Rohingya Genocide: Bangladesh gives OIC $500k for legal battle

Bangladesh has disbursed $500,000 to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation as part of a fund-raising campaign initiated by foreign ministers of the 57-nation group for The Gambia's legal battle against Myanmar over the Rohingya genocide in the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

The Gambia is also a member state of the OIC.

"We have already disbursed the fund to the OIC in support of The Gambia in its legal battle," said Dr Mohammad Javed Patwary, Bangladesh's permanent representative to the OIC and ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

Patwary, who leads Dhaka at the OIC's Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) in Niger, told the BSS that the OIC General Secretariat has by now opened up a dedicated account for the West-African country's battle at ICJ, as the nation also signalled its urgent need for funds.

"I call for urgent, voluntary and substantial contribution of the [OIC] member states for the legal case," The Gambia's Justice Minister Dawda A Jallow said while presenting the latest updates of the Rohingya case at the CFM, where the crisis appeared to be the key agenda.

He said The Gambia needed approximately US$ 5 million to pay particularly the lawyers to run the case, as it hired a reputed US-based law firm to stand by the prosecution in the case.

But Jallow said that "unfortunately" the law firm was yet to receive any significant payment for the legal services it rendered since September 2019 as "it is only this month that a sum of US$ 300,000 was paid to the law firm, which is less than 10 percent of the amount owed".

He further said the case was aimed to seek a conclusive and lasting solution to the Rohingya crisis and cautioned that all potential OIC interventions to the ICJ regarding the Rohingya cause should be conducted in coordination with his country for the sake of the cause.

He warned that any uncoordinated OIC intervention could affect the case and "seriously complicate matters".

OIC General Secretariat officials said apart from Bangladesh, other OIC member states that have so far provided financial support to The Gambia over the case are Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Nigeria.

Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen was scheduled to lead the Bangladesh delegation at the OIC's two-day crucial 47th CFM session that began on Friday but Covid-19 detection at the last minute forced him to scrap his scheduled Niger visit.