“Most of our villages are gone and turned into a jungle as there is no one living there”
— IDP from Rakhine.
People in need, targeted, prioritized and severity by location
The boundaries and names shown and the designations used on this map do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by the United Nations.
Source OCHANeeds
Since the February 2021 military takeover, civilians in Myanmar have faced escalating multifront conflict, repeated waves of displacement, recurrent climate shocks and pervasive human rights and international humanitarian law violations, including grave violations against children, increased risks of GBV, including conflict-related sexual violence and risks of unexploded ordnance, all of which have intensified protection risks and deepened the humanitarian emergency. As violence spreads across multiple regions, an estimated 11.6 million people now require urgent protection assistance, including 3.6 million people displaced by conflict. The situation has been further compounded by the March 2025 earthquake, which killed approximately 3,800 people, destroyed tens of thousands of homes and critical infrastructure, and devastated a region hosting nearly 12 million people, including 2.1 million IDPs—67 per cent of the country’s displaced population post-2021.
People living in conflict-affected areas face sustained violence, restricted mobility and systematic deprivation of services (including protection services), resulting in worsening living conditions. From January 2024 until September 2025, the Protection Incident Monitoring System (PIMS) documented 6,971 incidents resulting in 12,518 human rights violations affecting 382,918 individuals, 38 per cent of whom were children. Protection risks, including those related to child protection, GBV, and mine action, are widespread. The most frequently reported incidents include destruction of property, indiscriminate attacks on civilians, killings, maiming and physical injuries, compounded by heightened exposure to mines and explosive ordnance, placing Myanmar globally among the countries with the highest annual incident rates.
Barriers to accessing services—including discrimination, bureaucratic obstacles, military blockades and the destruction of critical infrastructure—severely limit people’s ability to access state-provided protection services. Conflict and climate shocks have broken down community protection mechanisms, while the lack of livelihoods and services undermines people’s self-protection capacities. Exposure to violence and prolonged stress erodes coping capacity, negatively affects mental health and drives psychosocial distress.
People face heightened risks of violence, displacement and exploitation, often shaped by age, gender and sexuality. Displaced populations are particularly vulnerable to GBV, including conflict-related sexual violence, exploitation, intimate partner violence and psychological abuse. Lack of economic opportunities and displacement often compel women and girls to resort to harmful coping mechanisms such as survival sex and child marriage. Specific risks such as trafficking, including of children, and irregular movement further exacerbate vulnerability and can result in serious harm, including death. The 2025 Security Council report on Children and Armed Conflict highlights grave risks facing children in Myanmar, including recruitment, attacks on schools, and killing and maiming. Child labour, including its worst forms, is evident across all population groups, alongside high rates of physical, emotional and sexual abuse against children within homes and communities.
Rohingya communities in Rakhine continue to face severe and systemic protection risks, including recurrent violence, discrimination, forced evictions, land dispossession and arbitrary arrests. Approximately 550,000 Rohingya remain in Rakhine, including 314,000 non-displaced and 235,000 displaced persons. The Arakan Army’s recent offensive, during which it captured 15 out of 17 townships, triggered the flight of an estimated 121,000 Rohingya to Bangladesh, almost one fifth of the remaining Rohingya in Rakhine. Those who remain are subject to severe movement restrictions, lack civil documentation, and have extremely limited access to essential services. Conditions are sharply deteriorating among camp populations facing acute food shortages, poor hygiene, disease outbreaks, rising suicide attempts and near-complete isolation from livelihood opportunities, markets and humanitarian assistance. As a result, many continue to undertake perilous sea journeys in attempts to reach Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia, or Thailand.
Ahead of the December 2025 elections, increased violence, enactment of repressive laws, and a surge in forced recruitment by all parties to the conflict have heightened protection risks. Misinformation, increased surveillance and disinformation are fuelling mistrust within communities, amid growing reports of arbitrary arrests.
