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Information Technologies, Practical Strategies
The BurmaNet News: November 18, 1998
Issue #1141
Noted in Passing: " Anyone who comes to this Church on
Sunday we will shoot dead." - sign posted by DKBA troops in
front of village churches (see KHRG: UPDATE #98-U5: NORTHERN
KAREN DISTRICTS)
HEADLINES:
KAREN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP: UPDATE #98-U5: NORTHERN
KAREN DISTRICTS
15 November, 1998 from <khrg@burma.net>
KAREN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP INFORMATION UPDATE
An Independent Report by the Karen Human Rights Group
[Information Update is periodically produced by KHRG in order to
provide timely reporting of specific developments, particularly
when urgent action may be required. It is produced
primarily for Internet distribution. Topics covered will
generally be reported in more detail in upcoming KHRG reports.]
Continuing Hardships for Villagers in Northern Karen Districts
Villagers in the northern districts of Karen State and Karen
areas of eastern Pegu Division and northeastern Mon State
continue to suffer SPDC operations involving village destruction,
forced relocations, uprooting of their crops and forced
labour. Areas referred to in this report include Taungoo
(Karen name Taw Oo) District, Nyaunglebin (Kler Lwe Htoo)
District, Papun (Mudraw) District, and Thaton (Doothatu)
District. This information was recently reported by KHRG monitors
based in or visiting these areas. The situation in Taungoo
District will be reported in detail in an upcoming KHRG report.
Taungoo (Taw Oo) District
Taungoo District forms the northern tip of Karen State,
sandwiched between Karenni State to the east, Shan State to the
north, and Pegu Division to the west. The vast majority of
villagers in this region are Karen. Many live in small,
difficult to access villages in the very steep and forested hills
covering most of the district. Further west, the hills let
off into the gentler terrain of the Sittang River valley near
Toungoo town.
For two to three years now the villagers in the western plain of
the district have faced heavy burdens of forced labour on roads,
army camps and the Pa Thee dam project, while some of their
villages just east of Toungoo town were forcibly relocated to
make way for the dam. Things have been even worse for the
hill villagers, as over the past two to three years the
SLORC/SPDC has steadily increased its troop presence in this
previously inaccessible area. As troops moved in villages
were burned and food supplies destroyed, a road was pushed
through the rugged terrain from Bawgali Gyi (Kler Lah) to Bu Sah
Kee for military access, and villagers suffered from the forced
labour on this road as well as demands for army camp and
portering labour. Many fled into hiding in the hills.
Now most villagers are back in their villages in the area but are
facing increasing pressure from the military. Most of the
villages are now referred to as "Nyein Chan Yay"
("Peace") Villages, meaning that the villagers are
supposed to be allowed to stay there peacefully as long as they
obey SPDC orders. This includes the villages of Bawgali Gyi
(Kler Lah), Ye Tho Leh, Ye Tho Gyi, Kyaut Pon (Ler Ko), Kaw Soe
Ko (Dtay Sein Taung), and Kaw Thay Der (Pyaun Tho). All of
these are on or near the road from Bawgali Gyi to Bu Sah Kee
(this connects with the road up from Toungoo town).
However, this road is only passable for about 20% of its length
at the moment, because the rains have destroyed the entire length
from Kaw Thay Der to Bu Sah Kee. As a result, villagers in
the "Peace" villages are being ordered to provide
porters. They don't dare go so they must pay money, and
most of them can no longer afford to pay. Where the passable road
ends at Kaw Thay Der, the villagers must pay money and also go as
porters to carry supplies to outlying SPDC camps such as Naw Soe
and Bu Sah Kee. Currently all of this portering labour is
being done by women, because if men go they are kept as porters
for 2-3 months, or until they die or escape, whereas if women go
they are generally freed after 1-2 weeks. Each
"Peace" village has to send women to the closest Army
camp each day to act as messengers, and must also send shifts of
villagers to do forced labour clearing the undergrowth from the
roadsides.
