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."

US wants UN to take up Dalai Lama succession: envoy

Yahoo – AFP, Shaun TANDON, November 8, 2019

The Dalai Lama arrives for prayers wishing him a long life at the Tsuglagkhang
temple in McLeod Ganj, India in September 2019 -- the US wants the UN to
look at the issue of who will succeed him (AFP Photo/Lobsang Wangyal)

Washington (AFP) - The United States wants the United Nations to take up the Dalai Lama's succession in an intensifying bid to stop China from trying to handpick his successor, an envoy said after meeting the Tibetan spiritual leader.

Sam Brownback, the US ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, said he spoke at length about the succession issue with the 84-year-old Dalai Lama last week in the monk's home-in-exile of Dharamsala, India.

Brownback said he told the Dalai Lama that the United States would seek to build global support for the principle that the choice of the next spiritual chief "belongs to the Tibetan Buddhists and not the Chinese government."

"I would hope that the UN would take the issue up," Brownback told AFP after returning to Washington.

He acknowledged that China, with its veto power on the Security Council, would work strenuously to block any action, but he hoped countries could at least raise their voices at the United Nations.

"I think it's really important to have an early global conversation because this is a global figure with a global impact," he said.

US religious freedom envoy Sam Brownback, seen here at a July 2019 ministerial 

meeting in Washington, is raising pressure over the Dalai Lama's succession (AFP 

Photo/MANDEL NGAN)

"That's the big thing that we're really after now, to stir this before we're right in the middle of it -- if something happens to the Dalai Lama, that there has been this robust discussion globally about it ahead of time," he said.

"My estimation undoubtedly is that the (Chinese) communist party has thought a lot about this. So they've got a plan and I think we have to be equally aggressive with a plan."

The Dalai Lama once traveled incessantly, drawing huge Western audiences with his good-humored lectures on compassion and happiness.

But the Nobel Peace Prize winner has slowed down and earlier this year suffered a chest infection, although he is not known to have serious health issues.

Brownback said he found the Dalai Lama "quite jovial" and that the monk had told him, "'Look, I'm going to live another 15, 20 years; I'm going to outlast the Chinese government.'"

But Beijing has indicated it is waiting out the Dalai Lama, believing his campaign for greater Tibetan autonomy will end with him.

China, which argues that it has brought modernization and development to the Himalayan region, has increasingly hinted that it could name the next Dalai Lama, who would presumably be groomed to support Chinese rule.

Indian police detain Tibetan students as they protest against the visit of 

China's President Xi Jinping in Chennai in October 2019 (AFP Photo/STR)

In 1995, the officially atheist government selected its own Panchen Lama and detained a six-year-old identified for the influential Buddhist position -- whom rights groups called the world's youngest political prisoner.

Seeking 'unfettered' access

Mindful of Beijing's plans, the 14th Dalai Lama has mused about breaking with the centuries-old tradition in which wandering monks look for signs that a young boy is the reincarnation.

He has said that he could pick his own successor, possibly a girl, or even declare himself the final Dalai Lama.

The US Congress has also stepped up efforts, including by mandating visa denials by the end of the year for Chinese officials unless Beijing eases restrictions on US diplomats, journalists and ordinary people seeking to visit Tibet.

Brownback said he would like access to Tibet, "but I want it unfettered."

He said he similarly hoped to visit the western region of Xinjiang, which has drawn intense US scrutiny over the incarceration of some one million Uighurs and other Turkic-speaking Muslims.

"It is part of the same war on faith," Brownback said of Tibet and Xinjiang.

A Tibetan-in-exile carries a photograph of the Dalai Lama during celebrations 

marking the Lunar New Year in Kathmandu in February 2018 (AFP Photo/

PRAKASH MATHEMA)

Fears in Nepal

Brownback also visited Nepal, historically the gateway for Tibetans fleeing to India but which has increasingly clamped down under pressure from its giant northern neighbor.

