Gender-Based Violence Against Rohingya Refugee Women: A Crisis That Must Be Addressed

Constructing Humanitarian Selves and Refugee

Overview of the Rohingya Refugee Crisis

Discuss about the Constructing Humanitarian Selves and Refugee.

One of the most vulnerable groups of the refugee communities is the Rohingya. They are a group of the Muslim minority from the northern part of the Rakhine state in Myanmar. Despite the increased awareness of the prevalence of inmate partner violence and sexual violence in the platform of conflict and post-conflict scenario, the violence on the refugee women still continues. These acts of brutality fall under the concept of Gender Based Violence (GBV) (Olivius 2016).This explains the injury or the harm perpetrated against an individual will which is dependable over the inequalities of power that are informed by the gender roles. The gender-based violence poses a threat to the process of rehabilitation post-conflict and raises a question on the human security as denoted in UN Security Council Resolution 1325 (UN Women | Asia and the Pacific 2018). The paper aims to highlight the gender-based violence or the sexual violence on Rohingya refugee women by the security forces and by the refugee communities and the outsiders.

The violence against girls and women is one of the most dangerous violations of human rights in the world. Gender-based violence includes no economic, social or national boundaries. It undermines the dignity, health, autonomy, and security of the women who are the victim of this heinous act of violence. According to the U.N latest report, women and girls have been subject to dangerous gender-based and sexual violence executed by both the Rakhine locals and the Myanmar army (“All of My Body Was Pain” Sexual Violence against Rohingya Women and Girls in Burma 2017). October 2017 report on the gender brief on Rohingya Refugee Crisis explains the violence on the women refugees residing in the western state of Myanmar. An estimate of 537, 00 Rohingya refugees, mostly women survives in a terrible crisis (Refugees 2018). The traumatized and distressed population of female survives in terrible conditions with the lack of adequate water for drinking and sanitation, food, medical care and access to basic livelihood assets. The problem lies in a disproportionate impact on women and girls who are the most marginalized and vulnerable population among the Rohingya refugee community (Davies and True 2017). The crisis situation of the violence affects the feminine gender by perpetuating, reinforcing and aggravating persistent inequalities in gender, gender-based discrimination, and violence. According to the reports, almost each and every girl in the refugee community is either a survivor or a witness of multiple heinous crimes, sexual assaults, rape, murder by mutilation or live burning of close family members. The frequency of violence of women and girls by the security force has been increasing over the last few years. Many women and girls experience sexual violence and assault which results in conception and abortions (Akhter and Kusakabe 2014). This problem is a horrific reminder that gender-based violence and sexual assaults are the most dangerous weapons of war, tools, and instruments of terror or fear that are mostly utilized against the feminine gender of the Rohingya refugee population. Reports further highlight how the military engages in killing Rohingya women and girls by burning the entire Rohingya villages and engages in rape and other forms of sexual violence on the Rohingya girls and women (Sigalas 2018). Rape survivors escaping from the location often had to walk for days in severe pain from the injuries sustained from gang rapes.

Gender-Based Violence: Threat to Human Security

The UN Human Rights Council on March 24, 2017, authorized a fact-finding mission for targeting the situation of Rohingya community in the Rakhine state in particular (Blay-Tofey and Lee 2015). Since August 2017, an estimated half of the population fled to Bangladesh after the experience of the violence and joined thousands of refugees due to prior governmental repression and during the earlier violence. Thousands of girls and women of the community got internally displaced due to the lack of basic humanitarian assistance. The UN Security Council Presidential Statement described grave concerns on the issues of violence against women, reports of human rights violations and abuses by the security forces and the local community members. The Security Council called upon the government of Burma to end the excessive interference of military forces in the state of Rakhine and implement measures with the Security Council resolution 2016, for preventing the sexual violence against the feminine gender (Sexual Assault in the United States Military 2018). The council published statements that highlight the importance to co-operate with the UN special representative on the conflict of sexual violence and ensures the unrestrained access to humanitarian aid in the state of Rakhine. UNFPA has already been providing a range of services and takes the lead for supporting the survivors and victims of the gender-based and sexual violence (Islam et al. 2016). It has provided a wide range of facilities with women-friendly spaces and community watch groups, healthcare camps where assistance to medical needs and psychological counseling for the rape victims are done. The UN agencies are scaling up the responses in Bangladesh from the Rohingya community for supporting and providing aid to the women and the girls of the community who are in utmost need for reproductive healthcare. The government and other partners of the civil society are thus progressing and working hard to abolish the heinous crime and preserve the basic rights of the women and children of the Rohingya population (Akhter and Kusakabe 2014).

