The systematic oppression and well-documented genocide undertaken by the Myanmar military has pushed nearly a million Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh and elsewhere. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 60 percent of Rohingya refugees are children, and many are vulnerable to exploitation due to one nation’s domestic policies.
Many Rohingya children have lost at least one parent because of the violence, and thousands more are altogether orphaned. Young children recount stories of abuse and display scars from gunshot wounds. “They are mentally and emotionally traumatized after fleeing the violence, and the children are especially vulnerable to exploitation”, says Elahi Ahmed with ActionAid, an NGO creating Women’s Safe Spaces in the Bangladeshi refugee camps.
Child mothers are common, and teenage kids are often head of household in these camps. Many children have physical and intellectual issues exacerbated by hunger, trauma, and stress. Families are distraught, and according to Ahmed, there have been multiple accounts of nefarious offers to buy children for anything from cheap labor to sexual exploitation. And while not well documented in this area, extremist groups often consign the plight of others as justification for recruitment.
The Rohingya are desperate, and it is “only a matter of time before they decide any intervention on their behalf will do – even one from al Qaeda or ISIS,” as Azeem Ibrahim poignantly notes in his book The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide.
The world can no longer ignore this crisis. Foreign governments must place more political and diplomatic pressure on Myanmar. The U.S. must restrict travel and banking affairs for known actors involved in crimes against humanity. Steady pressure on the Myanmar regime must include calls for returning citizenship to the Rohingya, who have ties to the region that predate Myanmar’s constitution. Local autonomy for the Rohingya must be established within the Rakhine state of Myanmar, and the rest of the world should apply pressure to that end.
While the U.S. is preoccupied with the nuclear threat of North Korea, the current administration would do well to emphasize the destabilizing threat caused by Myanmar’s military regime, which has links with North Korea under the Non-Aligned Movement. Myanmar’s domestic policies are destabilizing the region and having broader implications for the world.
The West must also stop its political adulation of Aung San Suu Kyi, whose political party touts a brand of democratic reform limited to the ethnic majority in Myanmar. She is part of the ruling elite and merely a puppet used by the military regime to boost its external legitimacy under the pseudo-banner of democratic reform.
The plight of these children reveals a pronounced vulnerability to exploitation and extremism. The past six months have given rise to their systematic abuse and exploitation in the region. The situation is dire, with children accounting for a majority of the suffering. The world should stand up for human rights and serve the Rohingya children by applying as much political pressure as possible on Myanmar’s regime. It’s a dark time in this part of the world, and we had better not ignore it.
Eric Lee is working with Rotary International to deliver aid and interview Rohingya children in the Balukhali Refugee Camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