Brownback said he raised fears for Tibetans with Nepal's foreign minister, Pradeep Gyawali.

But he acknowledged Nepal's difficult situation and said: "I would hate to be very harsh on the Nepalese because they've been so good over so many years to help the Tibetans."

Brownback said that the burden was ultimately with China to allow freedom of movement -- and not to interfere in Tibetan Buddhism.

"A government doesn't own a religion," he said. "A religion runs itself."

"We hope we'll get a number of other communities around the world to express similar positions and concerns."

Asia must quit 'coal addiction': UN chief

Yahoo – AFP, Joe Freeman, November 2, 2019

Several Asian megacities are at risk of flooding linked to global
warming (AFP Photo/Manan VATSYAYANA)

The UN chief on Saturday warned Asia to quit its "addiction" to coal, as climate change threatens hundreds of millions of people vulnerable to rising sea levels across the region.

The warning follows fresh research this week predicting that several Asian megacities, including Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City and Mumbai, are at risk of extreme flooding linked to global warming.

Antonio Guterres said Asian countries need to cut reliance on coal to tackle the climate crisis, which he called the "defining issue of our time".

"There is an addiction to coal that we need to overcome because it remains a major threat in relation to climate change," he told reporters ahead of a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Bangkok on Saturday.

He said countries in the region need to be on "the front line" of the fight by introducing carbon pricing and reforming energy policies.

"We are lagging behind," he said, adding that the rollback of coal could help curb rising global temperatures.

Coal remains a major source of power across Southeast Asia, where breakneck economic development has spurred soaring energy demands -- but at a cost to the environment.

Antonio Guterres said Asian countries need to cut reliance on coal to
head off the climate crisis (AFP Photo/Joe Freeman)

About one-third of Vietnam's energy comes from coal power with a slew of new plants set to come online by 2050, while Thailand is investing in fossil fuels.

Coastal areas across Southeast Asia have already seen major floods and seawater incursion linked to climate change.

New research this week showed that at least 300 million people worldwide are living in places at risk of inundation by 2050, a much bleaker picture than previous data predicted.

Destructive storm surges fuelled by increasingly powerful cyclones and rising seas will hit Asia hardest, according to the study in the journal Nature Communications.

The UN chief also spoke on Myanmar's persecuted Rohingya Muslims, nearly three-quarters of a million of whom were driven into Bangladesh in 2017.

He urged Myanmar's government to "address the root causes of displacement and allowing of the return, voluntary and in safety and dignity" to Myanmar.

"Some steps have been done but they are too small. We need to do much more," he said.

Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi is also in Bangkok for the summit and is likely to face pressure over her country's treatment of the Rohingya, particularly from Muslim-majority Malaysia and Indonesia.

Myanmar has rebuffed all international pressure so far while only hundreds of Rohingya have returned to Myanmar, due to fear of further repression.

Related Articles:

"Recalibration of Free Choice"– Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth, 4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical) 8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“… 4 - Energy (again)

The natural resources of the planet are finite and will not support the continuation of what you've been doing. We've been saying this for a decade. Watch for increased science and increased funding for alternate ways of creating electricity (finally). Watch for the very companies who have the most to lose being the ones who fund it. It is the beginning of a full realization that a change of thinking is at hand. You can take things from Gaia that are energy, instead of physical resources. We speak yet; again about geothermal, about tidal, about wind. Again, we plead with you not to over-engineer this. For one of the things that Human Beings do in a technological age is to over-engineer simple things. Look at nuclear - the most over-engineered and expensive steam engine in existence!

