Over 400 orphans still search for parents: UNICEF

Two months after the deadly Cyclone Nargis ripped across Burma's southwestern coastal divisions, more than 400 children are still frantically searching for their parents, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Monday.

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Cyclone Orphans Take Low-Paid Work to Survive

Using a small oil lamp to seal the ends, a woman and

two children pack cheroots in to plastic bags in a small factory in Pegu,
58 kilometers (36 miles) north of Rangoon.
Sources said children orphaned by Cyclone Nargis
had migrated to the cities to find work. (Photo: AFP)

By VIOLET CHO
The Irrawaddy News

Many children orphaned by Cyclone Nargis are being employed in low-paid jobs in the Irrawaddy delta and Rangoon, according to monks in the region.

Monasteries throughout the region opened their doors to orphans, but a monk in Mawlamyinegyunn Township said children who lost their parents in the storm often preferred to live with adult survivors in their own communities, where they found work in the paddy fields and fish farms.

Other children who had lost their parents had migrated to the cities to find work in tea shops, small businesses and households, often encouraged by family members, the monk said. Some were as young as 10.

A senior monk in Mawlamyinegyunn said his monastery had sent 20 orphaned children to Phaungdawoo monastery in Mandalay, where they were being educated.

“There are so many children who desperately need care, and we are now trying to collect information and data about orphans so we can help them,” he said.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Monday that 428 children had been separated from their parents by the cyclone. More than 50 centers had been established to help them, said UNICEF spokesman Zafrin Chowdhury.

According to government figures, more than 84,000 people died in the cyclone and 54,000 are missing. The most vulnerable victims of the disaster were children, UNICEF said.

The International Labour Organization has expressed concern about the possibility that children may be forced to help in reconstruction work, and has warned UN agencies and relief workers of “the increased risk of incidences of forced labor, child labor, human trafficking and migrant labor as the authorities and individuals come to grips with the sheer size of the tragedy.”

Rangoon-based journalist Aung Thet Wyine contributed to this report.
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Traffickers target child cyclone survivors

CHILD traffickers are targeting the youngest and most vulnerable survivors of Burma's catastrophic cyclone and two suspects have already been arrested, the United Nations has reported.

The children, among up to two million people struggling to survive without enough clean water, food or shelter in the aftermath of the storm, were approached last week in Rangoon, the UN said yesterday.

"A broker came to a shelter and tried to recruit children,'' said UNICEF's chief child protection officer in Burma, Anne-Claire Dufay.

"There was an intervention. The police intervened and made arrests,'' she said.

The official death toll from Cyclone Nargis has risen to 34,273, with 27,836 people missing, state radio said today.

Ms Dufay said children who had been separated from their parents, and who were possibly orphans, were now facing the threat of violence on top of the everyday struggle to find enough food and water.

"There are concerns for children in camps,'' she said.

Katy Barnett, Save the Children's child protection adviser in Rangoon, said the organisation was aware of the report of the arrests and expected more trafficking problems as the crisis develops.

"It's something which agencies have been expecting. It's an absolute standard thing in the fallout from an emergency like this,'' Ms Barnett said.

"Traffickers can easily get hold of unaccompanied or separated children and tell them they'll lead a better life or be safe.''

Ms Barnett said another unconfirmed report of people looking in camps to recruit girls to work as domestic workers - a typical ruse for traffickers - was being investigated by a church organisation today.

"They are asking families if they would give their girls up and they haven't been stopped yet apparently,'' she said.

Burma made human trafficking illegal in September 2005, but in a report last year the US State Department listed the isolated nation as one of the world's worst offenders, along with North Korea and Laos.

Many of those involved in the trade are women and girls who face sexual exploitation after being smuggled across borders.

--Source: here

Refugee camps guarded like 'prisons'

Mizzima's correspondent returned from Pathein, the capital of Irrawaddy Division, one week after Cyclone Nargis hit the Delta. As a foreigner, he was denied access to areas which were hit hardest by the cyclone. But he saw hundreds of cyclone victims, including many orphans, and listened to their stories.

The Burma Army and local authorities keep survivors in evacuation camps that are guarded and managed like prisons.

In Myaungmya, close to the totally destroyed township of Laputta, the government has converted the six government high schools into shelters, each housing about 600 survivors. No one is allowed to enter these schools and no survivor is allowed to leave, not even for the search of missing family members.

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