YANG: We want to tell you
up front: this next story is
not suitable for children.
If your kids are in the room,
please turn us off and come
back in about 8.5 minutes
when Paul Solman helps
make sense of what some
call the bitcoin bubble.
Even for adults this
is a disturbing story,
but an important one.
Special correspondent Tania
Rashid and videographer
Philip Caller (ph)
take us inside the dark
world of human
trafficking in Bangladesh.
Horrific things are
done to young girls.
This the final installment
of their three-part
series in partnership
with the Pulitzer Center
on Crisis Reporting.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TANIA RASHID, PBS NEWSHOUR
SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT:
At a checkpoint on the
main road leading from
the camps, Bangladeshi soldiers
aren't looking for guns or
drugs, they are searching for
Rohingya women being
trafficked into sex work.
The majority of Rohingya
refugees are women and girls,
many are poor and without a male
breadwinner.
They are vulnerable to
traffickers looking to make fast
money by recruiting girls into
the Bangladeshi sex trade.
Soldiers stop vehicles they
suspect could be used by
traffickers, and passengers are
asked to show their
national ID cards.
According to the army officer
in charge of this checkpoint,
around 10 Rohingya girls
attempt to pass every night.
As the night goes on,
the searches continue.
They look inside buses
and motorized rickshaws
known locally as CNGs,
questioning passengers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE
(through translator): What
school did you go to?
You, count to 10.
RASHID: Rohingyas and local
Bangladeshis can have similar
appearances which makes it hard
for the soldiers to
identify who is who.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through
translator): Show me your cards.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE
(through translator):
Where did you come from?
Where are your ID cards?
RASHID: The army has been
stopping several CNGs on the
road, and they suspect one of
the girls in this
vehicle is a Rohingya.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through
translator): Get out.
Tell me the truth.
I know you are Rohingya.
Who is leader of your
block at the refugee camp?
RASHID: As it turns out , the
woman right there is Bangladeshi
and she's helping take
this woman who is a
Rohingya into Cox's Bazar.
The soldiers question them
and search their bags.
They say that the Rohingya woman
is being trafficked for sex
work and that the Bangladeshi
woman travelling with
her is her trafficker.
They recruit Rohingya girls
and women from the camps and
traffic them into Bangladeshi
towns and cities.
After detaining the group for
a few hours, soldiers decide
to send the two women back
to the camps and keep the
man for further questioning.
Back in Kutupalong, the
biggest camp, the sex trade is
thriving and the influx of tens
of thousands of vulnerable
women is fuelling the business.
Most Rohingya refugees come
from insular, conservative
Muslim families, and sex work
is taboo.
Camp brothels are hard to spot.
They look like ordinary
shelters made of bamboo
and plastic sheets.
This woman whose name and
face we conceal to protect her
identity started sex work out
of desperation to feed
her two children after
her abusive husband left
her for another woman.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through
translator): The food
handout is not enough.
When my kids cry for rice,
where will I get it from?
I'm only doing this to support
my family, I feel bad doing
it but I have to survive
somehow.
RASHID: She is one of
four Rohingya women
working in this brothel.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through
translator): I see one,
sometimes two men per day, for
about 20 minutes, 15
minutes to one hour.
They give me two to six dollars.
The men come from different
backgrounds, some are poor,
others are rich, they are mostly
Rohingya.
Occasionally, I see
Bangladeshi men as a clients.
They make me do bad
things to them and make
me work really hard.
When I do it, I'm so ashamed,
so I only take my pants off.
RASHID: Cox's Bazar
is the nearest city to
the camps, infamous for
its thriving sex trade,
fuelled by tourism.
I'm on my way to meet with
a Rohingya sex worker.
They normally travel in auto
rickshaws like this one from
the camps into the city center.
This girl is only 15 years old.
She fled from Myanmar to
Bangladesh six months ago.
We concealed her face and
name to protect her identity.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE
(through translator):
The Myanmar soldiers
grabbed hold of me, they
beat me, tied my hands and
feet and hung me from a tree.
Next to me, there
was another woman.
The soldiers cut her
belly and vagina.
They cut off her breasts
and put them in plastic bag.
I started screaming and a solder
bit a piece of my cheek off.
Then they pulled me
down and gang-raped me.
Afterwards, they stabbed me
and dumped my body into the
river thinking I was dead.
I can't remember
much after that.
I lost so much blood
that I was unconscious
more than three days.
Somehow I managed to swim across
the river and get to Bangladesh.
I swam alone.
RASHID: But life in the
camps was tough, she turned
to selling drugs to survive.
After getting caught and
spending two months in jail, an
older Rohingya woman made her
an offer.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My
friend said why don't you
run away from the camps.
I know people who can help you.
Do you want work in
a garment factory?
I said yes.
RASHID: But her friend
was actually a trafficker
who recruits young
Rohingya girls into sex
work.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A car
picked me up from the camp and
took me down the main road to
Cox Bazar.
Nobody stopped me at the
checkpoints, as the pimps
are friends with the army.
They took me to a brothel.
RASHID: She now works seven
days a week and gets $1 per
client after the pimp takes his
cut.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I saw five
men at the same time today.
They are raping me the same way
the Myanmar soldiers raped me.
They pin my hands to the
bed, force my legs open and
thrust so hard it hurts.
RASHID: Her pimp gives her
drugs for the pain and steroids
to make her look healthy.
Undercover filming in a Cox
Bazar's brothel reveals that
the recent influx of tens of
thousands of vulnerable girls
has meant that they are now
full of underage Rohingya.
I'm at a secret location
at the edge of Cox's Bazar
where I am about to meet with
a pimp who traffics Rohingya
girls into prostitution.
This pimp has seven Rohingya
girls that he sells.
He says that the refugee
crisis is good for business.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through
translator): Rohingya girls
have a very Burmese look.
It's different.
They have lighter skin.
They are prettier and taller.
Young Rohingya girls from
12 to 14 sell the most.
Clients love fresh flesh.
The little girls
have more to give.
RASHID: He says the easiest
way to get the girls is to
prey on their vulnerability.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When
the Rohingya girls arrive
in Bangladesh, they
don't know anything.
They are so innocent,
scared, and unaware.
I tell these little girls, look
you have nobody, I'll marry
you, but we need money to get
married.
Rohingya girls are
easy to convince.
I have sex with all my girls,
I take their virginity.
Then I share them
with the clients.
RASHID: What sorts of
clienteles visit these girls?
Are they Bangladeshi
men, or -- who are they?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE:
Most of the clients are
Bangladeshi tourists,
but about once or twice
month I have foreigners, white
men, Americans, Europeans.
They stay in the big
hotels and keep the girls
for two to three days.
I don't speak directly
to the white men.
Usually, a hotel manager calls
me and asks me to send over
photos, they are the liaison.
RASHID: Many Rohingya
women who fled violence
end up in desperate
situations, both inside
and outside the camps.
Their precarious circumstances
make them easy prey to those
that seek to exploit them.
For the PBS NEWSHOUR,
I'm Tania Rashid in
Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.