Myanmar
Myanmar continues to turn a blind eye to Rohingya’s rights: OIC
A resolution titled “Situation of the Rohingya Muslim Community in Myanmar” has been adopted unanimously to keep the momentum in exerting continuous pressure on Myanmar authorities to create an environment for willful, safe, sustainable and dignified return of the Rohingya to their homeland.
The resolution was adopted during the 48th Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) held in Islamabad, Pakistan from March 22-23.
The situation of the Rohingya has not improved despite the efforts and calls of the OIC and the international community, Secretary-General of the OIC Hissein Brahim Taha noted, pointing out that Myanmar continues to turn a blind eye to the horrific violations against the Rohingya’s rights and did not fulfilled its international obligations.
He pointed out that this case sends a strong message to the international community about the Organization’s collective and coordinated work to support the Rohingya people, as well as its firm commitment to global ideals and principles of justice and accountability for human rights violations, according to the OIC statement.
READ: Sustainable solution of Rohingya issues lies on repatriation: FS
The OIC chief also stressed that the Rohingya case is one of the top priorities on the OIC’s agenda, one that the Organization has been following for over two decades.
Myanmar denies genocide, again describes Rohingyas as 'Bengali community'
Myanmar has again refused to accept the Rohingyas as an ethnicity, describing them as "Bengali Community" while responding to the latest US decision which announced that the Myanmar military is responsible for committing genocide against the Rohingya people in Rakhine State.
"As such Myanmar has never engaged in any genocidal actions and does not have any genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, racial or religious group or any other group," said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Myanmar in a press release in which Myanmar described the Rohingyas as "Bengali Community."
The Myanmar Ministry reiterated that Myanmar as a party to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the Statute of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) under the Charter of the United Nations is fully committed to respecting all the existing obligations.
"The narratives mentioned in the speech of the Secretary of State are found to be far from realities and references made were also from unreliable and unverifiable sources as well as sweeping allegations," reads the media release which was shared on its verified page.
READ: US announcement on Rohingya Genocide: Dhaka hopes it helps repatriation
Myanmar strongly objected and categorically rejected the remarks made by the Secretary of State of the United States of America as the contents and narratives therein are politically motivated and tantamount to interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign State.
Matthew Smith, chief executive officer at Fortify Rights, termed US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's announcement "historic" for the Rohingya and all people of Myanmar and also for wider efforts to prevent and remedy genocide.
"To prevent genocide, governments must at least acknowledge it when it happens, which is precisely what the US government did today
United Nations member states should publicly acknowledge the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar and ensure that the UN Security Council refers the situation to the International Criminal Court (ICC), said Fortify Rights Monday.
"It is a signalling and remarkable milestone for Rohingya victims and survivors that the US has formally determined that the violence committed against Rohingya by the Myanmar military amounts to genocide and crimes against humanity," said Zaw Win, human rights specialist at Fortify Rights.
"It has been a long-term expectation for the Rohingya community. Declaring that what happened to the Rohingya is in fact genocide should spur international accountability efforts and make it more difficult for the Myanmar military to continue its atrocity crimes."
In November 2019, the Gambia filed a case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the UN's highest court, for failing to prevent or punish genocide against Rohingya Muslims. The case is ongoing.
In September 2018, the ICC granted the chief prosecutor jurisdiction to investigate and possibly prosecute the crime against humanity of forced deportation of Rohingyas to Bangladesh, as well as persecution and other inhumane acts.
Last month, Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan concluded his first visit to Bangladesh as part of the ongoing investigation.
While the ICC is investigating forced deportation, it is not yet investigating the crime of genocide against Rohingya.
And the intergovernmental organisation has not yet accepted the National Unity Government of Myanmar's declaration delegating jurisdiction of the court.
The UN Security Council members should immediately put forward a resolution to refer the situation in Myanmar to the ICC, said Fortify Rights.
The UN members should also acknowledge the legitimacy of the National Unity Government of Myanmar and get fully behind its efforts to delegate jurisdiction to the court.
"Secretary Blinken's announcement is historic for the Rohingya and all people of Myanmar and also for wider efforts to prevent and remedy genocide," said Matthew Smith, chief executive officer at Fortify Rights.
"To prevent genocide, governments must at least acknowledge it when it happens, which is precisely what the US government did today."
