Myanmar's Suu Kyi rejects genocide claims at top UN court

Yahoo –AFP, Danny KEMP and Jan HENNOP, December 11, 2019

Myanmar's State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi defended Myanmar's treatment
of the Rohingya at the International Court of Justice (AFP Photo/Frank Van BEEK)

Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi rejected allegations of genocide against Myanmar in the UN's top court Wednesday, despite admitting the army may have used excessive force against Rohingya Muslims.

Suu Kyi denied "misleading and incomplete" claims by The Gambia that a 2017 military operation had attempted to exterminate the Rohingya, in a rare address by a state leader to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Once hailed worldwide as a rights icon for her defiance of the same generals she is now defending, Suu Kyi also warned the Hague-based court that its involvement in the case risked "feeding the flames of extreme polarisation".

Nearly three-quarters of a million Rohingya fled to neighbouring Bangladesh after the Myanmar military launched a huge offensive that it said was in response to attacks by local militants.

"Regrettably, The Gambia has placed before the court a misleading and incomplete factual picture of the situation in Rakhine state," said Suu Kyi, wearing traditional Burmese dress and flowers in her hair.

Timeline showing how Aung Sang Suu Kyi's international 

reputation has unravelled following the Rohingya crisis in 

Myanmar (AFP Photo/John SAEKI)

Brushing off international criticism, the 74-year-old civilian leader said Buddhist-majority Myanmar was dealing with an "internal armed conflict" and that troubles in the area go back centuries.

"Please bear in mind this complex situation and the challenge to sovereignty and security in our country," she said.

"Surely under the circumstances genocidal intent cannot be the only hypothesis."

Lawyers for Myanmar argued that to prove genocide, international law required concrete proof of the intention to destroy a race of people.

ICJ judges have only once before ruled that genocide was committed, in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia.

Flag-waving supporters have joined rallies in support of Suu Kyi in 

several Myanmar cities (AFP Photo/Sai Aung Main)

'Bluntly lying'

UN investigators last year concluded that Myanmar's treatment of the Rohingya amounted to genocide.

The Gambia, a small west African state that is mainly Muslim, claims Myanmar breached the 1948 genocide convention and wants the court to take emergency measures to stop further violence.

It has the backing of the 57-nation Organisation for Islamic Cooperation plus Canada and the Netherlands.

The case is being closely watched by the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya still in Bangladesh.

"Suu Kyi was our hope. But since she came out of imprisonment, she shattered it. How does she deny Myanmar army's atrocities?" Mohammad Yunus, Rohingya imam at the Kutupalong Rohingya refugee camp, told AFP after hearing Suu Kyi speak.

Robi Ullah, another Rohingya, said: "She is bluntly lying in front of the highest court. Such a shame!"

Aung San Suu Kyi said the case painted a "misleading and incomplete 

picture" of the situation in Rakhine state (AFP Photo/Koen Van WEEL)

In The Hague, former war crimes prosecutor Stephen Rapp told a panel discussion organised by pro-Rohingya activists "we see echoes of the Holocaust and Rwanda" in Myanmar's persecution of the minority group.

"This was a genocide... and I am profoundly disappointed that Aung San Suu Kyi presented these arguments," said Rapp, who was also a former US ambassador-at-large for global justice under the administration of former US president Barack Obama.

But Suu Kyi's decision to personally lead her country's case at the court has proved popular at home, where the Rohingya are widely regarded as illegal immigrants.

Around 250 pro-Myanmar protesters gathered in front of the ICJ on Wednesday, carrying placards with Aung San Suu Kyi's face reading "We stand with you".

"These allegations against Myanmar and Suu Kyi are rubbish," said Chomar Oosterhof, 53, a Burmese woman living in the Netherlands.

Flag-waving supporters joined rallies in support of Suu Kyi in several Myanmar cities on Tuesday. Huge billboards of Suu Kyi and three smiling generals have also appeared around the country.

Around 250 pro-Myanmar protesters gathered in front of the International 

Court of Justice on Wednesday (AFP Photo/Koen Van WEEL)

'No tolerance' for abuses

A day after sitting through hours of graphic accounts of violence read out by The Gambia's lawyers, Suu Kyi admitted there may have been civilian casualties including some killed when a helicopter opened fire.

