The United Nations is looking at legal boundaries to determine if violence against Rohingya Muslims constitutes genocide.
Jyoti Sanghera, Asia Pacific chief at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), said on Wednesday that the violence by Myanmar military could meet the boundaries, but “we haven’t yet made that determination at OHCHR.”
U.N. previously described killings and violence against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine State as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing.” International rights advocacy groups collected credible evidence of rampant rape, killing, and torture of Muslims, including children and elderly.
More than half a million Rohingya Muslims fled Myanmar for mostly neighboring Bangladesh and India after a weeks-long military campaign that culminated in late August and early September. There is no accurate death toll because Myanmar doesn’t allow international observers into the most affected areas. Rights groups estimate that more than 5,000 people might have been killed, most of whom are civilians.
Myanmar claims that its military is trying to root out militants linked to Rohingya Muslims.