Rohingya repatriation: Dhaka detects 'lack of goodwill' in Myanmar's list
Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen has said Myanmar needs to be "more sensitive" in making verified list of Rohingyas for repatriation noting that the list of 700 Rohingyas looks flawed.
Bangladesh urged Myanmar to make the list without breaking any family or village because the Rohingyas will not feel encouraged to return to Rakhine if their families or villages are broken.
Read:US announcement on Rohingya Genocide: Dhaka hopes it helps repatriation
While talking to reporters at his office, Dr Momen said the list (700 people) given by the Myanmar is being scrutinised as Dhaka sees lack of goodwill in preparing the list.
Asked about the tripartite effects - Bangladesh, Myanmar and China - to expedite the Rohingya repatriation, the Foreign Minister said the effects are still ongoing.
US announcement on Rohingya Genocide: Dhaka hopes it helps repatriation
Bangladesh has welcomed US announcement acknowledging Rohingya genocide noting that it might expedite efforts on accountability and repatriation fronts. "Though late, it's a good news. We welcome it," Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen told reporters at his office while responding to a question. He said if genocide takes place anywhere it should be acknowledged and the perpetrators should not go unpunished.
Read:UN members urged to acknowledge Rohingya genocide, refer Myanmar to ICC "That's why we say never again. We don't want to see any genocide. Unfortunately, genocide is taking place," said Momen. Terming the US a good friend of Bangladesh, Momen hoped that will put more pressure on Myanmar so that they take back Rohingyas to their homeland in Rakhine State. "If the repatriation efforts are expedited through this US announcement, we will be very happy," he said, adding that they are focusing on two goals - welfare of Rohingyas through repatriation and prevent repetition of genocide. Momen said the victims of genocide must get justice and hoped that the genocide case against Myanmar filed by The Gambia at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) will get momentum. Matthew Smith, chief executive officer at Fortify Rights, termed US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's announcement "historic" for the Rohingya and all people of Myanmar and also for wider efforts to prevent and remedy genocide. "To prevent genocide, governments must at least acknowledge it when it happens, which is precisely what the US government did today.
United Nations member states should publicly acknowledge the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar and ensure that the UN Security Council refers the situation to the International Criminal Court (ICC),” said Fortify Rights Monday.
'Kill more': Facebook fails to detect hate against Rohingya
A new report has found that Facebook failed to detect blatant hate speech and calls to violence against Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslim minority years after such behavior was found to have played a determining role in the genocide against them.
The report shared exclusively with The Associated Press showed the rights group Global Witness submitted eight paid ads for approval to Facebook, each including different versions of hate speech against Rohingya. All eight ads were approved by Facebook to be published.
The group pulled the ads before they were posted or paid for, but the results confirmed that despite its promises to do better, Facebook's leaky controls still fail to detect hate speech and calls for violence on its platform.
The army conducted what it called a clearance campaign in western Myanmar's Rakhine state in 2017 after an attack by a Rohingya insurgent group. More than 700,000 Rohingya fled into neighboring Bangladesh and security forces were accused of mass rapes, killings and torching thousands of homes.
Also Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the U.S. views the violence against Rohingya as genocide. The declaration is intended to both generate international pressure and lay the groundwork for potential legal action, Blinken said.
Also read: Rohingya sue Facebook for $150bn over Myanmar hate speech
On Feb. 1 of last year, Myanmar’s military forcibly took control of the country, jailing democratically elected government officials. Rohingya refugees have condemned the military takeover and said it makes them more afraid to return to Myanmar.
Experts say such ads have continued to appear and that despite its promises to do better and assurances that it has taken its role in the genocide seriously, Facebook still fails even the simplest of tests — ensuring that paid ads that run on its site do not contain hate speech calling for the killing of Rohingya Muslims.
“The current killing of the Kalar is not enough, we need to kill more!” read one proposed paid post from Global Witness, using a slur often used in Myanmar to refer to people of east Indian or Muslim origin.
“They are very dirty. The Bengali/Rohingya women have a very low standard of living and poor hygiene. They are not attractive,” read another.
“These posts are shocking in what they encourage and are a clear sign that Facebook has not changed or done what they told the public what they would do: properly regulate themselves,” said Ronan Lee, a research fellow at the Institute for Media and Creative Industries at Loughborough University, London.
The eight ads from Global Witness all used hate speech language taken directly from the United Nations Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar in their report to the Human Rights Council. Several examples were from past Facebook posts.