Your current ideas of capturing energy from tidal and wave motion don't have to be technical marvels. Think paddle wheel on a pier with waves, which will create energy in both directions [waves coming and going] tied to a generator that can power dozens of neighborhoods, not full cities. Think simple and decentralize the idea of utilities. The same goes for wind and geothermal. Think of utilities for groups of homes in a cluster. You won't have a grid failure if there is no grid. This is the way of the future, and you'll be more inclined to have it sooner than later if you do this, and it won't cost as much…

Water

We've told you that one of the greatest natural resources of the planet, which is going to shift and change and be mysterious to you, is fresh water. It's going to be the next gold, dear ones. So, we have also given you some hints and examples and again we plead: Even before the potentials of running out of it, learn how to desalinate water in real time without heat. It's there, it's doable, and some already have it in the lab. This will create inexpensive fresh water for the planet. 

There is a change of attitude that is starting to occur. Slowly you're starting to see it and the only thing getting in the way of it are those companies with the big money who currently have the old system. That's starting to change as well. For the big money always wants to invest in what it knows is coming next, but it wants to create what is coming next within the framework of what it has "on the shelf." What is on the shelf is oil, coal, dams, and non-renewable resource usage. It hasn't changed much in the last 100 years, has it? Now you will see a change of free choice. You're going to see decisions made in the boardrooms that would have curled the toes of those two generations ago. Now "the worst thing they could do" might become "the best thing they could do." That, dear ones, is a change of free choice concept. When the thinkers of tomorrow see options that were never options before, that is a shift. That was number four.”

“Afraid of Love” + “What’s Wrong Today”, Laguna Hills, California, US(2), Dec 9, 2018 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll)

• Stagnation of the current US Politics: Compassioned (US) leaders will arise in the future
• Shortage of fresh/drinking water: Invention to make salt from salt water magnetic and remove it with water desalination process in high volumes
• Pollution on Earth: 1 - Stop killing the environment! / 2 - The rise of temperature on Earth is “temporary” and is part of the "regular" Watercycle.
• Replacement of current fossil energy source: Use of magnetics based (small/big) engines to produces electricity / free energy
• Plastic pollution in the oceans: Invention to remove the plastics gradually from the oceans

Young Taliban must be heard, says new UN youth envoy

Yahoo – AFP, Pierre CELERIER, October 29, 2019

For Aisha Khurram, reaching out to all young Afghans -- including those joining
the ranks of the Taliban insurgency -- is critical (AFP Photo/WAKIL KOHSAR)

Afghanistan's ruling elite and international power brokers must listen to the fast-growing youth population -- including junior Taliban members -- if the war is ever to end, the country's new youth delegate to the United Nations says.

In a nation at war for 40 years and where two-thirds of the population is aged 24 or under, twenty-year-old Aisha Khurram says the younger generation's concerns have been shunted aside even as they inherit the conflict.

"For decades and even centuries, our fears and future have always been decided by the warring parties, irrespective of our perspective, irrespective of our opinions and our part in the process," Khurram told AFP in the UN's Kabul compound.

The international relations student at Kabul University was picked from 100 candidates for her high-profile role in early October, at the end of a tough selection process.

For Khurram, reaching out to all young Afghans -- including those joining the ranks of the Taliban insurgency -- is critical.

"Before they join the militant groups... we have to make the opportunities for them," she said.

"We have to hear their voices, we have to consider their right for education, their right for work opportunities and their right for life," she added.

"My own peer groups... do not enjoy the access to education, do not enjoy the opportunities that we have right now in Afghanistan."

Afghanistan's mainstream media -- concentrated in Kabul -- only reflect the views of urban Afghans she said, effectively blacking out opinions of vast swathes of the country, especially young people.

"It's not inclusive", she said.

She offered the #MyRedLine social media movement as an example in which young Afghans -- mostly educated -- state the "red line" they are not prepared to see Afghanistan cross in any eventual peace deal with the Taliban.

The campaign is "ignoring the needs and demands of the Afghan youth that are living outside of the Kabul (region)," she said, noting their urgent need for security trumps many "secondary" rights.

Global youth

Khurram, who was born in Pakistan after her family fled violence in Afghanistan, came of age at a time when the gruelling conflict is worsening.

According to the UN, the period of July to September this year was the deadliest on record for civilians, with more than 2,500 killed.

