Rachel Bentley is the International Director of Children on the Edge. Returning from a visit to Bangladesh in September•, she made the following statement: In the last month, a catastrophic rise of violence and ethnic cleansing in Rakhine State, Myanmar has forced over 480,000 Rohingya across the border to Bangladesh, into makeshift refugee camps and local communities. These already impoverished communities, who are still taking stock of recent flood damage, are ill-equipped to host scores of traumatised new arrivals. Returning today from a trip to Cox’s Bazar and the Kutapalong area where we work, it is clear that the situation is in flux and evolving every day. At present we have observed the following regarding the location, conditions and provision of aid for refugees:
Our responseThere are few solutions being presented for this beleaguered and stateless population, who are still largely unwelcome in Bangladesh and remain victims of hatred in Myanmar. Over the last week our partners have conducted a survey determining that at present, the majority of refugees are situated in the Kutupalong camp. They are now carrying out further needs assessments, ascertaining how best to help in camp, identifying unreached groups and gaps in provision. This will direct our first tranche of emergency humanitarian support (October-December 2017). This response will be implemented by our partners, MUKTI who we have been working with since 2000 and who have ample capacity. We anticipate that within the next few weeks and months, refugees will migrate back towards the slum areas around Cox’s Bazar. Children on the Edge already have a presence in many of these communities through our support of Learning Centres for working children. The second tranche of our support will commence from January 2018 onwards. During this stage it is likely we will establish a number of new learning centres for Rohingya children in the communities, however we will be constantly monitoring a situation that is, and will continue to be in constant flux. The priority of any work we deliver is to extend support to the most vulnerable refugees, those who are unreached and overlooked. Whether in the camp areas or the communities, during this phase the Centres we establish will provide stable, safe spaces for children to learn, play and recover from the trauma they have been through. This is an ongoing humanitarian emergency that will persist beyond 2018. We need to establish immediate humanitarian provision, as well as consistent longer term support for the most vulnerable displaced Rohingya children. • A more recent situation report (November 2017) can be found here
Our work providing low profile education to Rohingya refugee children has been chosen as one of 20 projects selected as examples of best practice in refugee education. Over half of the world's refugees are children, the majority of which experience the double jeopardy of losing both their homes and their education. Promising Practices in Refugee Education (PPIRE) is a joint initiative of Save the Children, UNHCR, and Pearson. Launched in March 2017, the initiative set out to identify, document and promote innovative ways to effectively reach refugee children and young people with quality educational opportunities. Methods from each chosen organisation were documented in the form of 5,000 word case studies, each recommending lessons for the sector going forward. You can read our case study on low profile education for Rohingya refugee children here. It highlights the need to find alternative solutions to improve the situations of the most vulnerable, and encourages practitioners to work closely with the local refugee communities, with an agile and creative approach. On the 22nd of September, during the UN General Assembly, the Promising Practices initiative launched a report that synthesises the key findings and lessons learned from across these projects. Both the projects and the experience of implementing partners have been used to identify ten recommendations aimed at improving refugee education policy and practice. Our Communications and Advocacy Manager, Esther Smitheram went to the event in New York to present on our work with an unregistered Rohingya refugee community. She said “We were pleased to contribute to an initiative that is genuinely crowdsourcing information from a wide spectrum of areas and organisations, finding the best education methods for displaced children. Children on the Edge exists to help those children who are out of the spotlight and unreached by the larger agencies, so we welcomed the opportunity to highlight the plight of the Rohingya, especially at this time”.
Children on the Edge are currently seeking financial support to provide immediate humanitarian support for Rohingya refugee families in Bangladesh.