But she argued these were an inevitable part of the conflict.

"It cannot be ruled out that disproportionate force was used by members of the defence services... or that they did not distinguish clearly enough between fighters and civilians," she said.

Myanmar was leading its own investigation and "if war crimes have been committed", then its justice system would deal with them, she added.

"There will be no tolerance of human rights violations in Myanmar," she added.

Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh watched a livefeed of Aung San Suu Kyi's 

appearance at the ICJ on Wednesday (AFP Photo/Munir UZ ZAMAN)

Aung San Suu Kyi was once mentioned in the same breath as Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi, having won the Nobel Prize in 1991 for her resistance to Myanmar's junta, which ran the country for nearly half a century.

The military's rule was characterised by brutal civil conflicts, biting poverty and isolation.

After 15 years under house arrest, Suu Kyi was freed in 2010 and led her party to victory in elections in 2015.

But her defence of the same military that once kept her locked up has since caused international condemnation.

Myanmar meanwhile faces a number of legal challenges over the fate of the Rohingya, including a probe by the International Criminal Court -- a separate war crimes tribunal in The Hague -- and a lawsuit in Argentina personally mentioning Suu Kyi.

Rohingya call for Myanmar's Suu Kyi to acknowledge atrocities

Yahoo – AFP, Sam JAHAN, December 10, 2019

Dildar Begum, with her daughter, says Myanmar soldiers killed her husband and
two young sons (AFP Photo/Munir UZ ZAMAN)

From squalid refugee camps in Bangladesh, Rohingya who fled a brutal Myanmar military crackdown are calling on Aung San Suu Kyi to acknowledge the mass atrocities as she defends her country against genocide charges at the UN's top court.

The Nobel peace laureate arrived Tuesday at the International Court of Justice in The Hague to lead the defence against claims brought by Gambia that Myanmar's military tried to systematically wipe out the Muslim minority in 2017.

The violence sparked a mass exodus of some 740,000 Rohingya to refugee settlements in Bangladesh border towns, where survivors are still haunted by the rape and murder of loved ones by soldiers and vigilante mobs.

"Suu Kyi cannot deny anything. The international community must listen to our voice because we are the real victims," Sayed Ulla, a Rohingya leader, told AFP at one of the camps.

"I want to see the convicts go to the gallows. They killed us mercilessly. I won't get back my family," added widow Saida Khatun, who witnessed her parents, husband and three children being slaughtered.

"Only seeing them (perpetrators) being punished for their deeds will make me happy."

Rohingya children play at at Jamtola refugee camp in Ukhia. Nearly one million 

Rohingya live in squalid camps in Bangladesh after fleeing the Myanmar 

military crackdown (AFP Photo/MUNIR UZ ZAMAN)

Widow Dildar Begum told AFP her village of Tula Toli was razed and two of her children killed.

Revealing scars she said were caused by soldiers smashing her head with boots and rifle butts after raping her, Begum recalled how her husband and two sons, aged one and five, were hacked to pieces.

"I still can hear my sons' voices in my dreams cursing me as I failed to save them," the 35-year-old said, breaking down in tears.

UN investigators have concluded that the 2017 violence amounted to genocide, with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) estimating that at least 6,700 Rohingya were killed in the first month of the crackdown alone.

The case brought by the tiny west African nation of Gambia is the first international legal attempt to bring Myanmar to justice over the crisis.

Gambia, acting on behalf of the 57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, on Tuesday will ask the ICJ to take emergency measures to halt Myanmar's "ongoing genocidal actions" against the Rohingya.

Rohingya fleeing the violence in Myanmar head into Bangladesh in this picture from 

October 17, 2017. Gambia has brought genocide charges at the ICJ over the military 

crackdown (AFP Photo/MUNIR UZ ZAMAN)

Myanmar's military has insisted its crackdown was needed to root out Rohingya militants who attacked border police posts in 2017.

Suu Kyi has kept silent over the plight of the minority and defended the same generals who once kept her under house arrest for 15 years.

