The country
Myanmar, formerly Burma, is a Southeast Asian nation that borders India, Bangladesh, China, Laos, and Thailand. The country gained its independence from the United Kingdom on 4 January 1948. Its capital is Naypyitaw. Myanmar covers a land area of 676,578 square kilometers. As of 2024, the country had an estimated population of around 56.5 million people. Over half of Myanmar's population consists of diverse ethnic groups.
The humanitarian situation
Myanmar faces multiple overlapping humanitarian needs caused by genocide, persecution, protracted armed conflicts, intercommunal violence and natural disasters. Humanitarian needs in Myanmar have continued to grow due to ongoing armed violence and political unrest since the military coup in February 2021. Myanmar is also one of the most vulnerable countries in South East Asia to natural disasters, facing numerous hazards such as floods, cyclones, and earthquakes.
On May 14, 2023, Tropical Cyclone Mocha - one of the most powerful storms in decades - hit western and northern Myanmar and southeastern Bangladesh. The cyclone caused widespread damage, affecting over 10 million people in both countries and compounding an already serious humanitarian situation. On May 23, 2023, the United Nations and humanitarian partners launched a US$333 million Flash Appeal for donor support to reach 1.6 million people affected by Cyclone Mocha in Myanmar's Rakhine, Chin, Sagaing, Magway and Kachin states.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), ongoing fighting across Myanmar continues to endanger the lives, safety, and health of civilians. Heavy armed clashes, including airstrikes, artillery fire and ambushes are reported in two-thirds of the country.
As of April 2024, there were an estimated 2.8 million internally displaced people (IDP) across Myanmar, including more than 2.5 million people who have been displaced within the country since the military takeover on February 1, 2021. Some 300,000 people are internally displaced due to conflict prior to February 2021, mainly in Rakhine, Kachin, Chin, and Shan state.
More than 1.3 million refugees and asylum-seekers from Myanmar – mostly from the Rohingya ethnic group - have fled to neighboring countries. Nearly half of the refugees and internally displaced people are children. Some 110,000 people have fled the country since the military takeover in February 2021.
For decades, the Rohingya, an ethnic Muslim minority, have faced institutionalized discrimination in Myanmar, such as exclusion from citizenship. Since August 2017, ongoing conflict and violence in northern Rakhine state forced over 700,000 people, mostly Rohingya, to flee Myanmar to Bangladesh. Most of the Rohingya refugees are living currently at the Kutupalong and Nayapara refugee camps in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar region.
Rising despair in Bangladesh’s refugee camps and ongoing violence in Myanmar are driving a dramatic increase in Rohingya risking perilous journeys across the Andaman Sea. The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has issued several public warnings about the sharp increase in the number of people, mainly Rohingya, fleeing both Bangladesh and Myanmar by boat.
In 2023, at least 4,490 Rohingya made the risky boat journey - an increase from 2022, when a total of 3,705 Rohingya risked their lives. The majority of those attempting the journey across the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal were women and children.
Some 569 Rohingya were reported to have perished or gone missing last year in South-East Asian waters. Nearly 1,000 Rohingya refugees traveling by boat died or went missing at sea in 2022 and 2023, including an Indonesia-bound boat carrying approximately 200 refugees that is believed to have sunk in November 2023.
About 2,000 Rohingya refugees - an estimated 73 percent of whom are women and children - arrived in Indonesia by sea from Bangladesh and Myanmar between mid-November 2023 and the end of March 2024, according to UNHCR.
The United Nations estimates that 18.6 million people - including 9.7 million vulnerable women and girls - in Myanmar will need humanitarian assistance and protection in 2024, an increase of 1 million compared to 2023. Among the population requiring humanitarian aid are some 6 million children.
According to the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 15.2 million people in the country - nearly 25 percent of the population - are food insecure. Myanmar's health system is in disarray and basic medicines are running out. It is estimated that 12 million people in Myanmar will need emergency health assistance this year alone.
Access restrictions imposed by the authorities and funding constraints severely hamper the ability of aid agencies to respond to humanitarian needs in Myanmar. In 2023, humanitarian organizations reached only 3.2 million people with humanitarian assistance due to underfunding and access constraints. The lack of funding still meant that more than 1.1 million people were left without priority life-saving assistance, nearly three-quarters of all planned shelter repairs and construction were not possible, and nearly 672,000 people did not have access to safe drinking water.