Battalions operating in the area include SPDC Infantry Battalions
#26, 30, and 48. Villagers are punished if any fighting
occurs in their area. Two to three months ago a column of
IB #48 was ambushed near Kaw Thay Der village and responded by
going into the village, calling out all the villagers and
systematically beating them. Villages which are not
considered as "Peace" villages because they are not
under direct SPDC control are open for destruction. Saw Wah
Der village has been ordered to move to Kler Lah since several
years ago but has never obeyed, so this year all the best houses
in the village (those with wooden construction and metal roofing)
were burned. This village has been burned many times over
the years. Now some of the villagers have fled to Toungoo town,
while others live in hiding in the forest, where they cannot
plant rice for fear of detection. Instead they plant cardamom and
sell it in the "Peace" villages to survive.
Three years ago the villagers of Bu Sah Kee settled in the forest
away from their village for fear of SLORC abuses, and they
continue to stay there. They continue to grow their hillside rice
crops, but whenever SLORC/SPDC patrols come close they flee into
the hills. Some of their crops are visible from the
Infantry Battalion #26 camp in the distance, so in September
Major Myo Myint ordered his troops to go and destroy all of Bu
Sah Kee's rice crop, presumably with the logic that some of this
rice would be used to feed Karen troops. On 6 September, IB
26 troops began moving through all the ricefields, pulling up,
cutting down or stomping down the villagers' crops, which would
not be ready for harvest until November/December. They
managed to destroy approximately half of the entire crop of the
village for this year. The 60 families of Bu Sah Kee now
expect that when they run out of rice they will have to find a
way to go and buy some in the "Peace" villages, but
they have no money. According to the latest Karen National
Union (KNU) reports, IB #26 continues to patrol Bu Sah Kee; the
KNU reports that on 30 October they opened fire on Bu Sah Kee
villagers in the fields who were trying to harvest some of the
remaining rice, forcing them to flee, while on 31 October they
shot and killed villager Pu Ee, age 60, and burned some stacks of
harvested paddy that they found.
The SPDC is now trying to build a road from Kaw Thay Der to
Mawchi, a town to the east in southern Karenni State. They
began building this road with bulldozers early in 1998 but
stopped work for the rains, and are expected to resume
soon. Though they are not using forced labour on this road,
it passes directly through the ricefields of Saw Wah Der village.
The villagers had already begun preparing their fields for the
1998 crop when construction began, but when all the SPDC troops
came to build and guard the road within sight of their fields
they no longer dared to plant, so many of them will have no crop
this year. Saw Wah Der village was later burned (see
above).
Villagers of Saw Wah Der, Bu Sah Kee and Klay Soe Kee (Ye Tho
Leh) are now all living outside their villages. According
to one report as yet unconfirmed, SPDC forces in the area have
given an order once again for all villages in the area, including
the "Peace" villages, to move to Kler Lah and Kaw Thay
Der. The troops have been ordering this for over 2 years
now, but it remains to be seen when they will decide to clamp
down and enforce it.
Nyaunglebin (Kler Lwe Htoo) District
Nyaunglebin (Kler Lwe Htoo) District straddles the border of
Karen State and Pegu Division, stretching as far west as the
western side of the Sittang River. The plains in the west
of the district are heavily SPDC-controlled, while the Karen
villages in the district's eastern hills are more remote. For
several years now SLORC/SPDC forces have tried to destroy Karen
resistance in the eastern hills, largely by forcing villagers to
move and wiping out their ability to produce food. Many
villages in the parts of these eastern hills bordering Papun
District have been destroyed since 1997 as part of the SPDC
campaign to wipe out Karen villages in northern Papun and eastern
Nyaunglebin Districts (see "Wholesale Destruction",
KHRG, April 1998).
According to the report of a KHRG monitor in the eastern hills,
villagers to the west in the plains must provide money to SPDC
forces and also go as porters and army camp labour, but it is the
villagers in the eastern hills who are suffering the worst.
In August, SPDC troops began burning more villages in Ler Doh
township. Oo Ker Kee, Tee Nya P'Tay Kee, and Nah Kee
villages have been burned in this operation by Light Infantry
Battalions #364 and 365. At Oo Ker Kee village, SPDC troops
occupied a nearby hill and then commenced shelling the village
with mortars with no warning. After the villagers fled, the
troops entered and looted the village, then burned it. This
is consistent with their village destruction tactics since 1997
in Papun and Nyaunglebin Districts. The villagers from
these 3 destroyed villages are now hiding in the forest with
little or no rice to eat. Part of their crop was destroyed, and
they are not expecting to obtain much from their fields this
year. Even the fields which were not destroyed have
suffered from the lack of rains this year.
