Rohingya women tied to trees and raped

International Desk: Disturbing accounts and evidence of Rohingya women tied to trees and raped by Myanmar’s military forces as well as men shoved into mass graves and set on fire have been turned over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for potential probe of the atrocities.

The evidence was submitted to the court by a coalition of Bangladeshi organizations as the ICC prosecutors are pressing to conduct an investigation into broad allegations of forced deportation of the minority Muslim population from Myanmar, where the international body has no jurisdiction, The Guardian daily reported on Saturday.

The evidence includes the story of 10-year-old Marwa, “whose family was shot dead before she, along with a group of other young girls from her village, was taken to a nearby school where they were repeatedly gang-raped.”

The exclusive report cited a document turned over to the ICC by the Asian Legal Resource Centre (ALRC) and its partner Odhikar.

Another document submitted to the ICC recounts the ordeals of a 20-year-old woman identified as Khurshida, “who described how she was held captive with several other Rohingya women, before being stripped, tied to trees and raped for days.”

She eventually lost consciousness and was “dumped outside the camp by soldiers who assumed she was dead,” the report said.

The case of the 25-year-old Sakila “who hid as her family were locked inside a house that was set alight by soldiers” as well as that of 31-year-old Nur Jahan “who was raped violently and repeatedly in front of her seven-year-old daughter” were also among the documents given to the international court.

Bangladeshi rights groups have argued that the sexual and gender-based nature of much of the violence committed in the majority Buddhist Myanmar against the Rohingya “is fundamental to the case and that ICC action should be taken to put the perpetrators on trial.”

The legal argument for an ICC probe of the atrocities in Myanmar, the report says, is being led by prosecutor Fatou Bensouda, pointing out that this is “the first time such a case has been considered by the court.”

Source: Agencies
 

risingbd/Dhaka/June 23, 2018/A K Azad