The fact that Facebook approved all eight ads is especially concerning because the company claims to hold advertisements to an “even stricter” standard than regular, unpaid posts, according to their help center page for paid advertisements.
“I accept the point that eight isn’t a very big number. But I think the findings are really stark, that all eight of the ads were accepted for publication,” said Rosie Sharpe, a campaigner at Global Witness. “I think you can conclude from that that the overwhelming majority of hate speech is likely to get through.”
Facebook's parent company Meta Platforms Inc. said it has invested in improving its safety and security controls in Myanmar, including banning military accounts after the Tatmadaw, as the armed forces are locally known, seized power and imprisoned elected leaders in the 2021 coup.
“We’ve built a dedicated team of Burmese speakers, banned the Tatmadaw, disrupted networks manipulating public debate and taken action on harmful misinformation to help keep people safe. We’ve also invested in Burmese-language technology to reduce the prevalence of violating content,” Rafael Frankel, director of public policy for emerging markets at Meta Asia Pacific wrote in an e-mailed statement to AP on March 17. “This work is guided by feedback from experts, civil society organizations and independent reports, including the UN Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar’s findings and the independent Human Rights Impact Assessment we commissioned and released in 2018.”
Facebook has been used to spread hate speech and amplify military propaganda in Myanmar in the past.
Also read: 3 stabbed dead in Gazipur over ‘Facebook comment’: 2 held
Shortly after Myanmar became connected to the internet in 2000, Facebook paired with its telecom providers to allow customers to use the platform without having to pay for the data, which was still expensive at the time. Use of the platform exploded. For many in Myanmar, Facebook became the internet itself.
Local internet policy advocates repeatedly told Facebook hate speech was spreading across the platform, often targeting the Muslim minority Rohingya in the majority Buddhist nation.
For years Facebook failed to invest in content moderators who spoke local languages or fact checkers with an understanding of the political situation in Myanmar or to close specific accounts or delete pages being used to propagate hatred of the Rohingya, said Tun Khin, president of Burmese Rohingya Organization UK, a London-based Rohingya advocacy organization.
In March 2018, less than six months after hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled violence in western Myanmar, Marzuki Darusman, chairman of the U.N. Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar, told reporters social media had “substantively contributed to the level of acrimony and dissension and conflict, if you will, within the public."
“Hate speech is certainly of course a part of that. As far as the Myanmar situation is concerned, social media is Facebook, and Facebook is social media,” Darusman said.
Asked about Myanmar a month later at a U.S. Senate hearing, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook planned to hire “dozens” of Burmese speakers to moderate content and would work with civil society groups to identify hate figures and develop new technologies to combat hate speech.
“Hate speech is very language specific. It’s hard to do it without people who speak the local language and we need to ramp up our effort there dramatically,” Zuckerberg said.
Yet in internal files leaked by whistleblower Frances Haugen last year, AP found that breaches persisted. The company stepped up efforts to combat hate speech but never fully developed the tools and strategies required to do so.
Rohingya refugees have sued Facebook for more than $150 billion, accusing it of failing to stop hate speech that incited violence against the Muslim ethnic group by military rulers and their supporters in Myanmar. Rohingya youth groups based in the Bangladesh refugee camps have filed a separate complaint in Ireland with the 38-nation Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development calling for Facebook to provide some remediation programs in the camps.
The company now called Meta has refused to say how many of its content moderators read Burmese and can thus detect hate speech in Myanmar.
“Rohingya genocide survivors continue to live in camps today and Facebook continue to fail them,” said Tun Khin. “Facebook needs to do more.”
War crimes, crimes against humanity committed daily in Myanmar: UN expert
War crimes and crimes against humanity are being committed every day with impunity by the military junta of Myanmar, Tom Andrews, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, told the Human Rights Council in Geneva Monday.
"The people of Myanmar have been told that the world has a 'responsibility to protect,' victims of atrocity crimes, including crimes against humanity and war crimes. As the military junta escalates its ruthless attacks on the people of Myanmar, the people of Myanmar see only endless expressions of concern from the international community, vague declarations that something should be done and a tedious, endless wait for a consensus to act," he said.
"For nearly 14 months, this body [the Human Rights Council] and other UN bodies have held meetings, issued statements and passed non-binding resolutions. Some member states have sanctioned individuals and entities linked to the Myanmar military junta."
