Burma is receiving an assessment of no advancement. Although, Burma made some efforts to eliminate the worst forms of child labor, government officials were complicit in the use of forced child labor. The government extended the Supplementary Understanding with the ILO to continue the forced labor complaint mechanism through 2018. During the June 2018 Union Peace Conference, the government also committed to the elimination of six grave violations against children, including the recruitment and use of children as soldiers. The government also established a mechanism to coordinate efforts to address child labor.
Despite these initiatives, Burma is receiving an assessment of no advancement because, in previous years, it forcibly recruited children into its national armed forces, and there is a lack of evidence that it has fully ceased this practice and that these children have been released from the armed forces. The government's "self-reliance" policy has created an ongoing risk of forced labor in conflict areas as the national armed forces continues to coerce civilians, including children, to work as porters, cleaners, and cooks in conflict areas. In addition, several of the armed ethnic groups recruited and used children, including as combatants in armed conflict.
Children in Burma engage in other worst forms of child labor, including in commercial sexual exploitation, sometimes as a result of human trafficking. Government policies increased children's vulnerability to the worst forms of child labor by denying Rohingya children, displaced by conflict, access to education because of government restrictions on their movements. The penalties imposed for recruiting and using children in the military are not sufficient for the seriousness of the crime. In addition, the government did not publish information on criminal law enforcement efforts to investigate, prosecute, and convict cases involving the worst forms of child labor.
Courtesy : US Department of Labour
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