With half of the world's population now aged under 25, the UN is trying to amplify young voices at major summits through a youth delegation programme.

Countries can select representatives to advocate on several priority areas including the environment, juvenile justice and employment. But for Khurram, the key issue is peace.

She first went to Afghanistan in 2004, three years after the US-led invasion to topple the Taliban and hunt for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

In recent years the security situation has only deteriorated, and the US spent the past year pushing for a deal with the Taliban that would have seen the Pentagon pull thousands of troops from Afghanistan in return for security guarantees.

But President Donald Trump nixed talks last month as Taliban attacks continued.

Khurram said many Afghans were suspicious of the negotiations, which cut out the government of President Ashraf Ghani, who is currently seeking election for a second term.

"There are three parties in the conflict, and only two of them now are engaged in negotiations," she said. "Afghan people deserve to be a part of this process."

Afghans under 18 make up around half the estimated population of 37 million, but Afghanistan's political class does not reflect the country's youth.

A grizzled crew of old-school warlords and bickering elders still dominate the political scene, focused on consolidating power instead of strengthening national governance.

Khurram said she is helping to organise a "youth jirga" -- a meeting in which young people from all over the country can come together and brainstorm ways to influence any peace process.

Kim's horseback ride spurs policy shift speculation

Yahoo – AFP, 16 October 2019

Analysts say Kimg Jong Un's horseback hike may signal a new policy direction
for the nuclear-armed North

New pictures of Kim Jong Un riding a white horse through a winter landscape to the summit of Mount Paektu, a sacred peak for North Koreans, have fuelled speculation that the young leader may be set for a major policy announcement.

The images released by the official KCNA news agency were accompanied by a gushing text, that noted the "noble glitters" in Kim's eyes, and labelled his snowy, horseback ride "a great event of weighty importance" for the nation.

Accompanying officials were left convinced that "there will be a great operation to strike the world with wonder again and make a step forward in the Korean revolution," the agency said.

Pictures of Kim Jong Un riding a white horse through a winter landscape have 

fuelled speculation that the young leader may be set for a major policy announcement

Analysts said the hike may signal a new policy direction for the nuclear-armed North.

"In the past, Kim has climbed Mount Paektu ahead of major political decisions," said Shin Beom-chul, an analyst at the Asan Institute of Policy Studies.

Kim hiked to the peak in December 2017 before launching diplomatic overtures that led to his first ever summit with US President Donald Trump.

But negotiations have been gridlocked since a second summit between Kim and Trump collapsed in February and the North has been raising tensions through a series of missile tests.

The official KCNA news agency described Kim Jong Un's horseback mountain 

ride as 'a great event of weighty importance' for the nation

The sight of North Korean leaders riding white horses across snow-capped peaks – and in particular Mount Paektu - have been a dominant theme of past photos, posters and portraits of Kim's father Kim Jong Il and grandfather Kim Il Sung.

According to B.R. Myers, a professor at Dongseo University in South Korea who specialises in North Korean propaganda, the images present an imperial motif of a leader protecting the cultural and ideological purity of the nation from corrupt, outside forces.

Kim also visited the site of a giant construction project in nearby Samjiyon county, KCNA reported, and blamed US-led international sanctions for his country's hardships.

Kim Jong Un also visited the site of a giant construction project in Samjiyon 

county, KCNA reported

"The situation of the country is difficult owing to the ceaseless sanctions and pressure by the hostile forces and there are many hardships and trials facing us," Kim was quoted as saying.

North Korea is under multiple sets of UN sanctions for its nuclear and missile programmes.

Pyongyang and Washington restarted working-level talks this month in Sweden only for it to quickly break down, with the North blaming the US for not giving up its "old attitude".

North Korea tested this month what it said was a submarine-launched ballistic missile that marked a "new phase" in its capabilities -- the most provocative in a series of weapons tests it carried out since 2018.