A catastrophic rise of violence and ethnic cleansing in Rakhine State, Myanmar has forced over 400,000 Rohingya across the border into Bangladesh into makeshift refugee camps and local communities. These already impoverished communities, who are still taking stock of recent flood damage, are ill-equipped to host scores of traumatised new arrivals. The BBC report that despite larger aid agencies arriving with humanitarian aid, the government has forbidden distribution outside of the official camps. These camps can support only 70,000 of the estimated 400,000 refugees, leaving hundreds of thousands to fend for themselves with no support at all. 60 percent of these arrivals are children, and many Rohingya refugees say they have had no contact with any international aid agency at all. Children on the Edge are uniquely placed to respond to the current crisis and meet the needs of these most vulnerable refugees. We have seven years of experience working within the Rohingya community in an unregistered camp on the Bangladesh border. This work has been highlighted as a ‘Promising Practice’ in a recent report to the UN General Assembly, recommending best practice in refugee education for the sector. We have built up strong local partnerships over this time, and these partners are best situated to provide support to unreached refugees through their skills, experience and networks. Due to the limited help available in the official camps, many new arrivals go on to seek refuge further inland, in urban slums or enclave communities which are already comprised almost entirely of other Rohingya migrants. These areas are outside of the scope of the UN and larger agencies, and it is here that Children on the Edge is currently concentrating its efforts. Over the past few weeks alone, 50,000 Rohingya have sought shelter in the slum areas of Cox’s Bazar. In these communities, we are responding to both the immediate relief needs of the new arrivals as well as preparing to provide services once the crisis passes and world's attention turns elsewhere. Given that there are already 200,000 newly-displaced, vulnerable children along the border, it is difficult to overstate the scale of the need. In response, we will provide essentials such as rice, clean water, latrines and tarpaulin along with cash transfers to new arrivals in slum and enclave communities. By safeguarding the refugee’s water supply, protecting their health from unsanitary waste, providing basic shelter, and ensuring they have enough to eat, this programme will protect the lives of thousands of the most vulnerable Rohingya in this crisis. In addition, we aim to build 20 safe spaces within these communities. These safe spaces will be child-friendly environments, where 1,200 severely traumatised children can go to re-establish a sense of normalcy, through a daily routine with trained and trusted adults. Here they can play, learn, receive a nutritious snack each day and begin to process what they have been through. Our safe spaces will also give parents and carers a few hours each day, in the knowledge that their children are safe, to start finding solutions to their problems. They can use this time to search for work and food, find lost family members and begin to process what the future might hold. As the humanitarian crisis evolves; Children on the Edge will be working with local partners to create a number of classrooms and safe spaces for some of the most vulnerable new arrivals. With thousands more refugees arriving every day, the needs far outweigh the resources available.
An already grim situation for Rohingya migrants in Bangladesh has reached dire new levels over the past month in what has turned into a humanitarian catastrophe for the Rohingya. A fresh wave of violence and atrocities in Rakhine State, Myanmar coincided with near record levels of flooding in the region. Over 330,000 have fled across the border into makeshift refugee camps and local communities, many of which are underwater. Children on the Edge partners on the ground report the situation as ‘chaotic’ and ‘unpredictable', as they join the effort to provide aid to thousands of arrivals, fleeing what the UN is describing as a 'textbook example of ethnic cleansing'. Most of these have arrived in the Cox's Bazar area where we work. Local staff are estimating that with this new influx, there are now at least 500,000 Rohingya arrivals since the last spike of violence and displacement in October 2016. The timing could not be worse for such a human catastrophe to unfold. Large swathes of the country remain underwater as the region has received near record rainfalls in the past month. Already impoverished Bangladeshi communities, which are still taking stock of flood damage, are ill-equipped to host scores of tramautised new arrivals, many of whom have had their homes burned by the Myanmar army and witnessed even more unspeakable acts. The government in Naypyidaw has made little secret of its disdain for the nearly one million Rohingya in Myanmar, and this latest outbreak of violence appears to be another dark chapter in their larger campaign to force them out of the country. We have been working with Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh for the past seven years, educating children in Kutapalong camp, one of the largest makeshift camps on the border. Our classrooms provide a child-friendly, stable and safe space for these children to learn and recover from trauma. Our years of experience working with the Rohingya community here makes us uniquely placed to respond to the current crisis. We are responding to both the immediate relief needs of the new arrivals as well as preparing to provide services once the crisis passes and world's attention turns elsewhere. There are 200,000 newly-displaced, stateless children who are extremely vulnerable, arriving in communities where we are working. It costs just £4.30 a day to provide a safe space for 60 Rohingya refugee children. Make a donation today and help us support and protect as many of these children as we can. “I don’t remember what life was like before coming to the camp”, says Azima, “but my friends tell me we would play and go swimming”. Azima is nine years old and lives in a Rohingya makeshift refugee camp on the Bangladesh-Myanmar border. Her mother told us about when they fled Myanmar due to the persecution of the Rohingya, saying “After the riots and looting started we were scared. When the violence came to our village we fled with only what we could carry. We walked one day to the water. Then took a boat to Bangladesh. Then we walked one more day”. Azima is one of six children, her father has been missing for over two years after leaving to find work on a fishing boat. Her mother weaves fishing nets to try and earn enough money to feed the children, but this is a constant struggle. When we talked with the Rohingya community back in 2010, the only thing they requested was education for their children. The official United Nations