Violence was the direct cause of death for at least 6700 Rohingya civilians, including 730 children, living in the state of Rakhine, Myanmar, in the initial 31 days following the latest upsurge of unrest that began on August 25, 2017, according to surveys conducted by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Discriminatory policies against the Muslim ethnic minority Rohingya living in Buddhist-majority Myanmar have been carried out by the Myanmar government for decades. Last August, after a Rohingya militant group attacked police stations and army posts in northern Rakhine, the government declared the Rohingya group a terrorist organization and mounted a campaign ostensibly to restore stability to the region. The government’s “clearance operations” have forced more than 600 000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. In November 2017, MSF conducted 6 retrospective mortality surveys to assess the situation among the Rohingya refugees living in different settlement camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, with 4 surveys carried out in the northern settlements and 2 surveys in southern settlements. At least 9000 Rohingya were reported to have died in the first month of the crisis (August 25 to September 24), of which 71.7% deaths were the direct result of violence. Gunshot wounds accounted for 69.4% of the total violence-related deaths. Other causes of violence-related deaths included being burned at home (8.8%), being beaten (5%), sexual violence (2.6%), and landmine blasts (1%). Among children younger than 5 years who were killed, 59% died of gunshot wounds, 15% were burned to death at home, 7% were beaten to death, and 2% died from landmine blasts. These numbers are likely to be underestimates, reported the authors.
Language: en
LA - en SN - 0098-7484 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.2018.0964 ID - ref1 ER -