The hearing comes amid growing impatience in Dhaka over the presence of the refugees, who now number nearly one million, after two failed attempts to voluntarily repatriate them back to Myanmar's Rakhine state.

Ahead of Suu Kyi's ICJ appearance, hundreds of refugees gathered at one of the camps on Tuesday morning, chanting "Gambia, Gambia" and raising their fists.

"We prayed and chanted slogans for Gambia for filing the case against Myanmar," one refugee, who asked to remain anonymous, told AFP after the rally.

"We hope we'll get justice."

Aung San Suu Kyi to lead Myanmar defence against ICJ case

Yahoo – AFP, November 20, 2019

Myanmar's State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi will personally lead a team to
The Hague, her office said (AFP Photo/Lillian SUWANRUMPHA)

Myanmar's civilian leader and Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi will head up a delegation to the UN’s top court to defend a case accusing the mainly Buddhist country of genocide against Rohingya Muslims, the government said Wednesday, a decision that blind-sided observers.

West African nation Gambia is due to open its case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December on behalf of the 57 member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

The complaint accuses Myanmar of breaching the 1948 UN Genocide Convention through its brutal military campaign in 2017, which targeted the Rohingya minority in Rakhine state.

In the opening hearings, the small, majority-Muslim African country is expected to ask the court to make an emergency injunction to protect the Rohingya, pending a decision on whether to deal with the wider case.

But Suu Kyi will personally lead a team to The Hague to "defend the national interest of Myanmar," her office said.

Myanmar has also retained prominent international lawyers, it added.

The country has repeatedly justified the crackdown on the Rohingya as necessary to stamp out militants and insists its own committees are adequate to investigate allegations of abuse.

Some 740,000 Rohingya were forced to flee into sprawling camps in Bangladesh after the brutal 2017 military crackdown, in violence that United Nations investigators concluded amounted to genocide.

'Never ever surrender'

The case will be the first international legal attempt to bring Myanmar to justice over the Rohingya crisis, and is a rare example of a country suing another over an issue to which it is not directly a party.

The ICJ was set up in 1946 after World War II to adjudicate in disputes between UN member states.

Myanmar's 2017 military campaign targeted the Rohingya minority (AFP Photo/

Ye Aung THU)

Gambia's effort is one of several legal challenges mounting against Myanmar.

The International Criminal Court -- another Hague-based court set up in 2002 to probe war crimes -- last week authorised its chief prosecutor to launch a full investigation into the persecution of the Rohingya.

Myanmar has not signed up to the ICC and therefore rejects its authority.

But the probe says it can be held responsible for crimes that affect neighbouring Bangladesh, which has signed up to the court.

Rights groups have meanwhile filed a separate lawsuit over the Rohingya in Argentina in which Myanmar's former democracy icon Sun Kyi was personally named.

This is under "universal jurisdiction", a legal principle which holds that some crimes are so horrific, they can be tried anywhere.

Independent Yangon-based analyst David Mathieson said the decision for Suu Kyi to lead the defence team personally was certainly a shock but he thought it "could potentially be positive".

"(She) should use the trip to absorb this information, not just denounce accountability measures as undue pressure on Myanmar," he said.

The former rights champion, widely condemned in the West for failing to stand up for the Rohingya, still enjoys overwhelming support at home where many buy the official line that the Rohingya are illegal immigrants.

Wednesday’s announcement is also likely to further rally people to her side as the country heads into an election next year.

As the news spread, outpourings of praise were posted on Facebook.

"Bravo!" congratulated Mg Khin. "She (Suu Kyi) will never ever surrender."

Myanmar faces genocide lawsuit at top UN court

Yahoo – AFP, November 11, 2019

Gambia has filed a lawsuit against Myanmar to force it "to cease and desist
from its genocidal acts" against Royingya victims (AFP Photo/MUNIR UZ ZAMAN)

The Hague (AFP) - Myanmar faced accusations of genocide in a landmark lawsuit filed by Gambia at the UN's top court on Monday over the Southeast Asian nation's treatment of Rohingya Muslims, Gambia's government said.

Gambia said it was acting on behalf of the 57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in bringing the case against Myanmar before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.