Moon's posted two pictures of the pooches, one of them showing five furry white 

pups cuddled on Moon's lap with the sixth in the first lady's arms

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Suu Kyi 'culpability' in Rohingya abuses an 'open-ended question': UN investigator

Yahoo – AFP, 17 September 2019

Suu Kyi is a Nobel laureate who spent years in house arrest

UN investigators called Tuesday for an expert evaluation of whether Myanmar's civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi can be legally implicated in the abuses committed against the country's Rohingya minority.

The fact-finding mission to Myanmar, set up by the UN Human Rights Council, said they were not equipped to determine what level of responsibility Suu Kyi should shoulder for the Rohingya crisis.

"It will become a legal issue whether or not there is an element of culpability here," fact-finding mission chair Marzuki Darusman told reporters in Geneva.

The Human Rights Council recently created a panel to prepare criminal indictments over atrocities committed in the country -- the so-called Independent International Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM) -- which could have the expertise to determine what responsibility Suu Kyi bears in the crisis.

A Rohingya child plays with a football inside a sewage pipe at a refugee camp

"It is still an open-ended question to what extent she might be implicated," Darusman said.

When asked if the Nobel laureate might be implicated, he said "that is for the judicial process to address," referring to the IIMM.

The fact-finding mission last year branded the army operation in August 2017 as "genocide" and called for the prosecution of top generals, including army chief Min Aung Hlaing.

Some 740,000 Rohingya fled burning villages, bringing accounts of murder, rape and torture over the border to sprawling refugee camps in Bangladesh, where survivors of previous waves of persecution already languished.

And in a damning report published Monday, the investigators warned that the 600,000 Rohingya still inside Myanmar's Rakhine state remain in deteriorating and "deplorable" conditions and continue to face a "serious risk of genocide".

Some 740,000 Rohingya fled burning villages, bringing accounts of murder,

rape and torture

The experts told the rights council on Tuesday that they had a confidential list of some 150 names, including officials, suspected of being involved in genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

'Criminal responsibility'?

Darusman said that the investigators initially shied away from laying blame on Suu Kyi, who spent years in house arrest before her party in 2015 won Myanmar's first fully free vote for generations.

He said that the fact-finding team had taken into account that Myanmar was "going through a transition, a democratic transition, and therefore in our first report we absolved Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi from any direct responsibility."

But while it was likely that Suu Kyi was not aware in August 2017 of the army's activities, "the issue now is that subsequently, there was no further addressing of this issue on her part," Darusman said.

Major Rohingya refugee camp populations in Bangladesh, as of Aug 15, 2019

Another member of the fact-finding mission, Christopher Sidoti, acknowledged that "it is clear that the civilian side of the government does not control the military side of the government."

But "the civilian side of the government has very substantial constitutional responsibilities," he said.

"The longer this goes on, the more impossible it is for the civilian side of the government to escape international criminal responsibility for the human rights situation in Myanmar."

The fact-finding mission, which was never granted access to Myanmar, is expected to wrap up its work during the ongoing session of the Human Rights Council, due to end next week.

But the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights situation in Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, should continue monitoring the situation.

UN rights investigator on Myanmar lambasts Suu Kyi

Yahoo – AFP, September 3, 2019

Suu Kyi no longer deserved to be called a democracy activist, Lee said (AFP
Photo/Jung Yeon-je)

Seoul (AFP) - Myanmar's civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi has washed her hands of the Rohingya crisis, a UN rights investigator said Tuesday ahead of a meeting between South Korea's President Moon Jae-in and the tarnished democracy icon.

Yanghee Lee, a university professor in Seoul who is the United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights to Myanmar, said Suu Kyi was "terribly misguided and misinformed" about the abuses against the stateless Muslim minority in her country.

The Nobel laureate was under house arrest for years when Myanmar was a military dictatorship before her party won elections in 2015 by a landslide, in the first fully free vote for generations.

