A/HRC/28/72
informed that victims are often reluctant to report their cases for fear of jeopardizing the
peace process or out of fear for their own security. Where they are reported, police show
reluctance to pursue cases against the military for fear of reprisals. Furthermore, cases take
years to pass through the legal system.
36.
The Special Rapporteur welcomes ongoing efforts to implement the joint action plan
to end the recruitment and use of child soldiers signed by the Government and the United
Nations in June 2012. She commends the Government for important steps taken so far to
support the implementation of the plan, including the identification and release of
553 children since the action plan was signed; improved access offered to the United
Nations country task force on monitoring and reporting by the military to its sites; a
nationwide awareness-raising campaign on the issue of child recruitment; and the adoption
of a number of directives to clarify policies and practices for military recruitment.
However, the Special Rapporteur received information of ongoing recruitment of children
into security forces due to a quota-based recruitment system that reportedly continues
within the military. She urges the Government to address that issue immediately, and to
accelerate the identification, release and reintegration of all children currently serving in the
national armed forces and border guard forces.
37.
The Special Rapporteur encourages the Government to continue to seek technical
assistance to put in place strengthened recruitment procedures, age verification mechanisms
and independent monitoring and oversight of all armed forces (including border guard
forces and other security forces) to prevent the unlawful recruitment of children. She
stresses the importance of bringing to justice those responsible for child recruitment and
use, including those with command responsibility and civilian brokers who assist in the
unlawful recruitment of children. She urges the Government to ratify the Optional Protocol
to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed
conflict, in order to further consolidate progress. She recommends that child protection
mechanisms should be fully incorporated in ceasefire and peace agreements and in the
mechanisms aimed at monitoring their implementation.
Rakhine State
38.
In Rakhine State, the Special Rapporteur met with local authorities and community
leaders, and visited camps in Myebon and Sittwe for persons who were displaced after the
violence in June 2012. It is recognized that those camps include those that are solely for
Rohingya Muslims and non-Muslims married to Muslims, as well as camps for those who
are Buddhists. During a number of frank discussions with representatives of both
communities, the Special Rapporteur was able to deepen her understanding of the root
causes of the conflict, the history of Rakhine State and the fears and suffering of its people.
The Special Rapporteur firmly believes that the chronic underdevelopment of Rakhine
State, and the conditions of poverty in which some people live, must be urgently addressed.
However, while she acknowledges that the Rakhine State government has initiated
processes for further development, she saw no significant improvement in the situation of
human rights from her previous visit in July 2014. In particular, discriminatory restrictions
on freedom of movement for internally displaced Muslims remain in place, severely
impacting access to health care, food, water and sanitation, as well as education and
livelihoods. Furthermore, no independent and credible investigations have been conducted
into allegations of serious human rights violations, including during and after the
considerable violence in June and October 2012 and January 2014, involving allegations of
documented in Myanmar since 2010, allegedly committed by State forces in both ceasefire and nonceasefire areas. Available from http://womenofburma.org/if-they-had-hope-they-would-speak/.
12
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