“According to the description of the challenges, potential, and impact of the implementation of universal jurisdiction by a country, the Court believes that…it would be better if universal jurisdiction is held at the regional level due to proximity to the location of the crime and the availability of evidence, making it easier to make arrangements between parties…In this regard, it is more certain to bring a forum for resolving serious cross-border human rights violations at the regional level, based on an international agreement without interfering with a country’s jurisdiction. When countries agree to submit themselves to an agreement, there is no longer an assumption or judgement of
differences between developed and developing countries. With such an agreement, each country has the same rights and obligations and is bound by the agreed arrangements. In this regard, arrangements regarding the mechanism of the court or procedural law, up to the model of punishing perpetrators, are agreements of each country in a region through an international agreement.”

Constitutional Court of the Republik of Indonesia, Darusman, Muqoddas and Alliance of Independent Journalists Case (No. 89/PUU-XX/2022, 14 April 2023, para. 3.16.4 166 [trans. ours]

This Application is filed on behalf of MR. SALAI ZA UK LING

He serves as the Deputy Executive Director of Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO), where he has spent two and a half decades working for human rights and religious freedom in Myanmar. CHRO is a non-governmental organization in Special Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) since 2018. It works to protect and promote human rights through monitoring, documentation, education and advocacy on behalf of indigenous Chin people and other oppressed and marginalized communities in Myanmar. A native of Chin State, Myanmar, MR. SALAI ZA UK LING recently gave testimony about the Tatmadaw’s atrocities against the people of his native country before the International Parliamentary Inquiry on Myanmar.

He brings this application in light of the war crimes, crimes against humanity, and gross human rights violations being committed against the people of Myanmar by the Tatmadaw, through its “Four Cuts” military strategy – essentially a horribly inhumane tactic to defeat the political opposition and rising insurgencies against the military regime by attacking the civilian populace and depopulating areas not in the military regime’s control.

In summary, under the Charter of the ASEAN, this Application seeks of the ASEAN and its Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights the following relief:

1. Declare Myanmar to be in violation of its international obligation to protect human rights and fundamental freedoms in the territory of Myanmar;
2. Urgently call on the Myanmar Junta and its Military (Tatmadaw) to immediately cease and desist from committing gross human rights violations and war crimes committed in the territory of Myanmar;
3. Urgently call on the Myanmar Junta and its Military (Tatmadaw) to, under applicable rules of international law, provide adequate reparations and satisfaction to the victims of gross human rights violations and war crimes committed in the territory of Myanmar;
4. Establish a fact-finding mission to Myanmar to investigate the gross human rights violations and war crimes committed in the territory of Myanmar;
5. Establish a regional tribunal for the prosecution of war crimes and other international crimes committed in the territory of Myanmar from 1 February 2021;
6. Implement an effective and functioning individual complaints mechanism in the ASEAN system that is consistent with international human rights law and standards, in order to effectively protect human rights and fundamental freedoms and to prevent future gross human rights violations and war crimes from occurring.

Download full PDF.