long history in the country.

Myanmar blackout may be cover for gross human rights violations: U.N. investigator

REUTERS

Tom Miles

June 24, 2019  

GENEVA (Reuters) - Myanmar’s army may be committing gross human rights violations under cover of a mobile phone blackout in parts of Myanmar’s Rakhine and Chin states, U.N. special rapporteur Yanghee Lee said on Monday. 

 Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Yanghee Lee gives her report to the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 11, 2019. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse 

Lee, an independent expert who reports to the U.N. Human Rights Council on human rights in Myanmar, said nine townships had been blacked out, with no media access and serious restrictions on humanitarian organizations.

“I fear for all civilians there,” Lee said in a statement.

Russian, Bangladesh foreign ministers meet in Moscow.

AA
Elena Teslova | 29.04.2019

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov calls on Myanmar and Bangladesh to solve Rohingya issue via dialogue

MOSCOW 

The question of the oppressed Rohingya people must be solved between Myanmar and Bangladesh via dialogue, Russia’s foreign minister said on Monday.

The international community has to provide support to the two states to find a mutually appropriate solution, Sergey Lavrov told a news conference in the capital Moscow after meeting his Bangladeshi counterpart AK Abdul Momen.

"I don't see any other decision, except bilateral, except a decision based on dialogue, on mutual understanding, as it must be between two neighbors," Lavrov said.

There is no progress on the repatriation of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees to Myanmar -- which they fled to escape persecution -- but Bangladeshi officials have gathered refugees’ biometric data and now have more precise data on them, said Momen.

This information will help resolve the Rohingya issue, he said.

Persecuted people

The Rohingya, described by the UN as the world's most persecuted people, have faced heightened fears of attack since dozens were killed in communal violence in 2012.

According to Amnesty International, more than 750,000 Rohingya refugees, mostly women and children, have fled Myanmar and crossed into Bangladesh after Myanmar forces launched a crackdown on the minority Muslim community in August 2017.

US Condemns Myanmar Ruling Keeping 2 Journalists Imprisoned.

VOA

April 24, 2019

FILE - Detained Myanmar journalists Wa Lone, (L) and Kyaw Soe Oo (3rd-R) are escorted by police from the courthouse as they are taken to prison after the first day of trial in Yangon, July 16, 2018.

The U.S. on Wednesday condemned the Myanmar Supreme Court decision upholding the convictions of two Reuters journalists for violating the country's Official Secrets Act by uncovering the Myanmar military's massacre of Rohingya Muslims.

Facebook still not doing enough to prevent ethnic hate in Myanmar, U.N. investigator says

Market Watch
Published: Apr 3, 2019
By MikeMurphy,Editor

Facebook Inc. has admitted it did not do enough to prevent the incitement of ethnic violence in Myanmar nearly two years ago, but it still has not taken enough steps to stop the spread of hate on its platform, a United Nations investigator says. “Facebook’s actions can only be described as minimal. It was as though the approach was apologize after the fact rather than try to prevent it in the first place.” Christopher Sidoti, U.N. investigator Hatred stoked on Facebook led to a military-led genocide against Myanmar’s Rohingya minority, the U.N. has said.

Myanmar Signals It Will Give Cold Shoulder to New UN Rights Investigator on Rohingya.

RADIO FREE ASIA 
2019-04-03

Prosecutor Nicholas Koumjian attends the trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor in the courtroom of the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone, based in Leidschendam outside The Hague, the Netherlands, May 16, 2012.

AFP

The United Nations on Tuesday announced the appointment of an American prosecutor as head of an independent team that will probe human rights violations in Myanmar’s volatile Rakhine state, focusing on atrocities committed against Rohingya Muslims and other minority groups.

Facebook's Efforts 'Not Nearly Sufficient' in Genocide-Torn Myanmar, UN Investigator Says

GIZMODO

Patrick Howell O'Neill

April 3rd '2019

Photo: Zach Gibson (Getty)

It’s been nearly two years since the bloody peak of a social media-fueled genocide in Southeast Asia, but Facebook is still not doing enough to prevent the ongoing promotion of violence and hate in Myanmar on its social network, according to a member of the United Nations team that found the Silicon Valley company for years failed to stop its platform from being used to incite genocide in the Asian nation.

UN weighs assisting with Rohingya island relocation plan.

Frontier
MYANMAR
Tuesday, March 26, 2019

People get off a boat on Bhashan Char island off the Bangladesh coast in October 2018, as it was being prepared for the relocation of Rohingya refugees. (AFP)

By AFP

DHAKA — The United Nations said Monday it was examining how to assist Bangladesh in relocating thousands of Rohingya refugees to a remote island despite warnings it could trigger fresh humanitarian upheaval.

Dhaka says shifting 100,000 refugees to a muddy silt islet in the Bay of Bengal will take pressure off overcrowded camps along its southern border, where almost a million Rohingya Muslims live in cramped tent cities.