For the people of Myanmar, these are welcome but insufficient steps to hold to account those responsible for relentless attacks on them that continue at this very moment, Andrews added.
He pointed to international action in light of the crisis in Ukraine as a standard by which its response to the crisis in Myanmar can be measured:
"Those responsible for the attacks against the people of Ukraine faced severe targeted sanctions personally, and their country's central bank was sanctioned even as foreign currency reserves were frozen," Andrews said.
READ: ICC prosecutor launches Ukraine war crimes investigation
"In the space of four days, the member states of the United Nations summoned the political will to take tangible action."
Andrews said the military junta had murdered more than 1,600 civilians, detained more than 10,000, displaced more than half a million, destroyed more than 4,500 homes since the start of this year, spread armed conflict to regions previously at peace, and continued to systematically oppress and persecute the Rohingyas in Rakhine State.
"It is clear to me that the generals responsible for these escalating horrors are guilty of crimes against humanity, including the crimes of murder, enslavement, displacement and forcible transfer, enforced disappearance, torture, rape and sexual violence," Andrews said.
"I also believe that junta forces have committed war crimes including willful killing, destruction of property, torture and inhumane treatment, pillaging, rape, and displacement of civilians."
In a report to the Council, Andrews highlighted the cost of the junta's attacks on the people of Myanmar: "The military junta has driven Myanmar into a humanitarian catastrophe marked by a crumbling health infrastructure, half the nation falling into poverty, rampant inflation, and the cruel and outrageous blocking of the delivery of aid to those in desperate need."
"Children are being targeted and killed even as they run with their parents for safety. More than 100 have been murdered since the coup was launched last year. More than 100 children are gone, victims of the military junta's ruthlessness, brutality, and cowardice," the UN expert said.
"As members of this Human Rights Council, a body that can serve as the conscience of the United Nations, I hope that most, if not all, of you are horrified and outraged as well."
Andrews added that nearly one million children have missed routine immunisations, which alone could result in the deaths of 33,000 children this year.
He urged the Council and its member states to "stand with and for the people of Myanmar with not only words but even more importantly, with action" as for growing numbers of men, women and children in Myanmar, it is a matter of life and death.
ASEAN envoy for Myanmar crisis arrives on first mission
Cambodia’s foreign minister arrived Monday in Myanmar’s capital Naypyitaw on his mission as a special regional envoy seeking to facilitate peacemaking in the fellow Southeast Asian nation, which was plunged into an extended violent political crisis after the army seized power last year.
Prak Sokhonn is representing ASEAN — the Association of Southeast Asian Nations — which last April reached a five-point consensus on Myanmar. It called for the immediate cessation of violence, a dialogue among all concerned parties, mediation by an ASEAN special envoy, provision of humanitarian aid through ASEAN channels, and a visit to Myanmar by the special envoy to meet all concerned parties.
The ruling military council of Myanmar, which is one of ASEAN’s 10 members, has delayed implementation of its plan, even as the country has slipped into a situation that U.N. experts have characterized as a civil war. Neither the military nor its opponents have suggested mutually acceptable compromises that could stem the violence, much less resolve the political impasse over ruling the country.
Soon after their arrival for their three-day visit, Prak Sokhonn and his party, including ASEAN Secretary-General Lim Jock Hoi, held a meeting with Myanmar's leader, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing and other top officials, during which they discussed implementation of the five-point plan, conditions for providing humanitarian assistance and cooperation with ASEAN, said a statement from Myanmar's Information Ministry.
Also read: US to declare Rohingya repression in Myanmar a 'genocide'
The statement, which described the meeting as a “first step,” said Min Aung Hlaing also presented his government's versions of the events leading to the army's takeover and the violence that followed it.
Myanmar's reluctance to implement the actions urged in the consensus has caused a split among the members of ASEAN, which has ostracized Myanmar by blocking its leaders from attending major meetings of the regional grouping. Min Aung Hlaing was not invited to last October’s virtual meeting of ASEAN leaders because of the disagreement.
That rebuke was issued shortly after Myanmar declined to let an ASEAN special envoy meet with its ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been in detention since the military took power in February 2021.
The army ousted Suu Kyi's elected government and then cracked down on the widespread protests against its action. After security forces unleashed lethal force against peaceful demonstrators, some opponents of military rule took up arms.
