Rohingya, Hindu, and other minorities forced to work in dangerous wartime conditions in Rakhine State
(BANGKOK, October 22, 2025) – The Arakan Army (AA) in Myanmar’s Rakhine State should immediately stop using forced labor of ethnic minorities—including Rohingya, Hindu, and other civilians—said Fortify Rights today, warning that the practice may constitute war crimes under international law. Survivors described being forced at gunpoint to porter ammunition, build fortifications, and perform unpaid labor for months under the threat of beatings, detention, and execution. The AA has also exacted forced labor from arbitrarily detained Rohingya civilians, some for periods of up to a year.
“Rohingya, Hindu, and other minorities in Rakhine State are being exploited and forced to work in dangerous conditions wholly against their will,” said Yap Lay Sheng, Senior Human Rights Specialist at Fortify Rights. “Those who do not comply face harsh sanctions, including threats of physical violence, arrest and detention, restrictions on movement and livelihood, and costly penalties levied by the Arakan Army.”
Between November 2024 and October 2025, Fortify Rights interviewed 21 survivors and witnesses of forced labor and conscription, including Rohingya Muslims, Hindu, and Chakma individuals. Rakhine State is an ethnically diverse state with a majority Rakhine Buddhist population and ethnic minorities, including Rohingya, Hindu, Chakma, Kaman, Mro, and others.
In November 2023, the AA launched an offensive that wrested control of large parts of Rakhine State from the Myanmar military junta. Soon after, it began institutionalizing a system of compulsory labor in villages and using detainees for forced labor. The AA also launched a forced recruitment drive, with conscripted minorities forced to take up military training and engage, simultaneously, in hard labor.
Survivors reported being forced to do various types of labor for the AA, including portering loads such as ammunition and food rations; building fortifications; and repairing damaged trenches, bunkers, battalion compounds, and other military infrastructure. They were also forced to perform non-military labor, such as tending to crops and cattle, clearing vegetation, and maintaining roads and other civilian infrastructures, in no less arduous or strenuous conditions. The forced labor appears geared to sustaining a still fiercely fought campaign against the junta, as well as rebuilding efforts.
Forced Labor in Villages
After making significant territorial gains in Rakhine State in 2024, the AA imposed a system of forced labor in many villages under its control, often requisitioning at least one member from each household, typically male, to work for periods ranging from a single day to several months.
A 23-year-old Rohingya man described how the AA corralled hundreds of men in Hpon Nyo Leik village in Buthidaung Township into the local mosque in May 2024 and then ordered them at gunpoint to engage in forced labor:
We were surrounded by AA with guns. They were standing and we were sitting. … They told us, ‘You all supported the junta military before we took over Buthidaung. You must … work for us to support us. It is our law.’
This survivor had to construct a detention facility for a month until the AA “replaced [them] with people from another village.”
The AA maintains the forced labor system through direct threats to village administrators and other local leaders to provide laborers. A Rohingya administrator appointed by the AA in early 2024 estimated that more than a thousand men under his charge in Nga Yant Chaung village, Buthidaung Township, reported themselves for labor at the demand of the AA. He told Fortify Rights that he resorted to physical threats against villagers to meet the quota imposed by the armed group and was himself beaten by the AA for failing to meet the quota.
“Once, I was beaten 20 strokes by the AA soldiers when I could not meet their quota for laborers,” the 30-year-old man said. “As I cannot bear the beating, I threaten others with force so that I avoid the punishment myself.”
The AA’s system of forced labor involves multiple ethnic minorities. A 42-year-old Hindu man in Maungdaw Township told Fortify Rights: “The AA used both Rohingya and Mro to demolish the schools. Then, Hindu people were brought to the school to collect and lay the stones for a road.”
A 30-year-old Hindu boat operator told Fortify Rights he was forced to use his boat to transport AA troops and rations weekly: “I have been called to work [for] four to five months since I started … with the requirement to serve once a week.” He said this has disrupted his daily livelihood, but he was not given a choice: “They told us we would be thrown into pits if we refused.”