Hopes were high that she would usher in a new era of freedom, but more than 740,000 Rohingya have since been driven out of the Buddhist-majority country and into Bangladesh in a 2017 army crackdown.

The US in July banned Myanmar's army chief Min Aung Hlaing and other officers for their role in the campaign of "ethnic cleansing".

Suu Kyi was spared from the sanctions but no longer deserved to be called a democracy activist, Lee told AFP.

"She should step up and really speak out for the treatment that the Rohingya had suffered for decades," she told AFP.

"It's time for her to speak out and use the word, call them the way they identify themselves as the Rohingya."

Myanmar calls the persecuted minority "Bengali", treating them as illegal interlopers from Bangladesh and refusing to grant them citizenship or basic rights.

Lee -- who has been banned from entering Myanmar over her criticism of its government -- was speaking as South Korea's Moon, a former democracy activist himself, was due to meet Suu Kyi later Tuesday as part of a tour of Southeast Asia.

South Korea is the sixth largest foreign investor in Myanmar, but Lee said that meant Seoul was "inadvertently contributing" to rights violations against Rohingya and urged Moon to be "principled" during the encounter.

"Our president enjoys a great history of being a human rights lawyer," said Lee. "But I'm afraid he hasn't been really speaking out for human rights for people.

"I think it's a shame that we are joining the bandwagon of other countries that looks out for... their countries' economic interest before the suffering of the people," she said, describing the Rohingya crisis as the "worst case of ethnic genocide in the 21st century".

UN experts urge 'financial isolation' of Myanmar military

Yahoo – AFP, 14 May 2019

Around 740,000 Rohingya people have been forced to flee Myanmar to refugees
camps like this one in Bangladesh

Myanmar's military commanders should be financially "isolated" and brought to trial to face charges of war crimes and genocide against the Rohingya minority, UN investigators said Tuesday.

The United Nations fact-finding mission on the situation in Myanmar called on the international community to cut off all financial and other support to the country's military.

Marzuki Darusman, who heads the fact-finding mission which just concluded a 10-day visit to surrounding countries, said drastic measures were needed since Myanmar so far had done little to resolve the egregious rights situation in the country.

"There has been no movement toward a resolution of the crisis," Darusman said in a statement. "The situation is at a total standstill."

Some 740,000 Rohingya refugees fled a military crackdown in August 2017 to cross into Bangladesh where 300,000 members of the persecuted Muslim minority were already in camps.

Many Rohingya refugees who fled said there had been mass rapes and slaughters in the villages, and in a report published last September, the fact-finding mission said there were reasonable grounds to believe the atrocities amounted to "genocide".

The investigators lamented Tuesday that "both military and civilian sides of Myanmar’s government persistently deny the facts and disclaim any responsibility for crimes under international law.

"Following this violence, Myanmar authorities have levelled empty Rohingya villages with bulldozers, effectively destroying criminal evidence, while making no substantive progress in resolving the ethnic animosities that have helped fuel the crisis," they said.

The UN fact-finding mission was not granted access to Myanmar itself, but during their visit to Bangladesh, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia, the investigators met exiled representatives from the Chin, Kachin, Shan and Rakhine ethnic communities.

"Meeting with these different ethnic communities only underscored our findings that the Tatmadaw (the Myanmar military) has over time committed similar atrocities against many of the ethnic groups living within the borders of Myanmar," expert Radhika Coomaraswamy said in the statement.

Another member of the team, Christopher Sidoti, said the investigators so far had "seen no evidence that the Myanmar government is acting in good faith to resolve the crisis or facilitate the safe return of refugees.

"The situation demands an increase in international pressure," he said.

"Due to the gravity of the past and continuing violations, attention must be given to the political, economic and financial ties of the Myanmar military – to identify who and what should be targeted so we can cut off the money supply as a means of increasing the pressure and reducing the violence," he added.

The fact-finding mission is due to present its final report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva next September, and will hand over its findings to a panel tasked with preparing criminal indictments.