What Would An ICC Arrest Warrant For Myanmar’s Junta Chief Mean?

Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing could be hit with an International Criminal Court arrest warrant, years after he led a deadly campaign against the Rohingya minority.

Min Aung Hlaing was head of Myanmar’s armed forces when the military launched a crackdown in 2017 following what it said were attacks by Rohingya insurgents in Rakhine state.

Bringing harrowing tales of rape, arson and murder, around 750,000 Rohingya fled into neighbouring Bangladesh.

The ICC’s chief prosecutor Karim Khan said Wednesday there were reasonable grounds to believe Min Aung Hlaing “bears criminal responsibility for crimes against humanity” committed during the crackdown.

Following Khan’s request for judges to grant an arrest warrant for the junta chief, AFP looks at the ICC’s case and what it may mean for Myanmar.

Min Aung Hlaing was head of the armed forces during the civilian government of Aung San Suu Kyi, which was toppled in a 2021 coup he led.

The military takeover plunged Myanmar into crisis and a civil war has raged ever since.

Since the coup, Myanmar’s junta chief has only given a handful of interviews to Chinese and Russian media.

He appears regularly on the front page of Myanmar state newspapers, inspecting infrastructure projects, advising farmers to grow more crops and handing out cash and food to wounded soldiers.

Khan said his request follows “renewed focus” on the court’s investigation, which was launched in 2019.

Some analysts note the announcement comes days after the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defence minister, and Hamas’s military chief.

“There is a whiff of political expediency in the prosecutor’s decision, using the Rohingya to appear balanced,” said independent Myanmar analyst David Mathieson.

Russian President Vladimir Putin — a junta ally — has been under an ICC arrest warrant since March 2023.

If the warrant is granted, the 124 members of the ICC are obliged to arrest the junta chief if he travels to their country.

The junta says “the statements of the ICC have never been recognised” by Myanmar, which is not a member.

The general visited Indonesia for a regional summit shortly after the coup, but he rarely ventures abroad nowadays.

Since then his only reported foreign trips have been to close allies and arms suppliers China and Russia — neither of which is an ICC member.

An ICC warrant in Russia can be seen as a badge of honour, said Richard Horsey of the International Crisis Group.

“With Putin in particular, it could boost their camaraderie.”

“The Rohingya were waiting for this,” said Senoara Khatun, a community school teacher in a refugee camp in Bangladesh.

“I hope every criminal will be brought to justice by the ICC under the law.”

As the junta has struggled to crush resistance to its rule, rights group say it has razed villages, carried out extrajudicial killings and has used attack jets and artillery to bombard communities suspected of opposition.

Any warrant “almost certainly won’t alter the behaviour of their forces on the ground”, said Horsey.

According to Mathieson, such a decision could actually have the effect of “raising his esteem amongst Rohingya haters and hardcore nationalists.”

“It also comes as cold comfort to the rest of Myanmar where atrocity crimes are being perpetrated every day, and impunity abounds,” he said.

“International accountability is sluggish.”