Survivors also reported witnessing some ethnic Rakhine Buddhists—typically those who had served the military junta—being forced to work. However, it appears that the AA does not subject the broader Rakhine civilian population to forced labor.
Besides threats of violence, those who fail to show up for compulsory labor have to pay hefty fines for each day of absence. “If we refuse to work, we have to pay 50,000 kyat [approximately USD 24] each day,” a 23-year-old Rohingya told Fortify Rights.
Frequently, the AA imposed financial penalties alongside other restrictions. A 25-year-old Rohingya man from Buthidaung said the AA ordered him to work as an unpaid teacher, explaining: “Some were refusing to join them. So … they restricted us … from doing business, gathering food, and traveling. They were keeping us in the village like it was a prison.” He paid more than one million Myanmar kyat (approximately USD 480) to avoid forced labor, but by the AA’s third approach, he “was fearful of them detaining me if I refused.”
In all cases documented by Fortify Rights, the individuals forced into conducting forced labor for the AA were not compensated for their work. The customary laws of war require fair payment for any labor conducted by civilians or detainees on the order of armed groups.
Detainee Forced Labor
In some cases documented by Fortify Rights, the AA arbitrarily detained civilians for forced labor.
Some former detainees told Fortify Rights how they were first arrested after failing to perform the forced labor in their villages as directed by the AA. “I was forced to do sentry duties in March or April this year [2025]… but I didn’t want to leave my wife alone at night,” a 26-year-old Rohingya man from Pa Wet Chaung village, Maungdaw, told Fortify Rights. “I was arrested and taken by the Arakan Army to build a road … for ten days … They beat me and tortured me, accusing me of failing [to conduct my sentry] duties.”
Fortify Rights has previously documented how the military junta has also abducted and forcibly conscripted Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh into armed service. Armed groups such as the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) are responsible for numerous abductions of Rohingya refugees in the Cox’s Bazar refugee camps in Bangladesh, with some victims forcibly transported back to Myanmar and recruited to fight against the AA.
A 21-year-old Rohingya man from Kyi Kan Pyin village in Maungdaw Township told Fortify Rights how the AA routinely detains Rohingya civilians based on mere suspicion of affiliation with Rohingya armed groups allied with the junta. Describing a mass arrest by the AA in late 2024, he told Fortify Rights:
They [the AA] said they had doubts and concerns about [our village’s] links with ARSA. … They tied everyone’s hands and took all of us. … Then, they transferred me to Buthidaung prison … forced us to do labor for the whole day and didn’t let us rest. … They made us work more than … the junta military [who also forced us to work before].
Unable to endure the harsh conditions, he managed to escape when he was brought to work outside the prison compound.
Under international humanitarian law, civilians coerced into assisting armed actors, such as ARSA, act under duress and cannot be considered voluntary participants or combatants, and should not be retaliated against with arrest or forced labor. The laws of war protect civilians taking no active part in hostilities.
Rohingya civilians are often caught between the warring sides in Rakhine State. In at least one case documented by Fortify Rights, the AA arbitrarily arrested a 55-year-old Rohingya man who had been detained and interrogated by the military junta a week previously. The AA accused him, without credible evidence, of collaborating with or brokering others to be recruited by the junta, and punished him with hard labor:
They have a big military base. … During the day, two of the AA officers would take me to the forest to cut bamboo. For 21 days, I was forced to work … I worked all day, for around eight hours without rest … They would give me food, a very small portion, in the evening. I wasn’t paid for my work. … they would tell me that with these bamboos, they will sell these bamboo and use them to buy weapons for the revolution.
The AA confines detainees in prison facilities, such as the Buthidaung prison, in former junta encampments, or in newly built makeshift detention centers. The AA detained some in simple bamboo enclosures and rudimentary shelters constructed by detainees themselves.
Fortify Rights previously documented the AA’s use of torture and ill-treatment in AA-run detention centers and other areas in Rakhine State, where AA personnel used physical violence to force detainees into meeting strict work quotas.