The lawsuit accuses mainly Buddhist Myanmar of breaching the 1948 UN Genocide Convention through a brutal military campaign targeting the Rohingya minority in Rakhine state.

The 2017 crackdown forced 740,000 Rohingya to flee over the border into sprawling camps in Bangladesh, in violence that United Nations investigators say amounts to "genocide".

"The Gambia is taking this action to seek justice and accountability for the genocide being committed by Myanmar against the Rohingya," Justice Minister Abubacarr Tambadou said in a statement.

The court is expected to hold its first hearings in December on Gambia's request for urgent interim measures "to protect the Rohingya against further harm", Gambia's lawyers Foley Hoag said in a statement, describing the case as "historic".

Human Rights Watch hailed the move by the tiny west African state, saying it was the "first judicial scrutiny" of Myanmar's alleged crimes against the Rohingya.

Param-Preet Singh, associate international justice director at HRW, said the court's "prompt adoption of provisional measures could help stop the worst ongoing abuses" in Myanmar.

The lawsuit asks the ICJ to "order Myanmar to cease and desist from its genocidal acts, to punish the perpetrators, and to provide reparations for the Rohingya victims," Gambia's justice ministry said.

It said Myanmar had failed to meet its obligations to prevent and to punish genocide, accusing it of "wanton acts of violence and malicious degradation with the specific intent of state actors to destroy the Rohingya as a group".

'Stepped up'

Mainly-Muslim Gambia said it had "stepped up" to file the case on behalf of the rest of the OIC. Tambadou is a former genocide prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and has visited Rohingya camps in Bangladesh.

Other legal attempts to bring Myanmar to justice over allegations of crimes against the Rohingya have so far stalled.

The prosecutor for the International Criminal Court -- a separate tribunal from the ICJ that investigates war crimes -- launched a preliminary investigation into Myanmar in 2018 but no charges have been filed yet.

UN investigators have also called on the UN Security Council to refer Myanmar to the Hague-based ICC or to set up a tribunal, like for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, but again no action has yet been taken.

The ICJ was set up in 1946 after World War II to adjudicate in disputes between UN member states.

It normally deals with issues of international law such as border disputes, but sometimes rules on alleged breaches of UN conventions such as those on terrorism or genocide.

The ICJ previously dealt with a genocide case when Bosnia brought a lawsuit against Serbia over the conflict in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

That case ended in 2007 with Serbia being held to have failed to prevent genocide during the 1995 Srebrenica massacre and of failing to cooperate with war crimes tribunals.

Japan issues complaint after whaling vessel collides with Dutch protest boat

Deutsche Welle, 3 February 2014

Japan has asked the Netherlands to take "practical measures" against a Dutch-registered anti-whaling vessel. The boat collided with a Japanese whaling ship off Antarctica over the weekend. Both sides have traded blame.

Japan's government condemned the actions of the anti-whaling protest boat on Monday in the latest twist in the long-running battle between conservationists and whalers.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, Japan's top government spokesman, said the anti-whaling group known as Sea Shepherd had orchestrated the collision, which took place in the Southern Ocean on Sunday.

"The sabotage activity was extremely dangerous," Suga told reporters.

The spokesman said Japan had urged the Netherlands to take "practical" measures to prevent a recurrence of Sunday's collision.

Sea Shepherd claim the Japanese vessel was responsible for the incident. The group alleged the Japanese ship hit their boat, the Bob Barker, in an effort to drive them away.

It said the harpoon vessel had spent hours prior to the collision dragging steel cables across the bows of the Sea Shepherd's ships in a bid to damage the rudders and propellers.

It was an "unprovoked attack" by the Japanese harpooners, carried out in a "ruthless" fashion, Bob Barker Captain Peter Hammarstedt said.

No one was injured in the incident, although both boats sustained minor damage.

The Bob Barker is named after the host of the US game show "The Price Is Right," who has donated millions of dollars to the group.

Whaling ruling expected

Australia's Environment Minister Greg Hunt ordered an investigation into the collision on Monday, issuing a warning to both groups.

"This must be a message to both parties - whalers and protesters - these are dangerous waters, nobody can play any games with safety, nobody can play any games with international law," Hunt said.

