International Criminal Court (ICC) Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan has requested an arrest warrant for Myanmar’s military leader, General Min Aung Hlaing, over crimes against humanity targeting Rohingya Muslims from August to December 2017.

Khan stated that investigations into violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine State reveal evidence implicating Myanmar’s armed forces and police in widespread persecution, deportation, and ethnic cleansing. “This is the first arrest request for a senior Myanmar official,” Khan said, citing testimonies, documents, and videos as key evidence.

The 2017 crackdown led to the destruction of nearly 300 villages and forced over a million Rohingya Muslims to flee to Bangladesh, where survivors shared harrowing accounts of violence, including rape and torture. The ICC judges will now decide whether to approve the arrest warrant.