A 46-year-old Rohingya man and former AA detainee from Shwe Pyae village in Kyauktaw Township endured five months of AA detention in Rakhine State, during which the AA forced him to work and tortured him, until he escaped to Malaysia, where he is now a refugee.
When I got tired and asked for food, they started beating me. They beat me with a cane on my back. There were so many bruises on my back and blood all over my back. They cracked my head and smashed it against the tree. … They tied my hands and legs and took me to a field under the hot sun … from morning to evening … with a rope. By evening, my legs and hands were swelling.
Survivors of the AA’s forced labor describe having to work in inhumane conditions, including excessive working hours, unsafe conditions, and being denied basic necessities like food, water, and rest while working. The AA’s ongoing arbitrary detention of detainees exacerbates these abuses, as victims are entirely under the control of their AA captors.
Ill detainees unable to work were at times denied food as a punishment. A detainee who fell sick told Fortify Rights:
When AA officers came to the prison for random checks and … they would ask why we were in the cell. … [We] explained that we were sick and couldn’t work. The AA commander replied, ‘Don’t give them food then.’ That day, we weren’t given anything to eat.
Without due process protections, detainees risk indefinite detention and are often forced to work for long periods. Although the AA and its political wing, the United League of Arakan, established judicial systems in some areas as early as 2021, those detained for forced labor were typically denied access to these processes.
A 30-year-old Rohingya man told Fortify Rights: “I didn’t have a lawyer. We were never taken before a judge. I don’t know what charge I was sentenced for. … I disappeared from the outside world.” He managed to escape after three months when he encountered a passing boatman who cut off his “metal chains.” He is now a refugee in Bangladesh.
Forced Military Recruitment
The AA has unlawfully recruited ethnic minorities as foot soldiers. In addition to attending military training, recruits are required to conduct hard and dangerous work, such as portering ammunition and digging trenches on the frontlines of the conflict with Myanmar junta forces.
A 28-year-old Rohingya man, who was forced to join the AA for a year, told Fortify Rights:
[We were] trained how to use a gun. When we cannot learn to fight, they forced us to cut grass and care for cows, and do random construction work. When there are bullets or rations arriving, we also have to carry them. … The junta military used to have a camp next to a river near our village. … and they [AA] used us to carry these [ammunition and rations] for them so they can avoid the military checkpoints.
The AA has forced some of its conscripts to work near active conflict zones under the threat of artillery fire and other aerial attacks. A 45-year-old Rohingya survivor told Fortify Rights:
The AA forced me and other detainees to … dig trenches for them. The trenches were ‘W’ or ‘V’-shaped, mostly dug near the feet of mountains and hills. The junta fired artillery into the area next to ours many times. … it was luck that they didn’t hit the place we were kept.
The AA’s unlawful recruitment of civilians often leads to more forced labor. A 22-year-old Rohingya man from Chin Tha Mar village in Buthidaung Township told Fortify Rights about an AA conscription drive in his village in April 2024: “The AA initially provided training to approximately 120 youth at Bo Gyi Chaung School that lasted ten days,” he said. Then, the AA sent the group to an AA outpost where the AA forced them to serve AA combatants by “herding cattle seized from the Rohingya, cooking, and performing other basic tasks [without being paid a] salary.”
Such practices extend to multiple ethnic minority groups. For example, a 50-year-old Chakma man fled Rakhine State with his family in November 2024 after a forced recruitment campaign. He said: “They asked for young men. They told us in the meeting that they were from AA. … If my son were caught, he would be detained and [recruited to fight for the AA.].”
Ongoing Arakan Army Abuses
The AA did not respond to Fortify Rights’s request for comment on the specific allegations contained in this press release. However, in response to prior accusations that it exploits Rohingya men, women, and children for forced labor, the AA has issued a public denial, claiming that these are a “deliberate attempt to tarnish the positive image” of the AA. It also maintains that detainees are not forced to perform hard labor beyond “routine physical exercise during their imprisonment.”
