Situation of Human Rights of Rohingya Muslims and Other Minorities in Myanmar

A/HRC/RES/39/2View PDF

Who created this mandate?

A Resolution of the Human Rights Council, under agenda item 2Annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and reports of the Office of the High Commissioner and the Secretary-General, published in 2018.

What else is in this group?

16 documents · 2015–2025

Newer documents in this group exist (latest: 2025).

2025A/RES/80/221Situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in MyanmarCompare with earlier document
2025A/HRC/RES/59/2Situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in MyanmarCompare with earlier document
2024A/RES/79/182Situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in MyanmarCompare with earlier document
2024A/HRC/RES/56/1Situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in MyanmarCompare with earlier document
2023A/RES/78/219Situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in MyanmarCompare with earlier document

This group bundles related documents that are not individually ordered.

Grouped automatically by matching titles within the same organ.

Who cites this mandate in the budget?

1 entity

A dot marks an entity citing this document in its “Mandates and background” narrative rather than only its Legislative mandates list. Many do both.

Extracted automatically from each entity’s budget submission.

What subjects does this mandate have?

12 topics

Accountability Anti-Discrimination Measures Criminal Justice Displaced Persons Evidence Fact-Finding Missions Human Rights Human Rights Violations Minorities Muslims Myanmar Repatriation

What does this mandate say?

36 operative paragraphs

Expresses grave concern at the findings of the independent international fact-finding mission that there is sufficient information to warrant the investigation and prosecution of senior officials in the Tatmadaw chain of command so that a competent court may determine their liability for genocide in relation to the situation in Rakhine State, and that crimes against humanity and war crimes have been committed in Kachin, Rakhine and Shan States, including murder, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, rape, sexual slavery and other forms of sexual violence, persecution and enslavement, and that children were subjected to, and witnessed, serious human rights violations, including killing, maiming and sexual violence, as part of a widespread and systematic attack on a civilian population warranting criminal investigation and prosecution, and that the military has consistently failed to respect international human rights law and international humanitarian law;

Strongly condemns all violations and abuses of human rights in Myanmar, as set out in the report of the fact-finding mission, including widespread, systematic and gross human rights violations and abuses committed in Rakhine State, including the presence of elements of extermination and deportation and systematic oppression and discrimination, which may amount to persecution and to the crime of apartheid, also strongly condemns the disproportionate response of the military and the security forces, deplores the serious deterioration of the security, human rights and humanitarian situation, the exodus of more than 723,000 Rohingya Muslims and other minorities into Bangladesh and the subsequent depopulation of northern Rakhine State, and calls upon the Myanmar authorities to ensure that those responsible for violations of international law, including human rights violations and abuses, are held accountable;

Calls for a full and independent investigation of the reports of systematic and widespread human rights violations and abuses committed, as reported by various United Nations bodies, including the Human Rights Council, the fact-finding mission and the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict;

Calls upon the Government of Myanmar to ensure the protection of the human rights of all persons in Myanmar, including of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities;

Also calls upon the Government of Myanmar to take all measures necessary to ensure accountability and to end impunity for all violations of human rights by undertaking a full, transparent and independent investigation into reports of all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law;

Further calls upon the Government of Myanmar to grant full, unrestricted and unmonitored access for the fact-finding mission, other human rights mechanisms and relevant United Nations agencies, as well as for relevant international and regional human rights bodies, including the Independent Permanent Human Rights Commission of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, and to ensure that all individuals have unhindered access to and can communicate with the United Nations and other human rights entities without fear of reprisal, intimidation or attack;

Welcomes the holding of the third session of the Twenty-first Century Panglong Conference from 11 to 16 July 2018 and the progress made towards the principles of a future democratic federal union of Myanmar, while calling for further steps, including an immediate cessation of fighting and hostilities, of targeting civilians and of all violations and abuses of international human rights law and international humanitarian law in northern Myanmar, and of the harassment, intimidation, arrest, detention and prosecution of human rights defenders and activists demonstrating for peace, the provision of immediate, safe and unhindered humanitarian access, including to areas controlled by ethnic armed groups, in particular in Kachin and Shan States, and the implementation of an inclusive and comprehensive national political dialogue ensuring the full, effective and meaningful participation of all ethnic groups, women and young people, and persons with disabilities, as well as civil society, with the objective of achieving lasting peace;