Response
The protection response aims to prevent and mitigate key protection threats faced by affected and displaced populations, ensuring that individuals receive safe, dignified and appropriate support that promotes recovery and safeguards their fundamental rights. This approach is implemented by a diverse range of partners, including those providing specialized programmes for specific groups (such as women and children) and those addressing specific protection issues, such as mine risk exposure or lack of documentation.
Interventions will be grounded in a rights-based, inclusive and survivor-centred approach and anchored in six core, integrated response pillars:
- monitoring and analysis of protection trends, risks and needs;
- provision of essential life-saving services and individual assistance;
- community-based protection and community-level child protection and initiatives that foster social cohesion and positive social and gender norms;
- communication and provision of information to strengthen people’s self-protection capacities;
- capacity-building and institutional support to partners to enhance the overall protection environment;
- advocacy aimed at reinforcing protection outcomes and ensuring accountability.
The Cluster will support partners to sustain specialized programmes, including interventions that respond to the needs of children, women and other at-risk groups in priority locations. Targeted support to individuals and caregivers facing the most severe and imminent risks will be prioritized through case management, tailored protection assistance, psychosocial care, legal aid and risk awareness activities. Highly specialized programming—such as clinical services including clinical management of rape, EORE, mine/explosive remnants of war victim assistance and legal representation—will be implemented by appropriately skilled partners guided by survivor-centred principles.
Case management will be implemented through specialized approaches tailored to the distinct needs of child protection and GBV responses, consistent with global standards, established case management steps, and survivor-centred principles. Child protection and GBV case management will continue to be overseen by their respective lead agencies and actors. Likewise, mental health and psychosocial support interventions will be tailored to specific target groups, such as caregivers and children (supported by child protection actors), GBV survivors (supported by specialized GBV actors), and mine survivors (supported by mine action actors).
Establishing safe spaces for vulnerable groups will remain a core intervention, including child-friendly spaces (managed by child protection actors), and women and girls’ safe spaces (led by GBV specialists). Critical information-sharing with communities, including women and children, will be maintained and tailored to specific audiences and risk profiles. EORE will be undertaken by mine action actors; dedicated activities will also address specific risks for children such as unsafe migration, recruitment, child labour and child marriage, alongside awareness-raising for GBV risk mitigation and targeted GBV prevention activities.
Where feasible, CVA will be used to promote protection outcomes and restore dignity, while specialized legal services will help affected individuals secure justice, legal identity including civil documentation/birth registration, and recognition of their rights. The response will integrate victim assistance and referral mechanisms to ensure timely and appropriate support across all protection interventions.
In parallel, the Cluster will strengthen AAP by promoting meaningful participation, transparent communication and systematic feedback mechanisms that allow communities—including children—to influence priorities and hold humanitarian organizations accountable for the quality and relevance of support. Child participation and dedicated accountability to children will be a specific focus of the Cluster’s approach to AAP in 2026.
The Cluster will also maintain targeted advocacy and sustained engagement with the HCT, donors and key decision-makers to reinforce the centrality of protection across the response. This includes highlighting and promoting accountability for violations; ensuring that humanitarian action is guided by international human rights and humanitarian law; and influencing policy and operational decisions that directly impact affected communities.
Monitoring
Response monitoring in Myanmar is constrained by limited access, bureaucratic barriers, capacity gaps and procedural restrictions. To address these challenges, the Cluster will adopt a layered monitoring approach grounded in continuous needs assessment and direct feedback from affected people through community consultations and feedback mechanisms. Regular feedback during implementation—including child-friendly complaints and feedback channels—will enable the Cluster and partners to adjust interventions as needs evolve, supporting accountable and responsive programming. Specialized monitoring of child protection and GBV case management will be undertaken through CPIMS+ and GBVIMS+ specialized information management systems for these cases.
Quarterly reporting will be strengthened through systematic use of the 5W framework, enabling the Cluster to capture and analyse progress against planned outputs and outcomes. This will enhance evidence-based decision-making, ensure consistency across reporting periods, and provide a clearer basis for advocacy and strategic adjustments throughout the HNRP cycle. The Cluster will also prioritize SADDD (with attention to gender) to support inclusive, equitable programming and better identify gaps affecting specific at-risk groups.