Since seizing power, the Arakan Army and its political wing, the United League of Arakan, has reiterated its commitment to respecting the rights of ethnic minorities and respecting human rights law and the laws of war. However, Fortify Rights has consistently documented and exposed instances of AA war crimes against the ethnic-Rohingya population, including a massacre of Rohingya civilians near the Naf River in Maungdaw Township on August 5, 2024, and arson attacks on Rohingya homes in May 2024. The AA has denied these allegations and has yet to take responsibility or hold its troops accountable for these crimes. In January 2025, after Fortify Rights exposed how AA soldiers tortured and summarily executed two prisoners of war, the AA publicly admitted to those specific crimes.
The Myanmar military junta also routinely uses forced labor in cities and towns across the country. In June, the International Labour Organization (ILO) passed a landmark resolution as a result of the junta’s persistent use of forced labor and other labor abuses, which calls on governments to take comprehensive and strategic action aimed at “the elimination of all forms of forced labour in the country,” and urges ILO member states to cease selling or supplying the junta with military equipment, jet fuel, and financing.
International Legal Framework
International humanitarian law—also known as the laws of war—applies to the conflict in Rakhine State and the broader situation in Myanmar, which constitutes a non-international armed conflict. In non-international armed conflicts, state and non-state armed actors, such as the Arakan Army, are bound by the fundamental rules set down by the Geneva Conventions, their additional protocols, and customary international law, and perpetrators and their commanders can incur individual criminal liability for serious violations of these rules.
The use of forced labor of civilians on or near the frontlines of armed conflict is prohibited under the Geneva Conventions. Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, for instance, which aims to protect civilians in non-international armed conflicts, explicitly prohibits “violence to life and person,” “outrages upon personal dignity,” and “humiliating or degrading treatment”—all of which prohibit forced labor of civilians near the armed conflict in Rakhine State. Article 4(1) of Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions, which applies specifically to non-international armed conflicts like the conflict in Rakhine state, expands on the guarantees of Common Article 3, stating:
All persons who do not take a direct part or who have ceased to take part in hostilities, whether or not their liberty has been restricted, are entitled to respect for their person, honour and convictions and religious practices. They shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction.
Additional Protocol II further provides that persons who are deprived of their liberty for reasons related to the armed conflict “shall, if made to work, have the benefit of working conditions and safeguards similar to those enjoyed by the local civilian population.” This includes fair payment for their work, which was not provided by the AA in all the cases documented by Fortify Rights.
The International Committee of the Red Cross has also stated that uncompensated or abusive forced labor in war is prohibited as a rule of international customary law.
Forcing civilians into dangerous, military-related frontline forced labor, such as portering ammunitions past army positions or digging frontline trenches, is particularly prohibited by the laws of war.
The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) classifies serious violations of Common Article 3—such as outrages upon personal dignity, including humiliating and degrading treatment directed at civilians and other non-combatants—as war crimes under the Court’s jurisdiction.
The ICC has an ongoing investigation into the situation in Rakhine State and could potentially include crimes committed by the AA as part of that investigation.
International human rights law also continues to apply throughout Myanmar, including in Rakhine State. Forced labor is prohibited by various international treaties and is considered to be part of international customary law, applicable to all states. The Forced Labour Convention, to which Myanmar is a state party, prohibits “all work or service which is exacted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily.”
The absence of choice, threats of violence, punitive fines for refusal, restrictions on movement, and the non-payment of wages collectively meet all the hallmarks of forced labor, imposed upon vulnerable ethnic minorities in Rakhine State by the Arakan Army, Fortify Rights said.
“The Arakan Army cannot claim to be liberating the people of Rakhine from the military junta while exploiting them through forced labor,” said Yap Lay Sheng, Senior Human Rights Specialist with Fortify Rights. “It must cease these abusive practices immediately, stop subjecting ethnic minorities to forced labor, and release all civilians who are detained and forced to work.”