Calls upon the Government of Myanmar to take the measures necessary to address the spread of discrimination and prejudice and to combat the incitement to hatred against Rohingya Muslims and other minorities by publicly condemning such acts and enacting necessary anti-hate speech laws, in accordance with international human rights standards, and by promoting interfaith dialogue in cooperation with the international community, and encourages political and religious leaders in the country to work towards national unity through dialogue;

Also calls upon the Government of Myanmar to make efforts to eliminate statelessness and the systematic and institutionalized discrimination against members of ethnic and religious minorities, in particular relating to the Rohingya Muslims, by, inter alia, reviewing the 1982 Citizenship Law, which has led to the deprivation of human rights; by ensuring equal access to full citizenship through a transparent, voluntary and accessible procedure and to all civil and political rights by allowing for self-identification; by amending or repealing all discriminatory legislation and policies, including discriminatory provisions of the set of “protection of race and religion laws” enacted in 2015 covering religious conversion, interfaith marriage, monogamy and population control; and by lifting all local orders restricting rights to freedom of movement and access to civil registration, health and education services and livelihoods;

Strongly urges the Government of Myanmar to take all measures necessary to implement fully all recommendations made by the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State;

Notes with concern the continued departure of members of the remaining Rohingya population and other minorities for Bangladesh, and strongly urges the Government of Myanmar and the armed forces to lift the curfew order in Rakhine State, in particular to ensure freedom of movement and the safety and security of all persons without discrimination, and to put an end to extortion against and the intimidation of the Rohingya population;

Calls upon the Government on Myanmar to allow free and unhindered access for local and international staff of humanitarian and other relevant international agencies to provide humanitarian assistance, including gender-responsive assistance, and encourages it to grant access to the diplomatic corps, independent observers and representatives of the national and international independent media, without fear of reprisal, and to safeguard those who report abuses;

Stresses the need for the creation of the conditions for the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable return of Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to their places of origin, offering dignified solutions to displacement, in consultation with the populations concerned and in accordance with international law and standards, with international oversight and monitoring and with the free and informed participation of refugee communities;

Strongly calls upon the Government of Myanmar to expedite the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable return of all internally displaced persons in conditions of safety and dignity to their homes in Myanmar, including the approximately 120,000 internally displaced Rohingya and Kaman persons currently in camps near Sittwe in central Rakhine since 2012, by offering dignified solutions to displacement, in consultation with the populations concerned and in accordance with international law and standards;

Calls upon the Government of Myanmar to provide any returnees with freedom of movement, unimpeded access to livelihoods, social services, including health services, education and shelter, and compensation for all losses;

Calls upon the United Nations and encourages other international agencies to provide all support necessary for the Governments of Bangladesh and Myanmar to expedite the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable return of forcibly displaced Rohingya Muslims and other minorities from Myanmar, including internally displaced persons, including through the early implementation of the memorandum of understanding signed by the Government of Myanmar, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the United Nations Development Programme;

Urges the Government of Myanmar to take all measures necessary to reverse and abandon policies, directives and practices that marginalize Rohingya Muslims and other minorities economically, to prevent the destruction of places of worship, cemeteries, infrastructure and commercial or residential buildings belonging to all peoples, and to ensure that displaced Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in Rakhine State do not lose their rights to their homes and properties, including by reviewing relevant laws, and to address the root causes of their vulnerability and forced displacement;

Expresses grave concern that the journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, who were investigating the Inn Dinn killings, have been jailed, prosecuted and sentenced, and calls for their immediate and unconditional release, and calls upon the Government of Myanmar to allow unhindered access of journalists throughout Myanmar, in particular in Rakhine, Kachin and Shan States;

Welcomes the signing by the Governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh of an arrangement on the return of displaced persons from Rakhine on 23 November 2017 and of a physical arrangement for the repatriation of displaced Myanmar residents from Bangladesh on 16 January 2018 as important first steps towards the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable return and repatriation of Rohingya refugees, and acknowledges the cooperation of Bangladesh with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, while urging all parties to invite the Office of the High Commissioner, the International Organization for Migration and other relevant international organizations to fulfil their mandates and to participate fully in the work of the Joint Working Group on the Repatriation of Displaced Myanmar Residents from Bangladesh and to ensure the transparent, effective and sustainable implementation of the returns process, in accordance with international law and with the free and informed participation of refugee communities;

