Gambiaj.com – (THE HAGUE, Switzerland) – The Gambia on Monday urged judges at the United Nations’ highest court to rule that Myanmar deliberately targeted the minority Muslim Rohingya for destruction, arguing that the community’s lives were turned into a “nightmare” by systematic violence amounting to genocide.
Addressing the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, Gambian Justice Minister Dawda Jallow said the Rohingya were ordinary people whose aspirations for peace and dignity had been brutally denied.
“They have been targeted for destruction,” Jallow told the judges. “Myanmar has denied them their dream; in fact, it turned their lives into a nightmare, subjecting them to the most horrific violence and destruction one could imagine.”
The case, filed by The Gambia in 2019, accuses Myanmar of breaching the Genocide Convention through its treatment of the Rohingya, a mainly Muslim minority from the western Rakhine State. It marks the first genocide case the ICJ is hearing in full in more than a decade, with potential implications beyond Myanmar, including for South Africa’s genocide case against Israel over the war in Gaza.
Myanmar has consistently denied committing genocide, insisting that its military operations were a legitimate response to attacks by Muslim militants. Israel has similarly rejected genocide allegations in the Gaza case, with its lawyers describing South Africa’s application as an abuse of the Genocide Convention.
The Gambian case centres on Myanmar’s 2017 military offensive, which forced at least 730,000 Rohingya to flee into neighbouring Bangladesh. Refugees reported widespread killings, mass rape and the burning of villages. A United Nations fact-finding mission later concluded that the campaign involved “genocidal acts,” a finding Myanmar’s authorities rejected.
Ahead of the hearings in The Hague, Rohingya victims expressed hope that the long-awaited proceedings would finally deliver justice. “We are hoping for a positive result that will tell the world that Myanmar committed genocide, and we are the victims of that, and we deserve justice,” said Yousuf Ali, a 52-year-old Rohingya refugee who says he was tortured by the Myanmar military.
During preliminary hearings in 2019, Myanmar’s then civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, dismissed The Gambia’s allegations as “incomplete and misleading,” defending the military’s actions at the time.
Under the current schedule, The Gambia will continue presenting its arguments for three more days, after which Myanmar will respond on Friday. The court will then hear testimony from Rohingya victims in closed sessions, marking the first time members of the community will be directly heard by an international court. Overall, the ICJ hearings are expected to span three weeks.
The case unfolds against a backdrop of continued instability in Myanmar, which has been in turmoil since the military seized power in a 2021 coup, violently suppressing pro-democracy protests and triggering a nationwide armed rebellion. The country is now holding phased elections that have been criticized by the United Nations, Western governments and human rights groups as neither free nor fair, claims the military authorities deny.
The Gambia, a predominantly Muslim West African nation, brought the case on behalf of the Rohingya with the backing of the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, framing the proceedings as a test of international resolve to enforce the Genocide Convention.
