00:00Prosecutors in the International Criminal Court said on Wednesday they will seek an
00:08arrest warrant for Myanmar's military leader, Min Aung Hlaing, for crimes against humanity.
00:14They said the Mayanmese general should be responsible for the persecution of the Rohingya
00:19community in the country.
00:21After an extensive investigation and careful review of the evidence collected, my office
00:26has concluded that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Senior General and Acting
00:32President Min Aung Hlaing, Commander-in-Chief of the Myanmar Defence Services, bears criminal
00:39responsibility for the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya
00:45committed in Myanmar and in part of Bangladesh between the 25th of August 2017 and the 31st
00:54of December 2017 by members of the armed forces of Myanmar, the Tatmadaw, supported
01:00by the police, border guard, police, as well as non-Rohingya civilians.
01:04This is the first application for an arrest warrant against a high-level Myanmar government
01:10official that my office is filing.
01:14More will follow.
01:16They said they welcome support from parties in the South Asia and Southeast Asia regions
01:21considering that the crisis in Myanmar has profound effects across the regions.
01:26A million Rohingya people fled to neighboring Bangladesh and other Southeast Asian nations
01:31to escape Myanmar's military offensive in what international investigators describe
01:35as ethnic cleansing.
01:37They allege security forces and Buddhist residents razed villages in Myanmar's Rakhine state,
01:43but the Mayanmese government had denied the allegations, saying that they were carrying
01:47out operations against those who attacked security posts.
02:18The Rohingya community said they had been suffering from the operation by the Mayanmese
02:24forces for the past eight years and they hope to see justice being served and they get to
02:28return to their homes.
02:31Judges in the world court will now decide if they agree there are reasonable grounds
02:35to believe the Mayanmese general was responsible for the crimes.
02:39There is no set time frame for their decision, but it usually takes around three months to
02:44rule on issuing an arrest warrant.
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