H.E. President José Ramos-Horta,
Nicolau Lobato Presidential Palace,
Aitarak Laran,
Av. Pres. Nicolau Lobato,
Díli,
Timor-Leste
October 23, 2025
Re.: The Situation in Myanmar
Your Excellency President Ramos-Horta,
We are writing as representatives of human rights organizations and civil society from Myanmar, throughout Asia, and across the world, firstly to congratulate you on Timor-Leste’s upcoming accession to the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). As well as economic, development, and inter-cultural opportunities, we hope that Timor-Leste’s ASEAN accession will provide your government with a valuable platform to continue to advocate for human rights, justice, and accountability throughout the region, thus building on Timor-Leste’s own profound history of struggle and victory against injustice.
Your Excellency, we write to urge you to use your position as a state party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to refer the situation in Myanmar to the ICC under Article 14 of the Statute.
Your solidarity with the Myanmar people has been long-standing, acknowledged, and appreciated. As you are aware, the situation in Myanmar continues to deteriorate, and is well documented in reports by international and community-based human rights organizations, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar. The High Commissioner Volker Türk’s latest report to the UN describes Myanmar’s human rights crisis as “plumbing new depths,” with civilians throughout the country “suffering the cruellest toll.”
According to the UN High Commissioner’s latest report, more than 7,000 civilians have been killed by the military and almost 30,000 political prisoners have been jailed since the 2021 coup. In August alone, an estimated 277 civilians were killed across the country. The military, he added, is “burning villages at alarming rates and abducting and forcibly recruiting civilians” and launching attacks that “reveal an utter disregard for civilian lives.”
The military’s use of airstrikes is well documented in the UN report, which was released in the same week as a report by Fortify Rights, titled Crashing Down on Us, which documents at least ten indiscriminate and deliberate attacks in Myanmar’s Kachin and Karenni states, as well as the 22 junta officials responsible.
The UN, Fortify Rights, and many other human rights organizations have documented frequent airstrikes targeting churches, schools, hospitals, homes, and camps for internally displaced people, killing scores of civilians, including children, and displacing entire communities. Beheadings, arson attacks, and torture of civilians have been reported. As one witness told the UN: “They chopped the bodies like when we chop the chicken. The head, the legs, the arms, and they also opened their stomachs. The heart was put on a plate.”
Your Excellency, as you know only too well, the people of Myanmar are courageously struggling for their basic human rights, democracy, and freedom from repression. The atrocities they face are very reminiscent of the barbaric atrocities suffered by people in towns and villages across Timor-Leste just over 25 years ago.
We therefore appeal to you not to forget the lessons of your beautiful nation’s transition to democracy and independence, and Myanmar’s continuing struggle.
We urge you to use your new ASEAN membership and your existing ICC membership to lead a regional initiative to secure genuine peace, justice, and accountability in Myanmar, a transition to true federal democracy with equal rights for all of Myanmar’s diverse ethnic and religious communities, and a clear rejection of the military regime’s planned sham elections scheduled for December 28, which cannot, in the current circumstances, be remotely free or fair.
Most importantly, we would encourage you, as the leader of one of only two Southeast Asian ICC state parties, to lead efforts to secure international accountability for mass atrocity crimes in Myanmar. The ICC at present only has jurisdiction to investigate crimes against Rohingya Muslims, which is an important and historic investigation — but its efforts must be expanded, and that can be prompted, in part, by a referral of the entire situation in Myanmar to the ICC. Specifically, we call upon Timor-Leste to file a referral of the situation in Myanmar under Article 14 of the Rome Statute with the ICC Chief Prosecutor, requesting him to open an investigation into atrocity crimes committed throughout Myanmar, and – furthermore – to urge other state parties to file referrals or to support yours.
We herein annex a template Article 14 referral letter for your reference.
As you will be aware, there are precedents for such action. In March 2022, after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, 41 ICC state parties acted urgently and referred the situation in Ukraine to the ICC. As a consequence, the chief prosecutor launched an investigation and issued arrest warrants, and the wheels of justice are moving forward as they should be. The atrocities in Myanmar are just as egregious as those perpetrated in Ukraine, and therefore, we hope Timor-Leste will play a leading role in referring Myanmar to the ICC. There should be no double standards in international justice.
Timor-Leste will undoubtedly play a very welcome role in ASEAN, and we celebrate your membership and wish your government every success. We hope that you and your government will stay true to the values that inspired and secured the birth of Timor-Leste as an independent nation, and that you will continue to play a leading role in advancing human rights throughout the region and the world.
In solidarity, with great respect and warmest good wishes,
- Alliance of Chin Refugees
- Arakan Rohingya National Union
- Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network
- Association of Rohingya in Thailand
- Asylum Access Thailand
- Burma Concern
- Burma Human Rights Network
- Burma War Crime Investigation
- Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK
- Coalition for the Rights of Refugee and Stateless Persons
- Exile Hub
- Fortify Rights
- Free Rohingya Coalition
- Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART)
- HOST International Thailand Foundation
- Kachin Gender Star Group
- Kachin Human Rights Watch
- Kachin Refugee Committee – Malaysia
- Kaladan Press Network
- Karen Human Rights Group
- Karenni Human Rights Group
- Migrant Working Group
- Mother’s Embrace
- Myanmar Defense and Security Institute
- Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organization in Malaysia
- New Myanmar Foundation
- Pantau Foundation
- Peace Rights Foundation
- People’s Empowerment Foundation
- Rights for Women Welfare Society – Bangladesh
- Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights
- Rohingya Human Rights Initiative
- Rohingya Peace Network of Thailand
- Rohingya Women Association for Education and Development
- Rohingya Youth for Legal Action
- Thailand Migration Reform
- Youth Congress Rohingya
Annex I. ICC Article 14 Referral Letter
[LETTERHEAD]
[DATE]
To the Honorable Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court,
Acting pursuant to Articles 13(a) and 14(1) of the ICC Statute, the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste hereby refers the situation in Myanmar to the Prosecutor of the ICC, and requests the Prosecutor to investigate the situation for the purpose of determining whether one or more specific persons should be charged with the commission of crimes within the jurisdiction of the court.
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste favorably notes that on 17 July 2021, Myanmar lodged a declaration under Article 12(3) of the ICC Statute, inclusive of all relevant crimes since 1 July 2002. The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste appreciates that the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar has recommended the use of Article 14 as a path for accountability in paragraphs 112 and 122 of his most recent report to the Human Rights Council (14 March 2024, A/HRC/55/65).
There is extensive documentation of the circumstances of these crimes, including against ethnic minorities, such as the Rohingya, and the ongoing crimes committed by the Myanmar military. [OPTIONAL TO ADD HERE ANY EMBLEMATIC CASE(S) TO HIGHLIGHT.]
Please see annexed a non-exhaustive set of references for this documentation and referral, more of which should be available from the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar and other sources.
Given that these crimes in violation of the ICC Statute are ongoing, I request that you expedite this matter. The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste would appreciate receiving communications on your actions to determine whether one or more specific persons should be charged with the commission of the vast, historic, and ongoing crimes committed in Myanmar territory.
Sincerely,
[SIGNATURE BLOCK]
Annex: List of References