Cyclone Mocha

• Myanmar’s military junta has said the cyclone resulted in the deaths of at least 145 people, including 117 from the Rohingya minority. However, this figure is feared to be much higher. The Arakan Rohingya National Alliance, a human rights coalition, said more than 400 people were killed. There were no reports of casualties in Bangladesh.
• An estimated 7.9 million people in Myanmar live in areas that experienced strong winds and of these, 3.4 million faced destructive winds of more than 74 miles per hour, placing them at high risk considering pre-existing vulnerabilities.
• According to the World Bank, the median estimate of total direct damages caused by Cyclone Mocha is $2.24 billion, equivalent to 3.4% of Myanmar’s GDP in 2021.
• In Myanmar, more than 158,000 shelters were reportedly damaged or destroyed across affected states and regions.
• Sixty-two schools in Rathedaung township in Myanmar’s Rakhine State were destroyed or damaged during Cyclone Mocha.
• Rapid analysis of Cyclone Mocha’s worst-hit areas in Myanmar found that 60% of the landmine incidents reported in the first quarter of 2023 were in areas that have now been affected by the cyclone.
• In Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, reports suggested that shelters, water points, latrines, culverts, bridges and other key community infrastructure were damaged. Bangladesh has not seen the same level of destruction as Myanmar.

Myanmar’s complex humanitarian emergency (CHE) was already categorized as a Level 1 CHE by CDP before Cyclone Mocha. Disasters often exacerbate pre-existing inequities and vulnerabilities within communities, and this occurred in Myanmar.

Ramanathan Balakrishnan, the UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator for Myanmar, said following the disaster: “It really is a nightmare scenario for this cyclone to hit areas with such deep pre-existing needs.”

Human Rights Watch said in the aftermath: “the resulting living conditions are, by design, squalid, contributing to a growing tally of preventable deaths and annual threats from extreme weather.”

According to ACLED’s Conflict Severity Index, in 2022, Myanmar experienced the third most intense level of violence after Ukraine and Syria. The country’s conflict is complex and involves hundreds of non-state armed groups fighting against the military junta and joining other ethnic-based rebel organizations that have been active for decades.

In the two years since Myanmar’s military seized power, declaring fraud in the general election won by the National League for Democracy, the fighting has significantly increased humanitarian needs and attacks on civilians persisted following the disaster.

An Assistance Association for Political Prisoners report said Myanmar’s military killed 157 children in 2022. An April 11, 2023 attack by Myanmar’s junta military on a village celebration in the central Sagaing region left at least 186 villagers dead, including children. Records documenting the deaths and injuries from the attack that were provided exclusively to The Washington Post by a network of local medics show that at least 25 children were among the dead. The Network for Human Rights Documentation-Burma documented 13 civilian deaths due to the military’s artillery attacks and 70 civilian arrests within the week of Sept. 8-14, 2023 alone.

According to Myanmar’s 2023 HRP, which lays out the shared vision of how to respond to the assessed and expressed needs of the affected population, one in three, or 17.6 million people, are in humanitarian need, an increase of one million people since the start of 2021. The Rohingya people, a stateless ethnic group, have faced decades of systematic discrimination, statelessness and targeted violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. Violent attacks led hundreds of thousands of Rohingya to flee to Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, in 2017. Hundreds have fled by boat from desperate conditions in Myanmar and camps in Bangladesh. In late March 2023, more than 180 Rohingya Muslims landed in Indonesia’s Aceh province. The year 2022 was the deadliest for Rohingya at sea for years.

The ongoing conflict has led to food shocks and decreased agricultural production, subsequently affecting livelihoods and overall food security. A report published by FAO and the World Food Programme (WFP) included Myanmar in a list of 18 “hunger hotspots” where critical food insecurity is projected to intensify. In 2022, Myanmar was one of the three largest food crises in the world, according to the Food Security Information Network, and the cyclone has exacerbated the situation.

The Myanmar Flash Appeal said, “Cyclone Mocha has structurally undermined food security by inducing losses of existing food stocks, agriculture inputs and assets for implementing income-generating activities (e.g., fishing material, small businesses), as well as reducing access to markets and increasing food prices.”

In Myanmar’s Northwest, the agriculture and fishery sectors were badly hit, with the cyclone causing loss of assets crucial for livelihoods and “posing a longer-term threat to food security.”

The agricultural and fishery sectors in Rakhine State and the Northwest have suffered enormous losses, with more than half of production capability lost in Sittwe, impacting essential assets for livelihoods.

In their July 15 Myanmar Humanitarian Update, UNOCHA reported, “Income losses, coupled with high inflation, have worsened food insecurity. Among households that have experienced significant income reductions, the level of food insecurity is particularly severe.”

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), “The current food insecurity situation is critical due to reduced agricultural production in 2022, intensified conflict, record high food prices and the devastating effects of Cyclone Mocha.”

Extensive damage was reported in IDP camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. For example, in Kyauktaw IDP camps, some volunteers reported that nearly all the bamboo IDP shelters and tarpaulins were destroyed. Field observations in the Sittwe camps revealed most of the shelters were heavily damaged.

In Rakhine State, more than 200 pre-existing displacement sites were severely damaged, and shelter debris posed additional risks to the IDPs. In Kachin alone, cluster partners identified that more than 15,500 IDPs in Shwegu, Mohnyin, Hpakant and Waingmaw townships needed shelter and non-food items assistance.

The World Bank’s Global Rapid Post-Disaster Damage Estimation (GRADE) report found the median estimate of total direct damages caused by Cyclone Mocha is $2.24 billion, equivalent to 3.4% of Myanmar’s GDP in 2021. Damages to housing and non-residential buildings account for over 49% and 18% of the total, respectively. The GRADE report said that in Rakhine State alone, more than 200,000 buildings were damaged or destroyed. The hardest-hit townships were Sittwe and Rathedaung.

In Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, approximately 930,000 Rohingya refugees resided in thirty-three camps. Refugees’ shelters are largely constructed from bamboo poles and tarpaulins, making them highly vulnerable to the impacts of cyclones, flooding and landslides. Women, children, the elderly and people with disabilities were among the most vulnerable.

In the International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) area of responsibility, 5,155 shelters were moderately or severely damaged across all three camps, of which 144 of those assessed were fully damaged. Rohingya Refugee Response, which coordinates humanitarian support for refugees in Bangladesh, said 5,800 shelters were damaged and 400 destroyed.