The gender-based violence and the rape or sexual assault is one of the key concerns that have emerged from the rising humanitarian crisis. Some of the suggested recommendations to address the problem of violence against women include ceasing of the ethnic cleansing campaign by the security forces that result in sexual violence. Besides this, investigation and appropriate punishment for the members of security forces who are responsible for the sexual violence should be done. Ensuring of the unimpeded access of the humanitarian aid organization for assisting the survivors of the sexual violence and co-operating with the international investigations should be done for identifying and addressing the crimes in the Rakhine state. Some of the other recommendations for the government of Bangladesh include the continual of accurate biometric registration of Rohingya women and children for equal protection access and opening up of the border for the asylum seekers of Rohingya to recognize and respect the principles of nonrefoulment (“All of My Body Was Pain” Sexual Violence against Rohingya Women and Girls in Burma 2017). Introduction of protocols for providing medical certificate to the women and the girls reporting rape to the health clinics, ensuring the full participation of the Rohingya women and the girls for their active participation with the community members to construct refugee camps, aid distribution, measures for the sexual and gender-based violence are some of the basic recommendations that need to be followed (Tazreiter, Pickering and Powell 2017). Besides this, regular updates from the UN Commissioner for the Human Rights for the consideration of appropriate action for sexual violence against women and children needs to be checked and followed up to address the denial of humanitarian access for the women of the Rohingya community.

• Provide care for post-rape and post-sexual violence which includes psychological services, health care facilities and monitoring of these services for a longer term.
• Imposing sanctions on the military force individuals who are responsible for the human right abuse that includes gender-based, sexual violence and the failure to abolish the sexual violence. These sanctions should include asset freezes, restrictions for accessing financial institutions and travel bans.
• The fact-finding mission should gather data and identify the area and command responsibility regard to the gender-based violence. They should also include recommendations on the mechanism of appropriate accountability in the final report and submit the final data report regarding the degree and rate of violence against the refugee women and children to the UN Security Council.

References

“All of My Body Was Pain” Sexual Violence against Rohingya Women and Girls in Burma. 2017. Human Rights Watch, [online] (ISBN: 978-1-6231-35485), pp.9-46. Available at: https://2160431_1167702736_AllofmyBodywasPain-SexualViole%20.pdf [Accessed 22 Apr. 2018].

Akhter, S. and Kusakabe, K. 2014. Gender-based Violence among Documented Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh. Indian Journal of Gender Studies, [online] 21(2), pp.225-246. Available at: https://2160432_689200402_Gender-basedViolenceamongDocum%20.pdf.

Akhter, S. and Kusakabe, K., 2014. Gender-based violence among documented Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. Indian Journal of Gender Studies, 21(2), pp.225-246.

Blay-Tofey, M. and Lee, B. 2015. Preventing gender-based violence engendered by conflict: The case of Côte d’Ivoire. Social Science & Medicine, [online] 146, pp.341-347. Available at: https://2160430_742780604_Preventinggender-basedviolence%20.pdf.

Davies, S.E. and True, J., 2017. The politics of counting and reporting conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence: the case of Myanmar. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 19(1), pp.4-21.

Islam, F., Khan, M.H., Ueda, M., Chowdhury, N.R.A., Chowdhury, S.M., Delem, M.D. and Rahman, A., 2016. 724 Situation of sexual and gender based violence among The Rohingya migrants residing in Bangladesh.

Olivius, E., 2016. Constructing Humanitarian Selves and Refugee Others: Gender Equality and the Global Governance of Refugees. International feminist journal of politics, 18(2), pp.270-290.

Refugees, U. 2018. SAFE space and fresh start for refugee survivors of sexual and gender-based violence. [online] UNHCR. Available at: https://www.unhcr.org/news/latest/2018/2/5a7428474/safe-space-and-fresh-start-for-refugee-survivors-of-sexual-and-gender-based.html [Accessed 22 Apr. 2018].

Sexual Assault in the United States Military. 2018. [ebook] University of New South Wales. Available at: https://2160605_503681158_SRAP5106strongpolicybrief-Sexu%20.pdf [Accessed 22 Apr. 2018].

Sigalas, M., 2018. Gendered Violence: An Analysis of State Legal Accountability for Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Amongst Refugee Women.

Tazreiter, C., Pickering, S. and Powell, R., 2017. Rohingya women in Malaysia: decision-making and information sharing in the course of irregular migration.

UN Women | Asia and the Pacific. 2018. Gender Brief on Rohingya Refugee Crisis Response in Bangladesh. [online] Available at: https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2017/10/gender-brief-on-rohingya-refugee-crisis [Accessed 22 Apr. 2018].