Asia

Myanmar

DRC has been providing humanitarian-development nexus assistance to people affected by displacement in Myanmar since 2009, including currently across three states of Kachin, northern Shan, and Rakhine States.

Current situation

Humanitarian needs in Myanmar are characterised by a complex situation of vulnerability to multiple and interlinked factors. These include protection risks, food insecurity, armed conflict, intercommunal tensions, ethnic discrimination, effects of climate change, natural disasters, displacement, restrictions on freedom of movement, and Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) risks. Other underlying and more deeply rooted causes relate to entrenched ethnic discrimination and systemic rights violations as well as widespread unemployment and struggles for resources. Myanmar furthermore is challenged with aspects of governance, rule of law, and political instability.

During 2021 and into 2022, political developments and renewed instability have substantially degraded the human rights and protection landscape in Myanmar. Conflict between armed forces continue to escalate and erupt across the country, with the population experiencing a growing presence of armed actors reducing the protective environment for civilians.

As of April 2022, more than 907,500 people in Myanmar were internally displaced (UNHCR), including 560,900 people newly displaced since February 2021, when the military seized power.

In Myanmar’s Kachin and Shan States, the security situation remains tense and fighting frequently erupts across townships. This is causing further protracted displacement compared to the shorter-term displacement experienced previously.

The pursuit of durable solutions requires participatory political processes within Myanmar and in Bangladesh, where more than one million Rohingya are now hosted as refugees after fleeing 2017 violence in Rakhine State, where they originate. Rohingya remaining in Rakhine continue to face deprivation of their rights and largely have little or no access to education and other public services due to the fact that they are not registered as citizens of Myanmar. The Rohingya are today the world’s largest group of stateless people. The ongoing conflict between the Arakan Army rooted in Rakhine State and the Myanmar military continues to fuel intense levels of conflicts and cause high levels of internal displacement in Rakhine.

Core sectors Myanmar

Protection

Economic Recovery

Humanitarian Disarmament and Peacebuilding

Shelter and Settlements

Camp Coordination and Camp Management

Displacement trends

Source: | DRC Foresight

News

13 Sep 2022

Ongoing displacements in Myanmar
04 Sep 2022

Educating conflict-affected people in Myanmar on the risk and impact of Unexploded Ordnances
30 Aug 2022

Addressing Food Insecurity of Households Facing Protracted Displacement in Northern Shan
16 Aug 2022

Cash providing a food-secure line to displaced families in Northern Shan, Myanmar
22 Mar 2022

Myanmar: New waves of displacement in Kachin State
01 Mar 2021

Statement on Myanmar

Documents

26 Oct 2022

Protecting Rohingya Refugees in Asia (PRRiA)
01 Aug 2022

Diaspora Emergency Action & Coordination (DEMAC)

Why we are there

The work of DRC in Myanmar is anchored in an approach that offers support across communities in urban, rural and isolated areas in Rakhine, Kachin and northern Shan – three of the seven states in Myanmar. DRC implements both directly and increasingly via local partners in response to pre-existing access constraints and Covid-19 restrictions.

What we do

In 2022, DRC has been focusing on responding to the immediate needs of internally displaced people (IDPs) and the communities hosting them, as well as building their resilience to shocks and stresses in the longer term, in line with the 2022 Humanitarian Response Plan.

We are focused on providing humanitarian assistance through multi-sector and integrated responses in Rakhine, Kachin and Northern Shan states. Efforts are made to further scale up and scale out responses to address the rapidly growing crisis in Myanmar through the following core DRC sectors of Protection, Economic Recovery, Shelter and Settlements, Camp Coordination and Camp Management, Humanitarian Disarmament & Peacebuilding and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH).