COX'S BAZAR: The disturbing drawings of homes engulfed in flames, and stickmen hanging from trees that are produced by Rohingya children in Bangladesh’s overcrowded refugee camps are slowly giving way to the flowers and sunny days that psychologists expect from healthy youngsters.
But the prospect of returning to Rakhine, where the Myanmar Army and Buddhist mobs orchestrated a campaign of ethnic cleansing, could reverse the healing and damage children forever, say experts.
“My friends were slaughtered by the military and Buddhists when we were trying to escape. There were dead bodies everywhere,” 12-year-old Sadiya told AFP in a trembling voice, wiping away tears with her headscarf.
“If we go back now, they will kill all of us. I don’t think we will ever go back. I don’t want to.”
Sadiya is one of the 690,000 Rohingya who have pressed into Bangladesh since last August. Two thirds are children.
Thousands arrived alone, many carrying with them a handful of pitiful possessions and graphic stories of seeing their families murdered and their villages burned in an orgy of communal violence.
The UN estimates 170,000 children are suffering from some form of mental trauma, having witnessed rape and torture.
For months they have lived in the camps that have spread from the riverine border, where desperate conditions have steadily improved.
After months of global pressure on civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar reached an agreement on Nov. 23 with Bangladesh to take back refugees.
The returns were supposed to start this week, but were suddenly shelved, with both sides blaming the other for a lack of preparation.
Aid agencies and experts say that is actually a good thing.
“We know the children that are already traumatized and need expert care, will be even more traumatized if they are forced to go back,” UNICEF Deputy Executive Director Justin Forsyth told AFP in the Balukhali refugee camp.
“Nightmares, wetting their beds, self harming. These are things children begin to do in extreme situations. I mean children shaking with fear because they don’t know whether they’ll see the same type of violence happening again.”
The small army of psychologists working in the camps say repatriation could cause the Rohingya children long-term damage just as they are coming to terms with the relative stability of their new lives.
A handful of child-safe zones have sprung up across the camps, offering a respite from the drudgery of survival, where youngsters can play, draw, sing, act and read in safety.
Little is known about what preparations the Myanmar authorities are making, but pictures that emerged this week of processing centers wrapped in razor wire offered a stark contrast.
Sirajum Monira, a Bangladeshi government clinical psychologist at Kutupalong camp, said returning youngsters was not simply a case of shovelling them back across the border.
“The incidents can’t be forgotten easily. It is a major incident for their life which will be carried out throughout their life,” she said.
“After repatriation, going back to their own home, they will need psychological support.”
Even before the killing began last August, life was hard for the Rohingya, a minority despised by most Burmese as illegal immigrants — despite many having lived there for generations.
Myanmar imposes strict controls on education, freedom of movement and religion in Rakhine, though actual conditions are difficult to verify because the government not allow foreign media or aid groups into the region.
Ten-year-old Mohamamad Zubayer, whose father was killed by Buddhist mobs, would prefer to stay where he is.
“I don’t mind living here forever,” he told AFP, saying he particularly enjoyed going to school — something he had not been able to do in Myanmar.
Traumatized Rohingya children fear return to Myanmar
Traumatized Rohingya children fear return to Myanmar
South Sudan orders UN personnel to leave parts of Jonglei state
- The military said all civilians living in Nyirol, Uror, and Akobo counties in Jonglei were “directed to immediately evacuate for safety to government-controlled areas as soon as possible”
JUBA: South Sudan’s military has ordered all civilians and personnel from the UN mission and all other charities to evacuate three counties in Jonglei state ahead of an operation there against opposition forces.
Clashes that the UN says are occurring at a scale not seen since 2017 have been convulsing South Sudan, Africa’s youngest country, for months.
Some of the fiercest fighting has taken place in Jonglei, located in the country’s east on the border with Ethiopia, where the South Sudan People’s Defense Forces, or SSPDF, is seeking to halt an offensive by fighters loyal to the Sudan People’s Liberation Army-in-Opposition, or SPLA-IO.
An operation code-named “Operation Enduring Peace” was “imminent,” the SSPDF said in a statement.
The military said all civilians living in Nyirol, Uror, and Akobo counties in Jonglei were “directed to immediately evacuate for safety to government-controlled areas as soon as possible.”
All personnel from the UN Mission in South Sudan and those working for nongovernmental organizations were also ordered to evacuate the three counties within 48 hours.
“Our peacekeepers in Akobo remain in place, carrying out all efforts under our mandate to help de-escalate tensions and prevent conflict,” a UNMISS spokesperson said.
She did not say whether UN staff also remained in the other countries.
Last week, SPLA-IO called on its forces to march on South Sudan’s capital, Juba, signalling a major escalation. Earlier this month, SPLA-IO forces seized the town of Pajut in heavy fighting in the north of Jonglei, and the town’s capture was seen as putting the state capital of Bor at risk.
In a statement, UNMISS said 180,000 people in the state had already been displaced by the conflict and urged South Sudan’s leaders “to put the interests of their people first by stopping the fighting.”
Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontières, or MSF, said in a statement on Sunday it had evacuated key staff from Akobo county after “clear instruction from the relevant authorities, and in response to the deteriorating security situation in the area.”
SPLA-IO forces led by South Sudan’s vice president Riek Machar battled the military in the 2013-18 civil war, which was fought along largely ethnic lines and killed about 400,000 people.
A peace deal in 2018 quieted the conflict, although localized clashes have persisted.
