The following is the second instalment in a four-part series by Jenna Dolecek on justice and accountability for victims and survivors of atrocities committed in Myanmar. For the first part of the series, please see here.

When it comes to accountability for atrocities committed in Myanmar, international courts and United Nations (UN) mechanisms are severely limited by political gridlock. Unfazed, some survivors and advocates have turned to universal jurisdiction (UJ) — a legal principle allowing national courts to prosecute grave crimes committed abroad. This second installment looks at how lawyers and activists are using UJ cases in Argentina, Germany, Turkiye, the Philippines, and Indonesia, to seek justice for Myanmar’s victims, and what challenges and possibilities this approach holds.

Among the many instances of atrocities committed in Myanmar, only those committed against the Rohingya have been taken up by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ). However, the genocide is only one facet of the civil war in Myanmar. Innumerable war crimes and crimes against humanity have been committedall over the country for decades and against different ethnic groups. The ICC lacks jurisdiction over these crimes, as Myanmar is not a party to the Rome Statute and its jurisdiction over atrocities committed against the Rohingya is limited to those linked to the territory of Bangladesh, a member-state of the ICC. 

In the previous post, differing visions of justice across Myanmar’s communities were explored. Some want justice in the form of courts, others in the form of respect for human rights, economic equality, safety, and citizenship guarantees. Now, we will explore whether and how UJ can be used to achieve justice where international courts and the UN have left an accountability void.

Leveraging Universal Jurisdiction for Accountability in Myanmar

To date, five UJ cases have been brought before various domestic courts. Four of them cover crimes committed after the February 2021 coup by the Myanmar military. The first pre-2021 coup case was filed with the Federal Court of Argentina in 2019 by the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK regarding the Rohingya genocide from 2015-2019. The case was accepted and the court has since issued arrest warrants for 25 individuals, including Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, for their roles in facilitating the Rohingya genocide. 

The first case filed after the coup was by the Myanmar Accountability Project (the Project) in Istanbul, Turkiye, in 2022. This case focuses on the use of torture at the notorious Yay Kyi Ai interrogation facility in Yangon. The Project’s complaint also claims that torture in detention is occurring in a widespread and systematic manner, which could also qualify as a crime against humanity. The complaint is based on violations of the Convention Against Torture, which Myanmar is not a party to, but Turkiye is. 

Turkiye has also been very sympathetic to the plight of the Rohingya, being fellow Muslims. The prosecutor in that case stated that since Turkiye is a party to the Convention, an “investigation must be initiated based on universal jurisdiction against the generals and commanders involved in these crimes, as well as those who actually committed the torture.” This was the first post-coup UJ case to be accepted and is ongoing. The Project also filed evidence in September 2025 related to the Pa Zi Gyi Massacre in Sagaing region.

In late 2022, Legal Action Worldwide, an organization specializing in strategic litigation and UJ,  as well as other organizations, filed a strategic legal case in Indonesia, a majority Muslim country. Many Rohingya, who are also majority Muslim, fled there to escape the genocide. The lawsuit was brought to Indonesia’s Constitutional Court and sought to “change a domestic law to allow for non-citizens to bring human rights claims against foreign perpetrators.” Although the lawsuit was ultimately dismissed, it involved the use of an interesting and creative tactic. The debate over the case hinged on the wording of Indonesia’s Constitution, which “guarantees the protection of human rights to ‘every person’”. However, Article 5 of the Constitution states that “Indonesia’s Human Rights Court can ‘hear and rule cases of gross violations of human rights perpetrated by Indonesian citizens outside the boundaries of the Republic of Indonesia.’”      Indonesian legal experts and human rights advocates want the words “by Indonesian citizens” removed for cases such as this. A petition was submitted to the Constitutional Court to amend the language but was rejected by the Court in April 2024.

The third post-coup case was filed by Fortify Rights in Germany in January 2023. This case, however, covers both the Rohingya genocide and post-coup committed crimes from 2017 to 2021. The complainants are a mix of Arakanese (Rakhine), Burman/Bamar, Chin, Karen, Karenni, Mon, and Rohingya, making it the first case to include Rohingya and other ethnic groups. The complaint was also the first to include charges of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in the same case. 

Unfortunately, the complaint was rejected in November 2023 for two reasons. First, none of the  perpetrators were present on German soil for authorities to arrest. As the Global Justice Centre points out, German authorities have“discretion to decide whether to open a case where there is no connection to Germany.” This is also known as ‘conditional’ UJ, where the victim or perpetrator has to either be a citizen of, or be present in, the country where the case was filed. 

Second, Germany stated that it would be duplicating the work of the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM). This reasoning is entirely flawed. The IIMM has absolutely no prosecutorial power whatsoever. Per its mandate, the IIMM exists solely to gather evidence and assist courts as cases are opened. Further, Germany has had great success trying Islamic State UJ cases at the same time the United Nations Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da’esh/ISIL (UNITAD), an investigative mechanism like the IIMM, was also operating. It does not follow that a UJ case into the situation in Myanmar would duplicate IIMM efforts when UJ cases on the Islamic State did not duplicate UNITAD efforts.

The most recent attempt at a UJ case was made again by the Myanmar Accountability Project who filed a case in the Philippines in October 2023. This case was the first to address crimes committed against the Chin people as a whole, who primarily reside in Chin state in western Myanmar. It is also the first to exclusively address war crimes. Over two years, the town of Thantlang was the target of relentless arson campaigns and other attacks on civilians. Violence so fierce that today, Thantlang is a ghost town. The Project filed an appeal in April 2025 as Philippine prosecutors never opened a file. Another reason for the appeal was that former President Rodrigo Duterte was arrested and sent to The Hague under the new government. This gave the Project and victims hope that human rights will have better recognition within President Bongbong Marcos’ new administration and the case will be accepted. 

Although UJ holds promise for Myanmar, it has not come without its challenges. Many still see UJ as political, a threat to sovereignty, and a tool that should only be used as a last resort. In the case of Myanmar, all other options have been exhausted leaving UJ as just that: a last resort. At the UN Debate on Universal Jurisdiction in October 2021, Kyaw Moe Tun, The Permanent Representative for Myanmar to the UN said, “The principle of universal jurisdiction is the most important means of ending impunity”. 
Universal jurisdiction offers an avenue toward justice, but it is not guaranteed, nor can it cover every victim or community. In the next post, we look at alternative approaches such as hybrid courts and locally implemented justice processes, which could bring accountability closer to those most affected.