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REUTERS_1.4.96: AI RAISES CONCERN A
Subject: REUTERS_1.4.96: AI RAISES CONCERN ABOUT VIOLENCE IN BURMA
ASIA: BURMA ARMY SHOOTING UNARMED CIVILIANS - AMNESTY
BURMA RIGHTS
BANGKOK, April 1 Reuter - Burmese security forces and a rebel
splinter faction allied to the government army continue to commit
gross violations of human rights in southeastern Burma's Karen
state, human rights group Amnesty International said.
In a report received by Reuters today the London-based group
said Karen civilians fleeing from troops were frequently shot dead
while others were executed because of suspected links with a Karen
guerrilla group fighting Rangoon for autonomy.
The rights group said Burmese authorities were also forcibly
relocating villages to the vicinity of government-controlled towns,
apparently in a bid to cut all links between civilians and Karen
National Union (KNU) rebels.
"Security forces continue to commit gross human rights
violations with impunity," Amnesty International said.
"The catalogue of these violations is extensive. The Burmese
army ... has killed unarmed civilians as part of its
counter-insurgency campaigns against the KNU ... Karen civilians
who were fleeing from troops as they aproached a village have been
shot dead in what appears to be a de facto shoot to kill policy of
anyone who runs," the rights group said.
"Others have been killed reportedly because the (Burmese troops)
suspected these individuals of supporting the KNU in some way.
"The army has killed still other victims seemingly at random in
an apparent effort to terrorise villagers into severing their
alleged connections with KNU soldiers," it said.
The KNU has been fighting a war for regional autonomy for the
past 47 years from bases along the Thai-Burma border.
Amnesty also said a Karen rebel splinter faction, which broke
away from the KNU in December 1994 and allied itself with the
Burmese army, was responsible for human rights abuses against Karen
civilians in Burma and Karen refugees in camps just inside
Thailand.
The rights group said the faction, known as the Democratic Karen
Buddhist Army (DKBA), killed and abducted dozens of Karen civilians
from camps in Thailand in an apparent effort to force the refugees
back to areas under its control in Burma.
Burmese military authorities have denied having any control over
the DKBA, but Thai officers on the border have said they
intercepted radio traffic indicating the Burmese contact and
supervise the faction.
Meanwhile, DKBA gunmen captured and executed a dissident Burmese
student in southeastern Burma, his colleagues said today.
The students, members of a dissident group opposed to Burma's
military government, said five of their colleagues travelled into
Karen state to contact forestry workers there and were captured by
DKBA members on March 27.
One of the students was executed later that day while the other
four managed to escape and fled back to Thailand, their colleagues
told reporters on the border.
REUTER sl
ASIA: KARENNI REBELS ABANDON LAST POSITION AFTER ATTACK
BURMA FIGHTING
BANGKOK, April 1 Reuter - Several hundred Karenni guerrillas in
eastern Burma abandoned their last stronghold over the weekend
after a three-day offensive by Burmese government forces, Thai
police and rebel sources said today.
Thai security forces were deployed along a stretch of the
Thai-Burma border in northwestern Mae Hong Son province to prevent
any spillover of the fighting after the guerrillas pulled out of a
hilltop base just inside Burma, a Thai border police officer said.
"We had to abandon our position after three consecutive days of
heavy shelling," a Karenni guerrilla officer told reporters on the
border.
He said the about 400 guerrillas who abandoned the camp broke up
into small groups and would wage guerrilla warfare against the
Burmese army.
The guerrilla source said at least 20 Burmese soldiers were
killed over several days of fighting. Three guerrillas were killed
and twelve others wounded.
The separatist rebels agreed to a ceasefire with the government
in March a year ago but the truce collapsed several months later
after Rangoon forces moved into the small Karenni zone in what the
rebels said was a violation of the agreement.
The Karenni guerrilla force, fighting for a separate state since
shortly after Burma gained independence from Britain in 1948, is
one of only a handful of guerrilla groups still fighting the
central government.
The Rangoon military government has reached ceasefire agreements
with 16 rebel forces since 1989 -- most recently the surrender of
opium warlord Khun Sa and his powerful Shan force in January in the
Golden Triangle region where the borders of Burma, Laos and
Thailand meet. REUTER ts