"Everyone must abide by the law and, of course, if there is evidence that either party has breached international maritime law, we will raise it."

Japan is legally permitted to hunt whales in Antarctica for scientific purposes under an exception to a 1986 ban on whaling. The country is reportedly planning to kill roughly 1,000 whales this year.

"Our research whaling is a legitimate activity allowed under the international treaty. Sea Shepherd's violent sabotage against it, which is threatening the lives of the Japanese crewmembers and causing damage to our ships and equipment, cannot be tolerated," the national Fisheries Agency announced in a statement.

Critics say Japan's whaling program is a guise for commercial whaling, as meat not used for study is sold as food.

Australia has appealed to the UN's highest court to outlaw the program. The International Court of Justice is expected to issue its decision later this year.

ccp/mkg (AFP, AP)

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The Netherlands to investigate Sea Shepard - Japan whaler - New
Australia to investigate claim Japanese whalers rammed Sea Shepherd ship - New

Kryon Q&A

Question: Dear Kryon: I was wondering about the way I feel about whales and dolphins. I've had a feeling that I have to go to them sometime, but I don't know how or what I'm to do when I get there. Please help.

Question: Dear Kryon: I'm a Turkish/Islam woman of 57. I live in Ankara and work for the European Commission's project in Turkey. I've read almost all of the Kryon books twice, and I'm planning to read them once more. My question is about the whales. Why do they commit mass suicide? What is the reason for this very sad event? Is it a kind of protest against Human Beings?

Answer: Dear ones, we've channelled many times about the whales of this planet. In review, they're the living portions of an actual grid-system! They contain the "history of Earth" within their beings, and they're sacred for that reason. They coordinate and cooperate with the crystalline grid of your planet, which is currently being rewritten (see Kryon channelling on the Website: "What's Next?" December 8, 2002). Doesn't it strike you odd that these mammals are the only ones protected against hunting by more than 90 percent of the countries of Earth... even the places without oceans? Do you think that this is an accident or a coincidence? No. It's cellular information for all humanity to protect the whales and keep them safe. Dolphins are their cousins and support group, and they play a role in the whales' development. This is why you're so attracted to them.

Whales do not commit mass suicide. They have no consciousness to allow for this, and it has never happened. Instead, you see whales often beaching themselves and then being saved by Humans, only to re-beach themselves and die. This takes place mostly on the coastlines of your continents, and often on those areas of topography that "stick out," such as a peninsula or isthmus. Your Cape Cod is a good example in America, and is also a place where this has recently happened (up to 47 whales on a beach).

The reason is that whales, dolphins, amphibians, birds, and even insects all navigate to their breeding ground or migration areas each year via the magnetic grid of the planet! Each group follows the ley lines of magnetic influence, almost as if they had a built-in compass. In fact, they actually do!

The magnetic grid of this planet has changed so much, so quickly, as we told you it would in 1989, that there hasn't been time for the pods of whales to adjust with time to these changes. Instead, many simply follow the old magnetic lines of migration, only to find themselves on a beach instead of the open ocean, as the old magnetic direction used to take them. They're confused, and they simply line up and try again, just as they have for years. These things are temporary, and as tragic as you might see them, it's all part of "pruning" the system, and the calves will go around in the future, establishing new instinctive information for the new whales regarding the grid changes. This information has even now been validated this year (2003) by your scientists.

Orcas put on show as ferry transports tribal artifacts to Bainbridge Island

Killer whales have been thrilling whale watchers this week in Puget Sound. But
they were especially exciting Tuesday when nearly three dozen orcas surrounded
 the ferry from Seattle as it approached the terminal on Bainbridge Island. NOAA
Fisheries Service photo by Candice Emmons

World Court to Shine Light on East Timor-Australia Spy Row

Jakarta Globe – AFP, Charles Onians, January 19, 2014

East Timorese activists hold a banner during a protest outside the Australian
 embassy in Dili, East Timor, on Dec. 9, 2013. (EPA Photo/Antonio Dasiparu)

The Hague. Tiny, young East Timor drags its giant neighbor Australia before the United Nations’ top court next week in a cloak-and-dagger case with billions of dollars in natural resources at stake.

