Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Britain filed a joint declaration of intervention with the case, lodged by The Gambia in 2019, the United Nations’ highest court said late on Thursday.
The group cited “common interest in the accomplishment of the high purposes” of the 1948 convention on the prevention and punishment of genocide.
“We want to make a contribution to clarifying and combating genocide. We are particularly focus on violence against women and children,” Tania von Uslar, Director-General for Germany’s Legal Affairs said in a post on X.
The court said that The Maldives has filed a separate declaration accusing Myanmar of genocide.
Under ICJ’s rules, the declarations mean these countries will be able to make legal arguments in the case brought forward in 2019 following international outrage at the treatment of the Muslim-minority Rohingya community.
Myanmar has denied genocide, rejecting the UN findings as “biased and flawed”. It says its crackdown was aimed at Rohingya rebels who had carried out attacks.
But the ICJ rejected Myanmar’s objections to the genocide proceedings in July last year, paving the way for the case to be heard in full.
Bangladesh currently hosts nearly one million Rohingya refugees who live in overcrowded and under-resourced camps.
Last month, Myanmar officials met Rohingya refugee families there to discuss their repatriation.
Under a repatriation plan, brokered during a three-way meeting between the two countries and China, Myanmar agreed to accept the return of about 3,000 refugees by December.
But many refugees have refused to go back, fearing further persecution.
Rohingya refugees crammed onto the deck of a wooden boat. One person is clambering up the side.
In recent days, escalating tensions in Myanmar have seen nearly 600 Rohingya people fleeing to neighbouring Indonesia.
However, while the people of Aceh in Indonesia have previously welcomed refugees, who are taken to a temporary camp before they are usually moved to other parts of Indonesia, tensions have been escalating as more and more Rohingya have arrived.
About 250 Rohingya refugees were afloat off the coast of Indonesia on Friday after attempts to land the previous day were aborted by local residents.
It was the third boat to reach Indonesia’s northernmost province since Tuesday. The two others, which arrived in a different location, were allowed to land.
In a statement sent to Al Jazeera, KontraS Aceh, the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence, said that one of the issues was that the government had no comprehensive plan to deal with the refugees, despite a 2016 presidential decree that states that the government will collaborate with institutions such as the United Nations and other international organisations to handle arrivals.
“When the government is silent and lets this problem drag on, this kind of rejection happens and it is very troubling,” Azharul Husna, the coordinator of KontraS in Aceh said.
KontraS Aceh added that it had urged the Indonesian government to help the refugees and immediately ratify the 1951 Refugee Convention.A solution to the Rohingya crisis is very important to Bangladesh and it supports the efforts, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen said regarding a UN resolution related to the repatriation to Myanmar of the 1.2 million Rohingya refugees it has sheltered for the past six years.
"We welcome it. A solution to the Rohingya crisis is very important to us and we support the efforts. This time, 114 countries have co-sponsored the resolution initiated by the OIC. It's a big thing," Momen told Arab News on Thursday (16 November).
Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslim refugees fled a military crackdown in Myanmar in 2017 and sought shelter in Bangladesh.
The third committee of the UN General Assembly adopted the resolution on the situation of human rights of Rohingya Muslims and other minorities in Myanmar by consensus on Wednesday, reports Arab News.
Tabled by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the EU, the resolution was co-sponsored by 114 countries, marking the biggest international support since the beginning of the Rohingya crisis.
The resolution urges Myanmar to create a conducive environment to facilitate the voluntary, safe and dignified return of the Rohingya to their homeland, and calls for swift implementation of the 2021 peace plan developed by members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to expedite the repatriation process.
The return of the Rohingya to Myanmar has been on the agenda for years, but a UN-backed repatriation process had yet to take off until now, despite pressure from Bangladesh amid dwindling financial support to host the large community.
Since March, repatriation has been negotiated between Bangladesh and Myanmar under a pilot scheme mediated by China, but Mizanur Rahman, Bangladesh's refugee relief and repatriation commissioner in Cox's Bazar, said that despite several visits and the compilation of data from an initial group of Rohingya willing to return, it remains unclear when the process will begin.
"Despite bilateral efforts being underway over the Rohingya repatriation, at the moment, I can't say when it will begin. It totally depends on the overall situation in Myanmar," he told Arab News.
"We want the Rohingya to be repatriated in a safe, dignified and voluntary way."