Actor tells Press Club event: Rohingya camps like 'Polish ghetto under the Nazis'

Oscar-nominated actor Matt Dillon described harrowing scenes in Myanmar's western Rakhine state at a NPC Speakers press conference at the National Press Club on June 12, telling the crowd that during his visit to the Rohingya refugee camps, he encountered no non-governmental organizations and, on one occasion, was told to turn off his camera and leave.

Dillon, who is currently starring in the Fox series "Wayward Pines," traveled to Myanmar six weeks ago after hearing about the persecuted and stateless Muslim minority group from activist Thun Khin, who is himself a Rohingya.

As a member of the board of Refugees International, Dillon decided to make the trip to the camps of the internally-displaced Rohingya near Rakhine's capital Sittwe, and was heavily impacted by what he saw.

“The first impression when you visit these camps right away is that nobody would live there if they had the choice,” Dillon said, adding that “young men’s spirits were broken. You could see it in their eyes.”

“There were signs of malnutrition among the children. We met people who tried to escape unsuccessfully and spent several months at sea, starved and beaten, only to return for ransom – they had to pay a ransom,” Dillon said.

Conditions for the ethnic group in largely Buddhist Myanmar –- particularly in the "neighborhood" of Aung Mingalar near the state capital Sittwe –- are akin to "a Polish ghetto under the Nazis," Dillon said. The Rohingya residents are fenced in and at the mercy of police, he added. That's where he was essentially chased away by authorities.

Thousands of Rohingya migrants who fled Rakhine state by boat this year –- and many who were forced onto the overcrowded vessels by gunmen and traffickers -- were left stranded in the water for up to two months before Malaysian and Indonesian officials agreed to accept some of them as refugees just two weeks ago.

Dillon stressed this has “taken heat off the Myanmar government,” because the issue is framed by the media as a crisis of refugees at sea, rather than as a crisis caused by the long-term violent persecution of a people in their own country.

Only in recent weeks has the issue received mainstream media attention in the United States. The Rohingya have had their homes torched, endured beatings and died at the hands of extremist Buddhist monks since ethnic and religious tensions in Myanmar flared in 2012.

The government has prohibited the use of the term Rohingya, forcing the Muslims to identify themselves as Bengali, because their “distant ancestors” were originally from Bangladesh, Dillon said.

Bangladesh, however, does not want them.

Michel Gabaudan, president of Refugees International, told the crowd that the government has done nothing to counter the “anti-Muslim hysteria” perpetrated by “radical Buddhist monks" in the country.

“I think it is the problem of Myanmar … they won’t be helped if they don’t change,” Gabaudan said in response to a question about responsibility for the Rohingya’s plight.

Meanwhile in Washington, the State Department's “diplomatic messaging has had no effect,” Gabaudan said, although he did not specify what action –- if any –- the Obama administration can take to step up the pressure on Myanmar's government.