Many underage have been arrested for political reasons
08 November 2023
After the military coup in Myanmar, there are many underage children who have been arrested and detained. AAPP, the Association for the Support of Political Prisoners, said that these children who are being arrested and imprisoned are suffering serious child rights violations. The report about this has been submitted by Nemangithat.
After the military coup, the young protestors were violently arrested by the military, and later bomb blasts, There have been a series of arrests related to weapons. Children who are not yet of age are included in these arrests.
Recently, the military council allowed the prisoners to visit the prison in person, so the children under the age of arrest were also allowed to meet their parents officially. A child activist close to the prison told VOA that these young children do not have the right to enjoy the rights of children under the law.
"There is no freedom to meet. A teacher is listening, Next we have to provide data. The lawyers gave it. Parents from Monday to Friday. In this world, what children say is shaped. I give you a pattern. A kind of army. Asking them to get up early in the morning and run away, beating the whole house if they commit a sin in the next room, etc. The children said that there are such things. There will be about 2000, 2500 in political cases. This is within the boundaries of Yangon.
Under Myanmar's Children's Law, children under the age of 18 are considered minors. He also said that most of the children who have been arrested are not allowed to enjoy the rights of children under the law and are facing serious crimes.
In Yangon and Mandalay regions, they are kept in youth training camp schools within the region, but in other regions, they are rarely kept separately and kept in police cells. In order to arrest the activists against the military dictatorship. There are children and elderly people who are related to them who are being held captive.
Most of the underage children who are under arrest are from Yangon, From Mandalay, Bago, There are also arrests in small towns such as Pyay. According to a person close to the prison, the children detained in the current youth training camp schools are not only being tortured, but also suffering from psychological problems.
"The main thing is the judiciary. In other words, the police. Do the police not understand children's rights? I don't know if it's a blind eye or what. When the children are taken to court, they handcuff them and come out. It is mentioned that it must be checked, not in the form of a court. But the police started handcuffing. Another thing is that some courts are very strict in terms of security. Except for the one who will be put to war, the rest will not enter. So the children don't eat when they leave the office, Of course there are such things. They are currently experiencing things like missing their next week's tuition."
Activists point out that the holding of underage children as hostages is a violation of children's rights by the military council, as well as international humanitarian law.
Most of the children who were arrested under the age of majority have to live in their respective cells while they are facing trial. An official of the AAPP Association for the Support of Political Prisoners said that because there is no isolation because there is no isolation, most of them are bullied by other prisoners.
"If minors are caught, they cannot be mixed with adult prisoners. Mixing them together will cause unwanted problems. These are pre-blocked. Although limited by law, he is currently held together with other prisoners. These children spontaneously and from criminal prisoners are faced with cases of abuse and abuse. And the number of people in youth detention centers is too high. When there are more than the number that can be accommodated, it is heard all the time that those who are older, whether it is in terms of age or body, bully and bully the younger ones. These are there.”
According to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in July, nearly 1,000 underage children were killed by security forces after the military coup, and thousands more were arrested. I tried to contact the youth training institutes and the Ministry of the Interior several times to find out the truth about the children being arrested, but there was no response.