A report by the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) - published in July 2023 - found that the humanitarian and human rights situation is exacerbated by the military’s strategy to prevent life-saving humanitarian aid from reaching those who desperately need it, including in the aftermath of Tropical Cyclone Mocha in May 2023. OHCHR said even when humanitarian workers had been permitted access, their ability to deliver aid was strictly limited and controlled.
Relief operations in Myanmar and neighboring Bangladesh (Rohingya refugee crisis) are dangerously and chronically underfunded. The World Food Programme was forced to cut food aid for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh twice in 2023 due to funding shortages. In May, the WFP cut food vouchers in Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh to just 8 US dollars, less than 9 cents per meal. In March, the WFP had already reduced its life-saving food vouchers from USD 12 to USD 10 per person per month. Since January 2024, the WFP has increased its monthly food vouchers back to USD 10 per person.
The 2024 Myanmar Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan (HNRP) has been published which targets 5.3 million people of the most vulnerable people this year, requiring US$994 million. The Rohingya Joint Response Plan (JRP) 2024 seeks US$872.7 million to assist 1.3 million people. The continued lack of funding is undermining relief efforts. The 2024 HNRP is only 4 percent funded as of April 2024, while the Rohingya Joint Response Plan is just 1 percent funded.
According to OCHA's assessment, the crisis in Myanmar - almost three years after the military took power - risks becoming a forgotten emergency. The UN office warns that the situation in 2024 requires immediate and sustained international attention to raise the necessary funds to alleviate suffering and save lives.
The 2023 Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) for Myanmar called for US$887 million to provide life-saving assistance to millions of people. As of December, the HRP was only 33 percent funded. The Rohingya Humanitarian Crisis Joint Response Plan 2023 required $876 million. As of December, the response plan was only 49 percent covered by funding.
The United Nations requested $826 million in funding for the Myanmar crisis in 2022. As of December 2022, only $291 million had been received from donors (35 percent coverage). For the Rohingya emergency in Bangladesh, $881 million was targeted. As of December 2022, international donors had provided only $434 million (49 percent coverage).
The security situation
In August 2017, the Myanmar government launched a military campaign that forced 740,000 of Rohingya to flee their homes in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. The United States has declared the Myanmar government has committed genocide against the Rohingya. An estimated 600,000 Rohingya people, living in Myanmar’s Rakhine State, are unable to move freely and are subject to government persecution and violence.
On February 1, 2021, the military staged a coup d'état and arrested State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi and President U Win Myint, as well as other leaders of the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD). More than 4,800 people were killed in protests and unrest after the coup at the hands of the military, and over 26,000 were arrested.
In 2022, intense armed clashes in several states, exacerbated by tight security and restrictions on the movement of people and goods, threatend the lives and safety of Myanmar people. Frequent, indiscriminate attacks, including airstrikes and artillery shelling in civilian areas, claimed victims and spread fear. Displacement also increased despite some reported returnees. According to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), Myanmar in 2022 was by far the worst country in terms of state-sponsored political violence against civilians.
In December 2022, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) passed a landmark resolution on Myanmar (Resolution 2669), demanding the military government immediately end violence in the Southeast Asian nation and release all arbitrarily detained prisoners. In reiterating the necessity for full, safe and unhindered humanitarian access, the UNSC underlined the need for scaled-up humanitarian assistance to all people in need in Myanmar and to ensure the full protection, safety and security of humanitarian and medical personnel.
In 2023, armed conflict in multiple states across Myanmar claimed lives, triggered displacement and affected civilians. Last year, more than 1 million people have been internally displaced and were living in precarious conditions in camps and informal sites, often in jungles and forests. Some 78,000 civilian structures, including homes, clinics, schools and places of worship, have been reportedly burned or destroyed since the military seized power. Some 255 of the country’s 330 townships have been impacted by armed clashes. Martial law is currently declared in 47 townships across multiple states and regions.
A report to the UN Human Rights Council, released in August 2023, found strong evidence that the Myanmar Armed Forces (MAF) and its affiliate militias are committing increasingly frequent and brazen war crimes. These war crimes include indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks on civilians from aerial bombing, the mass executions of civilians and detained combatants, and the large-scale and intentional burning of civilian homes and buildings, resulting in the destruction of entire villages in some cases.
In 2023, there was a staggering 270 percent increase in casualties from landmines and explosive remnants of war compared to 2022, with more than a thousand casualties reported nationwide.