Acknowledges the signing of a memorandum of understanding on 6 June 2018 by the Government of Myanmar, the United Nations Development Programme and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the creation of a technical working group to oversee implementation as an important and necessary step to create conditions for the safe, voluntary and dignified return of refugees from Bangladesh, and encourages the immediate publication of the memorandum;

Also acknowledges the establishment of an independent commission of enquiry by the Government of Myanmar on 30 July 2018, and calls for its close cooperation with all United Nations bodies and mandates, in particular the independent international fact-finding mission and the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar to ensure that all those responsible for crimes involving violations of international law, including violations and abuses of international human rights law, such as conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence and the attacks on children perpetrated during the military “clearance” operations in northern Rakhine State, are held to account;

Decides to establish an ongoing independent mechanism to collect, consolidate, preserve and analyse evidence of the most serious international crimes and violations of international law committed in Myanmar since 2011, and to prepare files in order to facilitate and expedite fair and independent criminal proceedings, in accordance with international law standards, in national, regional or international courts or tribunals that have or may in the future have jurisdiction over these crimes, in accordance with international law;

Also decides that the mechanism shall:

Be able to make use of the information collected by the fact-finding mission and continue to collect evidence;

Have the capacity to document and verify relevant information and evidence, including through field engagement and by cooperating with other entities, as appropriate;

Report on its main activities on an annual basis to the Human Rights Council as of its forty-second session and to the General Assembly as of its seventy-fourth session;

Takes note of the International Criminal Court Pre-Trial Chamber’s ruling that it may exercise jurisdiction over the deportation of the Rohingya people from Myanmar to Bangladesh, and requests the mechanism to cooperate closely with any of its future investigations pertaining to human rights violations in Myanmar;

Requests the Secretary-General to appoint the staff of the mechanism as expeditiously as possible, taking into account the experience of other relevant mechanisms, and to recruit or allocate impartial and experienced staff with relevant skills and expertise, drawing upon terms of reference prepared by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights;

Calls upon all States, including the Government of Myanmar and its independent commission of enquiry, and encourages civil society, business enterprises and other relevant stakeholders to cooperate fully with the mechanism to effectively fulfil its mandate and, in particular, to provide it with any information and documentation they may possess or come to possess, as well as any other forms of assistance pertaining to their respective mandate;

Requests the United Nations system as a whole to cooperate fully with the mechanism and to respond promptly to any request made by the mechanism, including access to all information and documentation;

Requests the Secretary-General to allocate the resources necessary for the implementation of the present resolution, including the logistical and technical resources necessary to support the functioning of the mechanism;

Encourages the General Assembly to consider taking further action to address the serious human rights violations committed in Myanmar, particularly in Rakhine, Shan and Kachin States, as documented in the final report of the fact-finding mission,1 and to seriously consider the recommendations contained therein and to pay due regard to the establishment of the mechanism;

Decides to extend the mandate of the independent international fact-finding mission, established by the Human Rights Council in its resolution 34/22, until the new mechanism is operational to ensure that the large and continually increasing amount of evidence of human rights violations and abuses it has collected is fully documented, verified, consolidated and preserved in order for the material to be effectively shared, accessed and used by the mechanism, and requests the fact-finding mission to submit a final report on its main activities to the Council at its forty-second session;

Requests the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to present a written report, to be followed by an interactive dialogue, to the Human Rights Council at its forty-third session, on the root causes of the human rights violations and abuses the Rohingya Muslim minority and other minorities in Myanmar are facing, including discrimination, racial intolerance, xenophobia and Islamophobic practices, in violation of international human rights law and contrary to international declarations, including but not limited to the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action, and to recommend concrete measures to be taken by the Government of Myanmar and the international community to address the current situation;

Encourages the United Nations system to give due consideration to the recommendation by the fact-finding mission on conducting a comprehensive, independent inquiry into the involvement of the United Nations in Myanmar since 2011 with a view to establishing whether everything possible to prevent or mitigate the unfolding crises was done, identifying lessons learned and good practices, making recommendations as appropriate, including on accountability, and enabling more effective work in the future;

Appeals to all States, international agencies and other donors to step up support for victims, including support for refugees, displaced persons and host communities, possibly through the establishment of a trust fund to address their needs, including the needs of those who have been victims of sexual violence, as well as child victims and witnesses.

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