Since July in the western part of Ler Doh township in the plains,
SPDC Infantry Battalion #60 has reportedly been ordering each
village tract (group of 5 to 10 villages) to provide 20 women to
become 'pwa thi lah' (Buddhist nuns) and to go and take residence
at the monastery in Klaw Maw village; this village also has a
DKBA camp with an estimated 95 DKBA troops. There is a high
proportion of Christians in these villages. Thus far some village
tracts have complied while others have not, and an estimated 40
women have become nuns because of the order, some of whom were
previously Christian and some Buddhist. DKBA troops have
posted signs in Karen in front of the village churches of Pah Dta
Lah, Hee Po Der, and Mah Bpee villages in this area of Ler Doh
township, reading "Anyone who comes to this Church on Sunday
we will shoot dead". As a result none of the
Christians in these three villages worship any longer on
Sundays. It is important to note that neither of these
incidents is consistent with general SPDC and DKBA policy
throughout Karen State. The SPDC is conducting forced
conversions of Christians in other parts of Burma which are
almost entirely Christian as a method to divide communities;
however, the Christians are already a minority among Karens and
therefore they are generally left to practice Christianity,
though the SPDC often tries to instigate interreligious
hatred. Some DKBA commanders have systematically persecuted
Christians, particularly when the DKBA was first formed, but most
do not, and there are even Christians within the DKBA and many
living in a site across the Salween River from DKBA headquarters
at Myaing Gyi Ngu (Khaw Taw). These incidents in Ler Doh
township are probably local initiatives by particularly
intolerant SPDC and DKBA commanders.
Papun (Mudraw) District
Papun District is bounded by Nyaunglebin District in the
northwest, Thaton District in the southwest, and the Salween
River and Thailand to the east. Over 100 villages in northern
Papun District have been systematically shelled, burned and
destroyed since 1997 by SPDC troops trying to eradicate support
for Karen resistance in the region (for details see
"Wholesale Destruction", KHRG, April 1998). About
100 of these were ordered to move, but many of the villages never
saw the order because the villagers always flee when SPDC troops
approach. In response, the SPDC launched a campaign to
simply destroy all villages without warning.
The situation in northern Papun District remains very similar to
what it was earlier in the year. Most villages have already
been completely burned and destroyed, but SPDC patrols continue
going through the area to burn any trace of villages which still
remain, food supplies, and the shelters of villagers who are
hiding in the forest. These patrols have reportedly mined
and booby-trapped the burned remains of some villages, because
they know that villagers are in hiding nearby and that they
frequently return to scavenge for food, belongings and materials
in the burned ruins of their villages. Villagers sighted in
the region are sometimes taken as porters, but are more
frequently shot or otherwise executed on sight. In Lu Thaw
township, at least 2 more villagers were executed on sight in
September. The vast majority of villagers are living in small
clusters of shelters and lean-to's hidden deep in the forests and
high in the hills, trying to access their old hillside rice
fields or to clear small new ones in the hills. These
fields have not yielded much, especially with the lack of rain
this past rainy season. In September, SPDC patrols were
sent through Lu Thaw township to destroy rice crops where
possible, and much of the crop was cut down with machetes or
stomped down by the troops. Villagers in hiding in the
forest are living primarily on roots and jungle leaves.
Even in areas where SPDC troops seldom arrive, such as Day Pu Noh
area, there is almost no rice available and villagers are
surviving on rice soup, sharing around whatever rice they can
find or buy from town. Villagers in this region are much
closer to Thailand than those in the other districts mentioned in
this report, but most of them do not want to go because of their
very close attachment to their land, their extreme fear of
landmines and SPDC troops along the escape routes, and their fear
of abuse and forced repatriation by Thai troops which they know
may await them on arrival at the border.