Since the end of October 2023, fighting between ethnic armed organizations (EAOs) and the MAF has escalated. More than 800,000 people have been displaced due to the clashes and aerial bombardments. In November, the fierce fighting between the EAOs and the MAF spread to other regions, including densely populated urban centers.
Since then armed conflict has been spreading in many parts of the country especially in Rakhine state, the northwest, Kachin and the southeast. The ongoing escalation of conflict in Myanmar is severely affecting people in almost every corner of the country, with alarming spillover effects into neighboring countries. The UN warns that the humanitarian impact is significant and deeply concerning.
According to the United Nations, this escalation is the largest and most geographically widespread since the military took power in 2021, with the north and south of Shan, Sagaing, Kayah, Rakhine, Chin, Magway, Kayah, eastern Bago and Kayin particularly affectd. As of December 2023, fighting between the Myanmar Armed Forces (MAF) and non-state armed groups, incuding the EAOs as well as People's Defence Forces (PDFs), persisted in around two thirds of the country.
The fierce clashes erupted after a sudden coordinated attack by a trio of ethnic minority-led rebel groups along the border between China and Myanmar in northern Shan State. The offensive, dubbed "Operation 1027" due to the date it began, was launched in northern Shan State on October 27, 2023 by the "Three Brotherhood Alliance" - consisting of the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), the Ta'ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and the Arakan Army (AA).
People across Myanmar live in daily fear for their lives, especially since the implementation of the National Conscription Law. In February 2024, Myanmar's military authorities announced plans to enforce a conscription law, with 5,000 people to be conscripted into the Myanmar Armed Forces every month from mid-April.
Since the announcement, arbitrary arrests and forced recruitment have continued to affect civilians. Members of the Rohingya community have been particularly hard hit. Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported in April that the armed forces have abducted and forcibly recruited more than 1,000 Rohingya Muslim men and boys from across Rakhine State since February 2024.
Donations
Your donations for the Myanmar emergency and the Rohingya emergency can help United Nations agencies, international humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and their local partners to rapidly provide water, food, medicine, shelter and other aid to the people who need it most.
- UN Crisis Relief: Myanmar crisis
https://crisisrelief.un.org/myanmar-crisis - UN Crisis Relief: Cyclone Mocha: Myanmar appeal
https://crisisrelief.un.org/cyclone-mocha-myanmar-appeal - World Food Programme: Myanmar emergency
https://www.wfp.org/emergencies/myanmar-emergency - UNHCR: Rohingya emergency
https://www.unhcr.org/rohingya-emergency.html - UNICEF: Rohingya crisis
https://www.unicef.org/emergencies/rohingya-crisis - Oxfam International: Bangladesh Rohingya refugee crisis
https://www.oxfam.org/en/what-we-do/emergencies/bangladesh-rohingya-refugee-crisis - IFRC: Myanmar: Complex emergency
https://www.ifrc.org/emergency/myanmar-complex-emergency
To find other organizations to which you can donate, visit: Humanitarian Crisis Relief, Refugees and IDPs, Children in Need, Hunger and Food Insecurity, Medical Humanitarian Aid, Vulnerable Groups, Faith-Based Humanitarian Organizations, and Human Rights Organizations.
Further information
- International Crisis Group: Five Years On, Rohingya Refugees Face Dire Conditions and a Long Road Ahead, August 22, 2022
https://www.crisisgroup.org/asia/south-east-asia/myanmar/five-years-rohingya-refugees-face-dire-conditions-and-long-road-ahead - UN OCHA: Myanmar
https://www.unocha.org/myanmar - European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO): Myanmar / Burma
https://civil-protection-humanitarian-aid.ec.europa.eu/where/asia-and-pacific/myanmarburma_en - UNHCR USA: Rohingya Refugee Crisis Explained
https://www.unrefugees.org/news/rohingya-refugee-crisis-explained/ - International Crisis Group: Myanmar
https://www.crisisgroup.org/asia/south-east-asia/myanmar - ACAPAS: Myanmar
https://www.acaps.org/en/countries/myanmar - Human Rights Watch: World Report 2023: Myanmar
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2023/country-chapters/myanmar - Amnesty International: Report 2022/2023: Human rights in Myanmar
https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/asia-and-the-pacific/south-east-asia-and-the-pacific/myanmar/report-myanmar/ - U.S. State Department: Burma genocide
https://www.state.gov/burma-genocide/
Last updated: 14/04/2024