legally obliged to make its compliance reports public at the time of submission to the Court as part of its erga omnes obligations to the international community on the prevention and punishment of genocide, this would give UN member states compelling reason to urge the UN Security Council to exercise its Chapter VII mandate and adopt a binding resolution on Myanmar in pursuit of peace and security in the country and wider region.154 Such a resolution should include referral of the situation in Myanmar to the International Criminal Court. Latest developments in the ICJ case On 29 November 2024, the Republic of Slovenia submitted a declaration of intervention in the case, followed by the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Belgium, and Ireland on 10, 12, and 20 December 2024 respectively. According to the recently updated Rules of the Court, declarations of intervention must be filed not later than the date fixed for the filing of the last written pleading by State parties to the case.155 This deadline was 30 December 2024, when Myanmar’s Rejoinder was due to be filed with the Court.156 At the time of writing, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the Maldives have been confirmed as intervening States by the Court. The Court has yet to publicly issue its decision on the admissibility of the additional declarations filed by Slovenia, the DRC, Belgium and Ireland.157 All of the above States filed their declarations of intervention under Article 63(2) of the ICJ Statute, as they are parties to the Genocide Convention. Read together with the Rules of the Court, this gives State parties to an international convention the right to intervene in a case where it concerns the ‘construction’ of a convention.158 In brief, this means that intervening States can seek to clarify the interpretation of the Genocide Convention, and the Court’s findings will be binding on them. In practice, the Court’s order gives intervening States the right to participate in proceedings, on this basis. Intervening States confirmed by the Court will be provided with copies of the written pleadings by The Gambia and Myanmar. The Court will then fix a deadline for intervening States to submit their written observations. These submissions must strictly address the subject matter of their intervention, focusing on the interpretation of the Genocide Convention in the context of the case. The Court will decide at a later date whether intervening States will be allowed to make observations during oral proceedings.159 procedures for monitoring the implementation of provisional measures indicated by the Court’ (21 December 2020) No. 2020/38. 154 Article 77 of the Rules read with Article 41(2) of the Court’s Statute provides that any provisional measures ordered by the Court are to be communicated to the UNSC. To date there is no indication that the reports on compliance with the orders have been provided to the UNSC. Erin Farrell Rosenberg, John Packer, Fernand de Varennes, ‘Provisional Measures in The Gambia v. Myanmar Case Before the ICJ: The Case for Making Myanmar's Report Public’ (22 May 2021), 11. 155 EJIL! Talk ‘The ICJ Changes the Rules for Intervention’ (11 March 2024) available at <https://www.ejiltalk.org/the-icjchanges-the-rules-for-intervention/> accessed 3 January 2025. 156 The first round of written proceedings concluded in August 2023, following Myanmar’s submission of its case for the defence - known as the Counter-Memorial - in response to The Gambia’s earlier submission of its case for the prosecution, the Memorial. Both parties to the case agreed that a second round of written pleadings was necessary before proceeding to oral hearings. According to the latest publicly available information, The Gambia submitted its Reply (written submission in response to Myanmar’s Counter-Memorial) on 23 May 2024. The Court subsequently set the deadline of 30 December 2024 for the filing of Myanmar’s Rejoinder (written submission in response to The Gambia’s Reply). 157 Following its practice with the earlier declarations of intervention, the Court will likely fix deadlines for the submission of written observations by the two parties to the case in response to the declarations - and for Slovenia, DRC, Belgium and Ireland in the event of an objection to their declarations by either party - after which the Court will issue its decision on the admissibility of these latest declarations of intervention. 158 Article 63(2) ICJ Statute available at <https://www.icj-cij.org/statute> and Article 82(3) ICJ Rules of Court, available at < https://www.icj-cij.org/rules> accessed 5 June 2025. 159 ICJ ‘Order - Admissibility of the Declarations of Intervention’ op cit. 10 [48]. 28