Violence in Myanmar rises, tiger population plummets

Horrific violence has affected Myanmar/Burma for longer than any civil war in modern history. The violence has its own obvious effects — the people who suffer the incredible trauma of, for example, having their infant children dashed across trees. And in these domestic conflicts, there are many tangential effects. For example, when violence plagues an […]

Burma: The constant threat of landmines

When I was in Burma on my first trip, we had a guide leading us through the jungle who seemed to know every inch of the place. This was before my military experience, and I was fairly young and certainly dumb, but I did my best to follow all instructions laid out by light hearted, […]

Human trafficking in times of significant humanitarian crises

Human trafficking exists in virtually every country in some form or another. The easiest targets tend to be the most vulnerable ones — that could mean vulnerable in their life situation (for example, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reported that 88% of their endangered runaways are missing from social services), or it could […]

Video: Monsoon rains threaten hundreds of thousands of Rohingya in refugee camps

The Rohingya refugee camps run along the border of Bangladesh and Burma/Myanmar. There are approximately one million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, and many have been scrambling to prepare for the rainy season. The rains have come, and flooding has begun to devastate many of these communities — the majority of these refugees have only arrived […]

Burma/Myanmar: Who are the Kachin people?

The fighting in Burma/Myanmar continues. The Rohingya are still in danger, as almost 700,000 of them have fled from their homes into refugee camps along the border of Bangladesh. However, now the Burmese military has shifted many of their efforts back to the Kachin, another ethnic minority that resides in the northern parts of the […]

Burma/Myanmar violence: From the Rohingya to the Kachin

The Burmese/Myanmar government has garnered intense international scrutiny with their handling of the Rohingya people. The conflict, which has been going on for decades and has begotten militant and civilian casualties on both sides, is nothing new. However, after some specific attacks on police checkpoints, the Burmese government decided to accelerate their offensives which escalated […]

Burma: The disconnect between the military and the elected government

An article in one of Burma/Myanmar‘s local publications bore a headline that might turn some heads in the United States: “Is the President Truly Above the Commander-in-Chief?” The title “commander-in-chief” is actually a military position, designating the person who is in charge of a nation’s armed forces. In the United States, of course, the commander-in-chief […]

Burmese government doesn’t know what to do with vacant Rohingya farmland

Myanmar/Burma — Since the conflict between the Rohingya and the Burmese government has continued since last year, almost 700,000 Rohingya have been driven from their homes and into refugee camps on the border of Bangladesh. Approximately 90% of the entire people had been driven from their homes in Rakhine state, which they have occupied for […]