Rohingyas in Myanmar suffering ‘heartbreaking’ misery and cruelty

Volker Türk was speaking as a new report was released by an independent UN fact-finding mission which found that human rights in the country – especially for minorities – have hit a new low.

Myanmar is locked in a brutal civil war between the military and various resistance groups.

In August 2017, Myanmar’s military conducted a ruthless crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in the western Rakhine State, prompting more than 740,000 to flee across the border to Bangladesh, where the vast majority are still living as refugees.

Five years since the military junta took control of Myanmar, it has killed at least 8,075 and forcibly conscripted hundreds of thousands while the rebel Arakan Army – the de facto authority across most of Rakhine – has committed widespread abuses against the Rohingya, according to the report.

Covering June 2025 to May 2026, the new report details how an armed group’s August 2025 decision to stop supplying other anti-military groups allowed the military to press its advantage, going as far as to deny humanitarian aid in an effort to “crush opposition and force obedience.”

Rohingya continue to suffer

The report describes the Rohingya as experiencing “systematic discrimination by all parties, with absolute impunity.”

Having lost most of its control over Rakhine State to the Arakan Army, the military has resorted largely to airstrikes to stop rebel advances – often in civilian areas – with at least 2,592 of these strikes in the reporting period.

The same military that killed thousands of Rohingya in 2017 has since forcefully conscripted around 125,000 – many of them Rohingya – subjecting some to forced alcohol consumption, denial of rest and physical abuse, according to the report.

Despite its stated policy of “inclusive governance and equal treatment,” the Arakan Army rebels have seized land, forced Rohingyas to build their own prison-like detention camps, strictly controlled border crossings in Rakhine and arbitrarily killed and tortured many.

Once detained by the Arakan Army, Rohingyas have reported being beaten with bamboo, burned with matches, hung upside down with their bodies spun until they passed out.

They also reported having chili applied to their genitals and their fingernails removed. The Arakan Army reportedly forced one child to clear the bones and skulls of fellow Rohingya after a massacre.

Conflict economy destroys communities

The report also outlines how since the 2021 coup, Myanmar has become the world’s largest producer of opium and synthetic drugs, alongside a multi-billion-dollar scam industry and the unregulated mining of rare earth minerals.

In the absence of rule of law, these illicit economies have helped finance the conflict, strengthen transnational criminal networks and degrade Myanmar’s natural environment.

Women and girls face entrenched gender inequalities and, in recent years, have been increasingly forced into the mining sector, putting them at heightened risk of sexual violence and reprisal if they spoke out, the report said.

“Perpetrators were shielded from external scrutiny or legal recourse, strengthening impunity and allowing the systematic reoccurrence of sexual violence and labour exploitation,” the report read.

Foreign nationals in managerial roles often exploit Burmese workers, forcing them into high-risk conditions and trapping them in debt bondage.

Marking nine years since the since their forced mass displacement, Rohingya people in Myanmar, Bangladesh and across the region “face deepening insecurity, shrinking protection space and diminishing prospects for durable solutions, exacerbated by funding cuts impacting life-saving assistance,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday.