UN: Rohingya return to Myanmar difficult without accountability for atrocities' perpetrators

New York: The United Nations stressed that it is difficult to achieve the desire of the Rohingya Muslim refugees for a safe return to Myanmar unless there is accountability for the "atrocities committed against them".

"While the Rohingya consistently express their desire for a safe and dignified return to Myanmar, this will be very difficult to achieve unless there is accountability for the atrocities committed against them, including through prosecutions of the individuals most responsible for those crimes," Head of the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (Mechanism) Nicholas Koumjian said.

"The continued plight of the Rohingya and the continuing violence in Myanmar illustrate the important role of the Mechanism to facilitate justice and accountability and help deter further atrocities," Kumjian said in a report published by the UN News Centre.

According to the Report, "there are ample indications that since the military takeover in February 2021, crimes have been committed in Myanmar on a scale and in a manner that constitutes a widespread and systematic attack against a civilian population."

The Mechanism has collected more than three million information items from almost 200 sources since starting operations three years ago, the Report notes. This includes interview statements, documentation, videos, photographs, geospatial imagery and social media material.

With the consent of its sources of information, the Mechanism is sharing relevant evidence to support international justice proceedings currently underway at the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.

Myanmar is facing international criticism and accusations of ethnic cleansing after about 900,000 Rohingya people fled in the Arakan state to neighboring Bangladesh, after a campaign of genocide launched by the Myanmar authorities, which was condemned by the United Nations