A statement issued last Friday by Cambodia’s foreign ministry said Prak Sokhonn’s first visit as ASEAN’s special envoy “will be aimed at creating a favorable condition leading to the end of violence as well as the utmost restraint by all parties,” along with distributing humanitarian assistance and encouraging political consultation or dialogue among all concerned parties.
Prak Sakhonn became the ASEAN special envoy after Cambodia took over as this year’s chair for the regional grouping.
Also read: Myanmar: UN report urges concerted effort by global community to hold military accountable
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen expressed interest in engaging more closely with Myanmar’s generals and in January this year became the first head of government to pay an official visit to Myanmar since the army seized power. In February, however, he expressed pessimism that the crisis there can be resolved anytime soon.
According to Cambodian officials, Myanmar’s military have given permission for ASEAN’s envoy to meet with other members of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party. However, virtually all its major leaders are jailed, like Suu Kyi, or in hiding to escape arrest.
The most important opposition force in Myanmar currently is the National Unity Government, a shadow civilian administration established largely by elected lawmakers from Suu Kyi’s party who were blocked from taking their seats by the army takeover.
Prak Sokhonn said last month he believes he should meet with Myanmar’s National Unity Government even though the country’s military considers it a terrorist organization. All of its civilian leaders are in hiding or in exile.
He said that if Myanmar’s military government is unwilling to talk directly with the National Unity Government, he could serve as a bridge between the contending parties. But he cautioned that this would have to be done in a way that did not create friction between the ASEAN envoy and Myanmar’s military government.
Another major opposition group, the General Strike Coordination Body, issued a statement Monday saying its 36 member organizations condemned the ASEAN special envoy’s visit as an attempt to support the military council without fully recognizing the will of the people in the country.
It pointed out that his visit did not include any contact with the National Unity Government, which had been among the suggestions ASEAN offered last year. The lack of a meeting with the shadow government amounted to ignoring the voices of the people of Myanmar and democratic forces, it charged.
US says Myanmar repression of Muslim Rohingya is genocide
Violent repression of the largely Muslim Rohingya population in Myanmar amounts to genocide, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday, a declaration intended to both generate international pressure and lay the groundwork for potential legal action.
Authorities made the determination based on confirmed accounts of mass atrocities on civilians by Myanmar's military in a widespread and systematic campaign against the ethnic minority, Blinken said in a speech at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
It is the eighth time since the Holocaust that the U.S. has concluded a genocide has occurred. The secretary of state noted the importance of calling attention to inhumanity even as horrific attacks occur elsewhere in the world, including Ukraine.
“Yes, we stand with the people of Ukraine," he said. "And we must also stand with people who are suffering atrocities in other places.”
The government of Myanmar, also known as Burma, is already under multiple layers of U.S. sanctions since a military coup ousted the democratically elected government in February 2021. Thousands of civilians throughout the country have been killed and imprisoned as part of ongoing repression of anyone opposed to the ruling junta.
The determination that a genocide has occurred could lead other nations to increase pressure on the government, which is already facing accusations of genocide at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
“As we lay the foundation for future accountability, we’re also working to stop the military’s ongoing atrocities, and support the people of Burma as they strive to put the country back on the path to democracy,” Blinken said.
More than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled from Buddhist-majority Myanmar to refugee camps in Bangladesh since August 2017, when Myanmar's military launched an operation aimed at clearing them from the country following attacks by a rebel group.
The status of the plight of the Rohingya had been under extended review by U.S. government legal experts since the Trump administration, given potential legal ramifications of such a finding. The delay in the determination had drawn criticism from both inside and outside the government, which has been accused through successive administrations of being too slow in making such decisions on this and in other cases, most notable in Sudan’s Darfur region in the early 2000s.
Read: Rohingya case: Bangladesh assures continued support for The Gambia
Human rights groups and members of Congress welcomed the announcement despite the delay in a determination that has already been made by other countries, including Canada, France and Turkey.
“The U.S. determination of the crime of genocide against us is a momentous moment and must lead to concrete action to hold the Burmese military accountable for their crimes,” said Tun Khin, president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK.
Human Rights Watch said the U.S. and other governments should seek justice for crimes carried out by the military and impose stronger sanctions against its leadership.
“The U.S. government should couple its condemnations of Myanmar’s military with action,” said John Sifton, the group’s Asia advocacy director. “For too long, the U.S. and other countries have allowed Myanmar’s generals to commit atrocities with few real consequences.”
