ROHINGYA REFUGEE CAMPS
The Rohingya refugee crisis is one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes of our time. The Rohingya have repeatedly been referred to as the ‘most persecuted minority on earth’. Due to persecution in their native Myanmar, some 1.2 million members of the Rohingya community are housed in the refugee camps on the Bangladesh-Myanmar border in devastating conditions.
Shelters in the camps are just a few square meters in size and often house up to twenty individuals. Families have difficulty gaining basic resources such as clothing and medicine. The extreme poverty has let to trafficking and other forms of exploitation. These problems have been exacerbated by the torrential rains during Bangladesh’s monsoon season. Nearly 3000 tents have been damaged or destroyed from storms and flooding. Rohingya refugees expect to be in the camps for the long-haul, as many of them have lost family members at the hands of the Myanmar army and fear continued violence if they were to return to their native Myanmar.
While the Bangladesh government is doing what it can to support the refugees, the country is one of the poorest in the world and is already limited in its resources. Silkpath Relief has travelled to the camps and has established ties with local individuals and community organizations to help assist with the dire humanitarian conditions. Team members of Silkpath Relief regularly frequent the camp to ensure that funds have been put towards their intended purpose.
We also support projects for Rohingya refugees living in Malaysia.
AFGHANISTAN
Afghanistan has one of the lowest GDP per capita rates in the world, which currently stands at US $562 (2016). Decades of war have devastated the country, and public institutions such as hospitals and schools remain in poor condition and severely under-resourced. Furthermore, the country suffers from severe inequality in wealth distribution, which leads to a small class of elites and widespread poverty.
Silkpath Relief has been in operation in Afghanistan since 2012, when the team made the first distribution of resources to poor families in Kabul (Zakat). Since then, we have continued to distribute aid directly to families as the economy has steadily weakened between 2012 and 2018. We have worked with eye doctors to provide necessary surgeries as well as medical clinics to help children requiring specialized treatments in India. We closely observe the distribution of funds to ensure that every dollar goes directly to families rather than getting caught in administrative overheads.