Kutupalong camp provided such services, but the overspilled makeshift camp, a sprawling mass of mud, stick and plastic shelters, had nothing. Not only this, but authorities would not permit permanent structures or formal schools for unregistered refugees. For a long time, thousands of children wandered the camps, unoccupied and vulnerable. We made education possible in what looked like an impossible environment, by supporting the refugee community to build low-profile schools for their children. These 45 classrooms were built onto existing dwellings and are now educating 2700 children in the makeshift camp. We trained over 40 Rohingya refugees as teachers using a curriculum especially designed for refugee children who have missed out on education. Over the last six years, these 2,700 Rohingya refugee children have received an education, in a safe and nurturing environment. Not only are they following a government approved curriculum and sitting exams, but, after what they have been through, they are developing their confidence and self worth. To reach the most children, one child from each household attends school, and then shares their learning with their siblings, parents and friends. Azima’s mother says “Azima is a very hard worker. That is why we chose her to go to school. She is smart and helpful. She spends many hours teaching her brothers and sisters to read and write. It is very important for the future of my family that my children know more than I do. I never learned to read. Without the schools my children could only weave nets like me. That is not a good life. I hope we can do better”. Azima is doing well, flourishing at the camp school and would love to be a teacher herself one day. In fact a 97% pass rate has recently been recorded, and she and her friends have also learnt skills to communicate with army officers, read vital health leaflets, negotiate better prices at the market and understand about the world by reading newspapers they find in the camp. “I don’t leave the camp because I am afraid of the police” says Azima, “but I love to go to the school. Without it I would have nowhere to go. It’s only hard sometimes when I am hungry, but I love to see my friends. My teachers are good people and they work hard every day. My favourite teacher is my English teacher as he likes to make jokes!” A new wave of violence against the Rohingya in October 2016 resulted in an additional influx of around 70,000 refugees to Bangladesh. It drew the eye of the international community and softened the government's position on unregistered Rohingya. We are optimistic that our education programme will now be recognised by the authorities and facilitated by UNICEF. With children like Azima in Kutupalong makeshift camp receiving the services they should, Children on the Edge can replicate the model to support new Rohingya arrivals, as yet unable to access services. You can help us to help these new arrivals by supporting our ‘Back to School’ campaign. Getting children Back to School
School’s out for summer, but you will have seen plenty of ‘Back to School’ supplies in the shops and online; as children get kitted out for their return in September. But getting ‘Back to School’ for the children we work with around the world is a lot more complicated than just buying pens, uniforms and packed lunch boxes. These children face enormous barriers to getting an education, but through our projects, we make it possible for them to access learning again, in a safe place. We provide education for thousands of children like Azima, living 'on the edge' in refugee camps, slum communities and in some of the most remote parts of the world. Could you make a donation today to help us support more children like Azima? Just £10 can provide exercise books and text books for ten Rohingya refugee children for a year in one of our camp schools in Bangladesh Burma’s Kachin people have suffered enormously at the hands of their own government in an ongoing conflict which has worsened in recent months. After military attacks and occupation, thousands of displaced people have been forced from Zai Awng camp and are now struggling in a hastily constructed settlement in northern Kachin. We are currently the only international organisation working with this forgotten community in the remote mountain camps. Our Asia Regional Manager, John Littleton visited this extremely hard-to-reach area of Burma in April 2017 and found that the situation has changed drastically, with many children now in increasingly desperate need of support. We’ve been working for a number of years in high-altitude, internally displaced people's (IDP) camps, including Zai Awng, providing education for 629 Kachin children, in 14 Early Childhood Development Centres. These safe spaces have given young children vital opportunities to learn, play and get the support they need, so that they are able to grow and develop, in spite of the daily realities of war. However, the intensified conflict in recent months, including air attacks and shelling has made these camps increasingly unsafe. Thousands of people were forced to flee Zai Awng late last year, looking for refuge over the border in China, only to be met with beatings and forced back, before fleeing again to stay safe. They hid in the jungle until troops withdrew. Some returned to the old camp but were not seen again, so the remaining 2,000 people built a new camp and called it Sha It Yang. This terrified and traumatised community have nowhere left to run, and are living in appalling conditions with little food and no clean water. Three teachers from our Centre in the original camp in Zai Awng have remained with the community and re-built a safe space for children in Sha It Yang. They have set up two classes but there is need for another four. Children are in desperate need of support after what they have been through, with teachers reporting that the even Chinese New Year firecrackers heard across the border are now terrifying for them. One teacher said, “We are doing the best we can, but naturally the children are quieter, less active and less able to be engaged and creative. The wider community is so tired of the fighting, they just want to go home, and they don’t understand why the world isn’t paying attention”. In the northern camps of Kachin state there is not a single other international organisation offering ongoing support to children. As the area remains an active war zone, access to the camps is difficult. Aid agencies sporadically operate in the central government controlled regions of Kachin State, but leave when the operating environment becomes too difficult. We are appealing for donations to ensure we can both maintain and expand our work here, to meet the escalating need in the new camp. If you are unable to support the work here financially, please share this blog where you can to direct attention to a terrified group of civilians, currently forgotten by the international community, yet in need of critical help.