Thaton (Doothatu) District
Thaton District straddles the border of Karen State and northern
Mon State. Being close to the coastal road and railway lines,
this district is under quite heavy SPDC control, and the DKBA
also has a significant presence in the eastern parts of the
district. Only small Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA)
units can operate in the area, so while there is sporadic
fighting in the area the villages there have not been
systematically destroyed in retaliation. Several Karen
villages near the Bilin and Donthami rivers were forced to
relocate to larger villages in 1997. Some of the people
from the villages in the Donthami area are now reportedly
trickling back to try living back in their old villages or the
surrounding forests. It is as yet unclear whether SPDC and
DKBA troops will allow this to continue.
When fighting occurs the normal response by SPDC troops is to
detain and torture local village elders. This is
accompanied in the area by fairly regular and systematic looting,
demands for money and forced labour as porters and at Army
camps. The future of villagers in this area will largely
depend on the amount of activity conducted by the KNLA; assuming
that the KNLA continues to operate there, it is likely that the
SPDC will eventually clamp down further on the villagers by
conducting further forced relocations.
Further details, interviews with the villagers affected and SPDC
written orders to villages in some of these areas will be
presented in upcoming KHRG reports.
ABSDF: TOWNSHIP NLD OFFICES PRESSURED TO CLOSE
16 November, 1998
TOWNSHIP NLD OFFICES PRESSURED TO CLOSE
Burmese Military Intelligence (MI) has forced executive members
of the Palatwa township branch of the National League for
Democracy (NLD) to resign. The township NLD office was also shut
down and all office equipment and documents were confiscated
after the forced resignation of the township executives. The
closure of the office, in Palatwa township, in Chin State,
western Burma, occurred on November 12th. The Belin township NLD
office in Mon State was similarly closed on November 11th after
the forced resignations of its members.
In Arakan State, sources said that NLD offices in Am and Minpya
townships were closed on 14th November, while township NLD
offices in Akyab (Sittwe), Ponnakyun and Myauk Oo were forced to
close in October. All closures followed the forced resignations
of township executives. MI Unit 10 was responsible for all
closures in Arakan and Chin States, and MI Unit 5 for the Mon
State closure. Resigning NLD members were required to sign
documents stating that they were resigning voluntarily for
financial, health or other personal reasons, rather than from
coercion.
Sources from Akyab said that local people are deeply concerned
about the future of the NLD, as MI Unit 10 is trying to close all
of the NLD township offices in Arakan and Chin states.
All Burma Students' Democratic Front For more information
please contact
01-654 49984, 01-309 3846
MIZZIMA NEWS GROUP: INDO-BURMA BORDER TRADE TO BE
SUSPENDED
14 November, 1998
Imphal, Manipur
The never smooth Indo-Burma border trade is once again to be
suspended. This time, it is going to be unilaterally sealed by
the India side. The All Communities Welfare Association of Moreh,
the apex welfare body of the Indian traders, decided yesterday
that it will indefinitely suspend "all trade across the
border with Burma" and seal the border gates from November
15 onwards in protest against "maltreatment of some Indian
traders by the Burmese authorities in Tamu (border township of
Burma). The decision was made in yesterday's day-long emergency
meeting of the association after the Burmese authorities abused
some Indian traders the day before yesterday.
According to local traders, Captain Khin Maung Myint, the new
Chairman of Tamu Township Peace and Development Council, abused
four Indian traders verbally when they went into Tamu on 12th
November. The total 14 traders were expelled from Tamu after they
were badly abused by the Tamu Chairman even though they were
holding valid documents including entry passes with due paid.
Captain Khin Maung Myint was recently appointed by Rangoon
authorities as the border township chairman in the place of
Captain Kaung Zan Oo who was infamous with corruption. The Indian
traders were angry that Captain Khin Maung Myint not only
maltreated their colleagues but also placed several restrictions
on the trade and not allowed any Burmese to cross the border from
Burma. They decided to suspend all trade with Tamu side until the
new restrictions were eased and the captain changed his
behaviour.
Ironically, the need to step up the border trade was raised in
recent high-level meetings between Burma and India during a visit
of India's Commerce Secretary Mr. P.P. Prabhu to Rangoon in late
October. Both authorities reportedly agreed to continue the
border trade without any restrictions. The Indo-Burma border
trade, which started three years ago, is currently mainly carried
on through Moreh in Manipur State of India and Tamu on the
Burmese side.