A 2018 State Department report documented instances of Myanmar's military razing villages and carrying out rapes, tortures and mass killings of civilians since at least 2016. Blinken said evidence showed the violence wasn't isolated, but part of a systematic program that amounts to crimes against humanity.
Read:Roving with Rohingyas: How feminine hearts can make a difference, from scare to care
“The evidence also points to a clear intent behind these mass atrocities, the intent to destroy Rohingya, in whole or in part, through killings, rape, and torture,” he said.
Previous determinations of genocide by the U.S. include campaigns against Uyghurs and other largely Muslim minorities in China as well as in Bosnia, Rwanda, Iraq and Darfur.
Car crash kills 7 in southern Myanmar
Seven people were killed in a road accident Saturday on Pathein-Chaungtha road in Ayeyarwady region, according to the local police.
A private car collided with an express bus and caught fire, killing seven people on board, including two men, three women and two children, said an officer of the Ayeyarwady police.
READ: 8 die in India bus accident
The officer said the passengers on the express bus were not seriously injured as they all got off the bus after the accident. They tried to open the doors of the private car when the fire broke out, but failed.
The victims were brought to Pathein hospital, according to rescue teams.
Myanmar: UN report urges concerted effort by global community to hold military accountable
The international community must take concerted, immediate measures to stem the spiral of violence in Myanmar, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a new report on Tuesday.
In Myanmar, Bachelet said, the military has engaged in systematic and widespread human rights violations and abuses – some of which may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity
The report, released for the 49th regular session of the UN Human Rights Council, said Myanmar's military and security forces have shown a flagrant disregard for human life, bombarding populated areas with airstrikes and heavy weapons and deliberately targeting civilians, many of whom have been shot in the head, burned to death, arbitrarily arrested, tortured or used as human shields, according to message received from Geneva.
Read: New report reveals weapons transferred to Myanmar military junta by UN Member States
Citing the determination of Myanmar's people in their opposition to the coup, Bachelet called on the international community to do all it can to resolve the crisis and hold perpetrators of gross violations of international human rights law accountable.
"Throughout the tumult and violence of the past year, the will of the people has clearly not been broken. They remain committed to seeing a return to democracy and to institutions that reflect their will and aspirations," Bachelet said.
Covering the period since the 1 February 2021 military takeover, the report is based on interviews with over 155 victims, witnesses, and advocates, whose accounts were corroborated with satellite imagery, verified multimedia files, and credible open-source information.
Its findings, however, represent only a fraction of the violations and abuses Myanmar’s people have been subjected to since the coup.
At least 1,600 people have been killed by security forces and their affiliates and more than 12,500 people have been detained.
At least 440,000 others have been displaced and 14 million are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance, the delivery of which has largely been blocked by the military in new and pre-existing areas of need.
The report concluded that there were reasonable grounds to believe the military, the Tatmadaw, had engaged in violence and abuse as part of a widespread and systematic attack directed against civilians – patterns of conduct that may amount to crimes against humanity.
Mass killings have taken place. In July in Sagaing Region, soldiers killed 40 individuals in a series of raids; villagers found the remains of some victims with their hands and feet still tied behind their backs.
In December in Kayah State, soldiers burned the bodies of up to 40 men, women and children; villagers described discovering the remains in several trucks, with bodies found in positions indicating they had tried to escape and were burnt alive.
Detainees reported facing torture and other forms of ill-treatment during lengthy interrogations in military detention centres across Myanmar.
This reportedly included suspension from the ceiling without food or water; being forced to stand for extended periods while in solitary confinement; electrocution, sometimes alongside injection of unidentified drugs; sexual violence, including rape; and forcing Muslim detainees to ingest pork.
While most of the gross human rights violations documented were carried out by security forces, at least 543 individuals – including local administrators, their families and alleged informants – were also reportedly killed due to their perceived support of the military. Anti-coup armed elements claimed responsibility for 95 of the incidents.
Read: EU imposes restrictive measures on 22 individuals, 4 entities in Myanmar
"Meaningful action by the international community is urgently needed to stop yet more individuals from being stripped of their rights, their lives and their livelihoods," Bachelet said.
"The appalling breadth and scale of violations of international law suffered by the people of Myanmar demand a firm, unified, and resolute international response."