US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will publicly announce the determination, which human rights groups have been advocating for years, at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, on Monday.
Until now, the US had stopped short of declaring the atrocities — including mass killings and rape — committed in 2017 against the Muslim minority Rohingya population a genocide. The violence forced nearly a million people to flee, and the United Nations recommended that top military officials face genocide charges.
The State Department has sanctioned a number of Myanmar military officials, including commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing, for their role in committing those human rights abuses.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.