Angelina Jolie to visit Rohingya victims of sexual assault
Angelina Jolie, a superstar and filmmaker,and also a special envoy of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), announced plans to visit Rohingya victims of sexual violence in Bangladesh.
Jolie gave a speech during the UN Peacekeeping Defense Ministerial Conference in Vancouver, Canada, on Nov. 15. She decried the sexual violence in Bangladesh a tactic of war against civilians.
“According to the UN, almost every female Rohingya refugee in the camps in Bangladesh is either a survivor of sexual violence or a witness to multiple instances of sexual assault rape or gang rape. MSF said that half – half – of the patients it has treated for rape are under 18 years old, and one was just nine years old,” Jolie said.
“This is rape and assault designed to torture to terrorize and to force people to flee. It has nothing to do with sex. It has everything to do with abuse of power. It is criminal behavior.”
Jolie informed the Bangladeshi delegation at the conference that she planed to visit the victims of sexual violence in refugee camps near the border with Myanmar. The foreign ministry of Bangladesh acknowledged the proposal but has not released any additional details about the trip.
As human right groups gave report about the barbarity, the Myanmar military denied all accusations of wrongdoing.