At the heart of the David and Goliath dispute at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague is a controversial oil and gas treaty signed by Dili in 2006, shortly after independence from Indonesia.

East Timor wants judges at the ICJ, which rules on disputes between states, to order Australia to return documents its intelligence services seized last year relating to Dili’s bid to get the treaty torn up.

“It’s simple: we’re asking for our documents back. Australia has unlawfully taken documents that are rightfully the property of Timor-Leste,” government spokesman Agio Pereira told AFP ahead of Monday’s hearing.

East Timor gained its independence in 2002 following years of brutal Indonesian occupation but has a sluggish economy that is heavily dependent on oil and gas.

Dili wants the key treaty it signed with Canberra in 2006 dividing oil and gas resources ripped up, saying Australia spied on ministers to gain a commercial advantage.

Australia allegedly used an aid project refurbishing East Timor’s cabinet offices as a front to plant listening devices in the walls in order to eavesdrop on deliberations about the treaty in 2004.

The treaty, Certain Maritime Arrangements in the Timor Sea, or CMATS, set out a 50-50 split of proceeds from the vast maritime energy fields between Australia and East Timor estimated at 26 billion euros ($36 billion).

Dili signed such treaties “at fragile and vulnerable times in our young nation’s history,” government spokesman Pereira said.

“Now, in 2014, we are acting with a new breadth of information, data and analysis, including information that Australia may have acted in bad faith and in breach of international law.”

Australian media have reported that the lion’s share of Timor Sea oil and gas would be on Timorese territory if the maritime border were defined according to customary rules of the sea.

But first the half-island nation wants the ICJ to order the return of documents seized in November when Australia’s domestic spy agency raided the Canberra offices of East Timor’s lawyer, Bernard Collaery.

Collaery is representing East Timor’s government in its bid lodged last year to get the CMATS treaty cancelled at the Permanent Court of Arbitration, housed in the same Palace of Justice in The Hague as the ICJ.

While that case is being held behind closed doors, the ICJ hearings will for the first time shine a very public light on Australia’s alleged skullduggery.

“This is going to be pretty hard on Australia’s image, it’s not exactly glorious for them,” international law expert Olivier Rentelink from The Hague’s Asser Institute told AFP.

The premises of a former Australian intelligence agent turned whistleblower in the arbitration case against Canberra were also raided.

Australia has largely refused to comment on the proceedings, although Prime Minister Tony Abbott has defended the raids as in the national interest.

East Timor Minister for Petroleum and Mineral Resources Alfredo Pires stressed his country’s generally good relations with Australia but said: “The only avenue we have as a small country is international legislation.”

Dili has asked for “provisional measures” until the ICJ rules on the case, including that the documents be handed to the court and that Australia guarantee it will not intercept communications between East Timor and its legal advisers.

“Timor Leste is a young country, we had the UN here and everyone teaching us transparency, the rule of law, and then we get one of the great teachers not following the rules,” said Pires.

Cases at the ICJ can take years to resolve.

Agence France-Presse

Top UN court awards temple area to Cambodia

Google – AFP, 11 November 2013

Cambodian Buddhist monks walk at Preah Vihear temple near the Cambodia-Thailand

 border in Preah Vihear province, some 400 kilometers north of Phnom Penh, on

November 10, 2013 (AFP, Tang Chhin Sothy)

The Hague — The UN's top court ruled Monday that the area around a flashpoint ancient temple on the Thai border belongs to Cambodia and that any Thai security forces there should leave.

The International Court of Justice interpreted a 1962 ruling saying that "Cambodia had sovereignty over the whole territory of the promontory of Preah Vihear," Judge Peter Tomka said.

"In consequence Thailand was under an obligation to withdraw from that territory thai military or police forces or other guards or keepers who were station there," Tomka said.

A Cambodian villager walks out from a bunker

 he dug as a precaution in a village near the 

Cambodia-Thailand border in Preah Vihear 

province, some 400 kilometres north of Phnom

 Penh on November 11, 2013 (AFP, Tang Chhin

Sothy)

At least 28 people have been killed in outbreaks of violence since 2011 over the ownership of the patch of border land next to the 900-year-old Preah Vihear temple.

