Running Head: Mitigating Refugees’ Social Exclusion

The 2017 unprecedented pouring of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslim refugeesinto neighboring Cox’s Bazaar, Bangladesh, fleeing violence related to a retaliatorymilitary crackdown in western Myanmar (Burma), created a major humanitarian crisis.Sympathy and solidarity were expressed worldwide, alongside a flood of humanitarianaid. However, their decades-old plight as socially excluded poor and marginalizedoutside Myanmar, particularly in host countries of Southeast Asia, has remained eclipsed.Youngsters, preferred targets for drug traffickers, participate as mules in smuggling aheavily consumed methamphetamine (yaba pills) proceeding from Myanmar. Suchdeviance (being part of the supply chain), which not only is a criminal offence, but alsoblamed on the entire community, is likely to exacerbate its marginalization. A collectivepunishment of these forcibly displaced would make them shift to becoming forciblyrelocated and confined to Thengar Char, a remote and underdeveloped island in theBay of Bengal known for being prone to flooding. Although important, criticism andcondemnations may be insufficient. This article addresses recreational sports as a tool ofsocial inclusion among other already known benefits, and is based on secondary data.In so doing, it seeks to link it with the key role of social policy in providing responsesto the needs of a vulnerable population in a protracted situation. Plentiful leisure timeavailable looks undervalued. There is a predominant monovalent activity with a genderdiscrepancy in participation. The article offers a perspective on mitigating their exclusion,drawing on a hierarchy of prepotency, and minding that social inclusion is neither thefocus of social policy nor recreational sports a panacea.