Myanmar’s military is building cases to bring individual perpetrators to court, a UN investigation report says, showing an increase in blatant war crimes.
War crimes committed by Myanmar’s military, including bombings of civilians, have recently become more widespread and more blatant, a team of UN investigators said in a report released on Tuesday.
In a report by the Independent Investigative Mechanism on Myanmar (IIMM), which investigated events between July 2022 and June 2023, it said it had strong evidence that the Myanmar military and its affiliated militia groups had committed three types of war crimes related to the fighting, with frequent increases in blatant war crimes.
These crimes included the indiscriminate bombing of civilians and the burning of civilian homes and buildings, resulting in the complete destruction of villages, the report said. The report cites the killing of captured civilians or fighters during the operation.
“Our evidence points to a significant increase in war crimes and crimes against humanity in the country, along with widespread and systematic attacks on civilians, and we are building case files that can be used in courts to hold individual perpetrators accountable,” IIMM head Nicholas Khun Giam said.
Since the coup d’état two years ago, the reimposition of sanctions by Western countries, the violent repression of the Burmese military dictators, and the emergence of revolutionary forces fighting the Burmese army from all sides, Myanmar has fallen into a state of chaos.
A spokesman for the regime could not be reached for comment on the report of the UN investigators’ findings.
