SITTWE,
Myanmar (AP) — American actor Matt Dillon put a rare star-powered
spotlight on Myanmar's long-persecuted Rohingya Muslims, visiting a hot,
squalid camp for tens of thousands displaced by violence and a port
that has been one of the main launching pads for their exodus by sea.
It
was "heartbreaking," he said after meeting a young man with a raw, open
leg wound from a road accident and no means to treat it.
Mothers
carrying babies with clear signs of malnutrition stood listlessly
outside row after row of identical bamboo huts, toddlers playing nearby
in the chalky white dust.
"No
one should have to live like this, people are really suffering," said
Dillon, one of the first celebrities to get a look at what life is like
for Rohingya in the western state of Rakhine. "They are being strangled
slowly, they have no hope for the future and nowhere to go."
Though
Rohingya have been victims of state-sponsored discrimination for
decades, conditions started deteriorating three years ago after the
predominantly Buddhist country of 50 million began its bumpy transition
from a half-century of dictatorship to democracy.
In
this Friday, May 29, 2015 photo, American actor Matt Dillon, left,
stands with a Rohingiya man at Thay Chaung harbor, north of Sittwe in
the western state of Rakhine, Myanmar. Dillon puts a rare celebrity
spotlight on the plight of Myanmar's long-persecuted Rohingya Muslims,
visiting a hot, squalid camp for tens of thousands displaced by violence
and a port that has served as one of the main launching pads for their
exodus by sea. (AP Photo/Robin McDowell)
Taking
advantage of newfound freedoms of expression, radical monks started
fanning deep-seated societal hatred for the religious minority. Hundreds
have been killed by machete-wielding mobs and a quarter million others
now live under apartheid-like conditions in camps or have fled by boat -
hundreds of dehydrated, hungry Rohingya washing onto Southeast Asian
shores in recent weeks.
In
this Monday, May 11, 2015 photo, 17-year-old Noor Alam, right, and
16-year-old Sadik Hussein squat together hours after escaping from a
human-trafficking boat at Thetkabyin village, north of Sittwe in the
western state of Rakhine, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)
Denied
citizenship, they are effectively stateless with almost no basic
rights. As they become increasingly marginalized, several groups are
warning that the building blocks of genocide are in place.
"I know that's a very touchy word to use," said Dillon. "But there's a very ominous feeling here."
In
this Friday, May 29, 2015 photo, American actor Matt Dillon, left,
stands with a Rohingiya man at Thay Chaung harbor, north of Sittwe in
the western state of Rakhine, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Robin McDowell)
"I've
been to some places where the threats of violence seemed more
imminent," said Dillon, who has also visited refugee camps in Sudan, the
Congo and elsewhere. "Here it's something else. It feels more like
people are going to be left to wither away and die."
Dillon
said he decided to come to Myanmar following a desperate, urgent appeal
by Rohingya activist Thun Khin at a Refugees International fundraiser
in Washington, just over a month ago. In Japan to promote his new
television series, "Wayward Pines," he decided it was a good time to
make the trip.
"There
are people working here, people who know a hell of a lot more about it
than I do," Dillon said after hearing grumbling from some aid workers
about what he hoped to achieve. "But listen, if I can use my voice to
draw attention to something, where I see people suffering, I'll do that
any day of the week. I'm happy to do that."
He
spoke to two teenage boys who tried to flee by boat, only to find
themselves in the hands of human traffickers, and was chased away by
armed security guards when trying to snap pictures of the last standing
Rohingya neighborhood in the state capital - a ghetto surrounded by tall
walls topped by rolls of heavy barbed wire.
But what really choked him up were the camps: "It affected me more than I thought it would."
While
there were clear signs humanitarian agencies are active - new latrines,
well-placed hand pumps, concrete open sewers - he noted in contrast to
camps he's visited in Sudan and the Congo, he didn't run into a single
Western aid worker during his two-day visit.
Nor
were NGO trucks rumbling through with medical equipment, food or other
supplies - due primarily to severe restrictions placed on aid agencies
by the government following pressure from Buddhist extremists.
"A lot of people are suffering," he said. "I'm really glad I had a chance to come, to see for myself what's happening here."
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