Rohingya refugees face domestic abuse

Rohingya women who fled their homes in Myanmar are now being beaten and abandoned by their husbands, while young girls are facing increased pressure to marry, aid workers say.

Polygamy, violence against women and forced early marriages are a “growing critical problem” in the cramped refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, southern Bangladesh, ActionAid is warning.

Almost 700,000 Rohingya refugees have fled neighbouring Myanmar since last August amid reports of extreme violence, forming a total of more than 900,000 displaced people in the numerous sprawling camps.

Many are already traumatised, and now face the potentially catastrophic disruption of the looming monsoon season, which charities fear will increase their vulnerability.

Rahima, who has four children under the age of 11, including a baby born in the camps, said her violent husband had abused her in Myanmar and continued to do so after they fled.

The 28-year-old had saved the equivalent of £3,500 and gold, which her husband stole before abandoning her and crossing to Bangladesh alone. When she finally arrived in the camps with her children in September, she could not find her husband. She later discovered he had remarried. He now plans to leave the camps with his new wife.

Speaking through a translator, she said: “Now I am saying to my husband: ‘You may not think about me, I am your wife, but how can you ignore your children?’ They need food, they need materials to build their life, but he doesn’t pay anything.”

ActionAid is using British donations to run two women-friendly spaces and a centre in the Moinerghona settlement, safe havens where women and girls can socialise over games, take part in drama workshops, get health checks and, crucially, speak to trained counsellors to deal with their trauma.

A Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.