Since June 2011 the Myanmar (Burma) central government has been in open conflict with the Kachin Independence Army following a failure in peace talks to resolve their longstanding conflict. While this conflict dates back decades, the past six years have seen consistent fighting, displacing more than 120,000 people across Northern Myanmar. In 2012 we heard first-hand accounts of those fleeing the conflict, who spoke of brutal violence, ongoing atrocities and severe violations of human rights including the wide-spread burning of villages, rape, maiming and executions. Now the government appears determined to crush this last remaining pocket of wide-spread armed resistance in Myanmar and their tactics have been increasingly harsh. In October, with significant natural resources and political influence at stake, they began to use jets, helicopters and shelling to attack civilians in the camps where we work. Zai Awng was one of the camps hit the hardest, with 3,000 displaced Kachin people living up in the mountains on the China border, taking refuge there since 2012. The October air attacks drove them out of the camp and over the border into China where they were badly beaten by authorities. Forced to turn back to Myanmar, they hid in the jungle until the troops withdrew. They returned to Zai Awng but in November the shelling resumed and they had no option but to flee again, hiding in a different part in China, then taking a different route back over the border. Any people who attempted within that month to return to the old camp disappeared, so the 2,000 people that remained built a new camp, closer to Laiza, called Sha It Yang. The terrified community are hoping this location could be safer, but are traumatised by their experience and livng with the knowledge that if they are attacked again, there is nowhere to run to. The conditions here are appalling, with thousands of people living under tarpaulin and only one road in or out. Food supplies are scant and the water is unsanitary, especially after rain, which saturates the area causing many problems. Three teachers from our Centre in the original camp have remained with the community and worked to re-build a safe space for children. They have set up two classes but there is need for another four. Children are in desperate need of support after what they have been through, with teachers reporting that the even Chinese New Year firecrackers heard across the border are now terrifying for them. One teacher said, “We are doing the best we can, but naturally the children are quieter, less active and less able to be engaged and creative. The wider community is so tired of the fighting, they just want to go home, and they don’t understand why the world isn’t paying attention”. In the northern camps of Kachin state there is not a single other international organisation offering ongoing support to children. As the area remains an active war zone, access to the camps is difficult. Aid agencies sporadically operate in the central government controlled regions of Kachin State, but leave when the operating environment becomes too difficult. We are appealing for financial support to both maintain and expand the work here, to meet the escalating need. Please share about this situation where you can, to direct attention to a beleaguered and terrified group of civilians, who are in need of critical help yet currently forgotten by the international community. Thousands of internally displaced people from Kachin State are facing freezing temperatures in the remote mountain areas where they have built settlements.
Surviving the cold at these high altitudes has become unbearable and our local partners have recently responded by distributing warm clothes such as trousers, coats, hats, socks and boots to each child and teacher at all of the 14 Early Childhood Development Centres we support here. There were 534 sets of warmth clothes distributed in total, procured from Chinese markets on the other side of the border. One grandmother of a child who received a set of clothes said, “My grandchild has been asking for socks and warm clothes since the winter advanced last month, but I could not afford to get any for him, and I felt extremely bad as he is in dire need of warm clothes. I am very thankful for your kind help on behalf of my grandchild, he is happy and feels secure now, and your assistance is very useful to us as you provide in a time of extreme need.” Find out more about the education we provide for Kachin children in Burma. Over 65,000 Rohingya refugees have fled Myanmar's Rakhine state since soldiers began intensive ‘counter-terrorism’ operations there in October. The level of human rights abuses has rocketed with countless reports of killings, rape, beatings and arson.
Tens of thousands have fled over the border to Bangladesh into the unofficial refugee camps, but the host communities are refugees themselves who have little to offer in terms of food and shelter. For over 5 years now Children on the Edge have been working with Rohingya refugee children in the makeshift camps of Bangladesh. We provide education to 2,700 children in a safe place, with a child friendly approach and trusted adult presence. The current surge of refugees into the camp that we work in has transformed a landscape already densely packed with sprawling makeshift shelters. The UN tracked about 22,000 arrivals in just one week, but those working locally estimate the number to be far higher. John Littleton, our Asia Regional Manager visited the camp last week and has reported that “The level of desperation is palpable. Not only is the physical landscape changing as dozens of bamboo, plastic, mud and stick huts are built each day, but there are lines of women and elderly people sat along the main road begging, in an area that is already resource scarce. I have been coming here over 5 years now and never seen this before”. Since their government passed the 1982 Citizenship Act, the Rohingya people have been denied access to citizenship and subjected to grave human rights abuses at the hands of the authorities and local population in Myanmar. For years, to escape this treatment, they have made perilous journeys at sea or fled across the borders, often to countries who, due to their own levels of poverty and overpopulation, do not welcome them. The Rohingya community we work with have faced ongoing attacks and vandalism at the hands of a resentful local community, but the latest influx of refugees has prompted a different reaction. John describes how “There is a softening in the wider community, and local violence towards the Rohingya is subsiding as it is dawning on people that these are not ‘migrants’, they are refugees fleeing from serious systemised abuse. This is clear from the sheer numbers of people entering the camps, but also the visible level of abuse that these people have suffered. Families are arriving injured and bleeding, some without clothes, many in grief having witnessed the death of loved ones, this is not something you can ignore”. Whilst in 2012 the persecution and abuse of the Rohingya came from from Buddhist militias that were backed by, but not overtly connected to the Myanmar government, the current atrocities are being perpetrated by organised soldiers in official uniform. The schools facilitated by Children on the Edge are already at capacity, but the current focus is working with those children to create an atmosphere of safety and familiarity. Teachers are trained from within the camps, and given specific guidance on supporting children living through trauma. In the face of everything they have witnessed this year the children are making great progress in their education. In our recent evaluation of the programme 92% of children in the schools exhibited signs of increased confidence and positive self-esteem. We are continuing to invest in this work and are actively pursuing funds for the schools to ensure their sustainability, deliver high quality education and provide a protective environment for these children. If you would like to find out more about supporting these schools at this crucial time, then please read our project page, consider an online donation, or get in touch. For over 5 years now Children on the Edge have been working with Rohingya refugee children in the makeshift camps of Bangladesh. The Rohingya are a Muslim minority group in Rakhine State, Myanmar who are widely considered the most persecuted group in the world.
Since their government passed the 1982 Citizenship Act, the Rohingya people have been denied access to citizenship and subjected to grave human rights abuses at the hands of the authorities and local population in Myanmar. To escape this treatment, they make perilous journeys at sea or flee across the borders, often to countries that are already impoverished and over populated. Bangladesh is now hosting around 400,000 Rohingya people and despite the recent surge of violence in Myanmar, are currently turning them away. In the last month there has been an additional surge of violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar, and a UN official has stated that the agenda fuelling it is ethnic cleansing. Some 30,000 Rohingya have fled their homes in the last month and an analysis of satellite images by Human Rights Watch has shown that hundreds of buildings in Rohingya villages have been razed. Claims of gang rape, torture and murder are adding to the crimes against humanity endured by this people group. Conditions for those that have made it across the border are poor and children have no opportunity for education. Official refugee camps are at capacity, overspilling into illegal makeshift camps. Movement is restricted and refugees have no permission to work outside the camps. They are often subject to attacks and persecution from locals who resent the refugee community. Children on the Edge work in the largest makeshift refugee camp in Bangladesh providing low profile primary education for Rohingya children in the camp. We operate 45 classrooms within the camp, enabling 2,700 children to gain a full primary education. All children follow a government recognised curriculum and take exams, ensuring that their education is officially recognised in Bangladesh, despite their migrant status. Without this provision there is a chance a whole generation of Rohingya will grow up unable to read or write, the latest wave of violence has tripled the amount of refugees coming into the areas we are working and the need is greater than ever. We are actively looking for support and funding for this vital work. Please get in touch if you think you can help with funding, or think about making a donation. Thank you. |
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