"It's good enough," Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, who was at the hearing in The Hague, told reporters.

Last year the ICJ ruled that both countries should withdraw forces from around the ancient Khmer temple, which is perched on a clifftop in Cambodia but is more easily accessed from the Thai side.

Cambodia and Thailand finally pulled hundreds of soldiers from the disputed zone in July 2012, replacing them with police and security guards.

Ahead of the ruling by the Netherlands-based ICJ, there were fears that the decision would revive nationalist tensions and spark renewed clashes.

Tens of thousands of people were displaced in the 2011 fighting, leading Cambodia to ask the ICJ for an interpretation of an original 1962 ruling.

Thailand does not dispute Cambodia's ownership of the temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site, but both sides laid claim to an adjacent 4.6-square-kilometre (1.8-square-mile) piece of land.

Leaders of the two countries appealed for calm before the ruling by 17 international judges.

The court decision is binding and cannot be appealed.

The mood on both sides of the Preah Vihear temple was tense ahead of the verdict, with tourists still allowed to visit the ancient structure via Cambodian territory. But journalists were denied access.

The Cambodian army meanwhile denied local media reports that it had sent military reinforcements to the area.

Cambodian soldiers travel along a road

 about 20 kilometres from Preah Vihear

 temple on November 11, 2013 (AFP, Tang

Chhin Sothy)

On her Facebook page Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra vowed Sunday to "consult" with Cambodia after the decision to avoid any conflict, adding her government would make a statement following the verdict.

The ruling, which was broadcast live on Thai television, is fraught with danger for her government, which is already grappling with mass street demonstrations against a controversial political amnesty bill.

The country's opposition is now likely to direct public anger towards Yingluck, whose divisive brother Thaksin is close to Cambodia's strongman premier Hun Sen.

Cambodia has allowed Thaksin -- who lives in self-imposed exile to avoid a jail term for corruption -- to hold a number of rallies for his "Red Shirt" supporters on its soil.

There are fears a negative verdict for Thailand will increase anger among hardline nationalists.

In a television appeal last week Hun Sen urged his armed forces to "remain calm and show restraint", adding he had agreed with his Thai counterpart to abide by the ICJ's decision.

The roots of the dispute lie in maps drawn up in 1907 during French colonial rule.

Japan to take S. Korea islands row to international court

Deutsche Welle, 11 Aug 2012

Japan says it will take a territorial dispute with South Korea to the International Court of Justice. This comes a day after the South Korean president fueled tensions with a trip to the islands at the center of the row.

A spokesperson for Japan's foreign minister said in an e-mailed statement on Saturday that Tokyo would bring the dispute over the islands to the international court following what was described as an "unacceptable action" on the part of the South Korean president.

"Japan decided to act to peacefully solve the issue by bringing it to the International Court of Justice," the statement said.

It said that in view of the visit to the islands by President Lee Myung-bak, presenting Japan's position to the international community was "more important than holding back, giving consideration for the whole Japan-ROK [Republic of Korea] relations."

The action would be taken in the "not too distant future," the statement said.

Constant bone of contention

Lee on Friday raised Japan's ire by visiting the islands - known as Takeshima in Japan and Dokdo in South Korea - which lie equidistant from the two mainlands and have been an ongoing source of tension between the two countries for decades. The islands, currently under Seoul's control, are thought to have rich frozen natural gas deposits.

Japan recalled its ambassador to South Korea on Friday, after Lee visited the disputed islands, the first South Korean leader to have done so. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda described Lee's trip as "extremely deplorable."

South Korean officials said the surprise visit was meant solely to underline the islands' importance as a natural reserve.

Relations between the two countries continue to be marred by historical disputes, despite close economic ties in recent times. Korea was under Japanese colonial rule from 1910 to 1945, something many Koreans still resent.

Japan may find it hard to bring the issue to the court, as it requires an agreement between the disputing parties to make its ruling binding. In the past, South Korea has several times rejected Japanese proposals to let the court rule on the dispute.

tj/slk (Reuters, AFP)