Karen Human Rights Groups Report

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Date: Sat, 15 Jun 1996 17:58:53 -0700 (PDT)


		  THE SITUATION IN PA'AN DISTRICT

       An Independent Report by the Karen Human Rights Group
		May 15, 1996     /     KHRG #96-17

[PART 1 OF 4 - SEE SUBSEQUENT POSTINGS FOR PARTS 2 THROUGH 4.]

[SOME DETAILS BLANKED OUT WITH 'XXXX' FOR INTERNET DISTRIBUTION.]

A small but steady flow of refugees from Pa'an District continue to cross 
the border into Thailand as living conditions in Pa'an District continue to 
deteriorate.  SLORC is increasingly in control there, and the DKBA 
(Democratic Kayin Buddhist Army, the Karen group allied to SLORC) is 
present throughout the area but is increasingly functioning only as an 
adjunct to SLORC; DKBA troops are now even supervising forced labour 
on road construction, especially on a new 50-km. road from Pa'an to 
DKBA headquarters at Myaing Gyi Ngu.  The Karen National Liberation 
Army has recently stepped up its guerrilla activities in the southern part of 
the District, which is only bringing down even heavier SLORC retaliation 
on the villagers.  People continue to be arbitrarily arrested, tortured and 
summarily executed by SLORC and the DKBA in the area, either because 
they have past or suspected connections with the KNLA or simply because 
the troops want to steal their land and belongings.

Villagers must now pay heavy extortion to both SLORC and DKBA and 
also must provide food to SLORC, DKBA, and KNLA.  By far the heaviest 
burden causing people to flee the area is forced labour for SLORC and 
DKBA doing road construction, commercial logging, military portering 
and building and servicing military camps.  SLORC has begun an absolute 
binge of road-building in the area, most likely to strengthen its military 
access.  Tens of thousands of villagers from every village in Pa'an District 
are being forced to build at least a dozen new roads forming a web 
through the entire region.  Many villages even have to rotate doing labour 
on two or three roads at once.  All of these roads are being built wide 
enough for "two vehicles side by side" - given that most people in the area 
possess nothing more than bullock-carts, this means military access.  
Through low-lying ricefields the road embankments often have to be quite 
high, requiring intense manual labour.  Children as young as 10 are 
doing it, and so are the elderly.  No machines are being used, except in a 
few places or where the forced labourers themselves can "hire" them.  
Villagers are being forced to cover some of the roads with broken bricks 
or stones in an apparent attempt to make them "all-season", but the 
embankments are just dirt and no proper drainage is being done, so the 
roads are sure to collapse in the rainy season starting this June.  Then, as 
the villagers know from long experience, they will be forced to build these 
roads all over again starting next dry season in November.

Another disturbing development in the area is the apparent increase in 
systematic persecution of the Muslim community.  The worst case is the 
recent destruction of  Muslim Nabu village (see Interviews #3-4), and it 
will be important to see whether further attempts to destroy and scatter 
Muslim communities in Karen State will follow.
 
The following accounts were given in interviews conducted throughout 
April and May by independent human rights monitors working with people 
in Pa'an District, by the Hsaw Wah Deh independent human rights 
reporting group, and by KHRG.  Names of those interviewed have been 
changed, and all false names used are enclosed in quotes; other names 
and details are real, though some details have been omitted or replaced by 
'xxxx' to protect people.

Reference is often made to SLORC's brick kilns.  SLORC Army Battalions 
commonly set up brick kilns as a profitmaker for the officers - rank-and-
file SLORC soldiers are forced to spend most of their time making bricks, 
the local villagers are forced to provide the fuel, and the officers sell the 
bricks for 5 Kyat apiece, none of which goes to the ranks or the villagers.  
Several interviewees mention DKBA officers Pa Tha Da (a.k.a. Kyaw Tha 
Da) and Nuh Po (a.k.a. Kyaw Nuh Po), two brothers from Bee T'Ka 
village who joined DKBA last year and have become particularly 
notorious for abuse of villagers.  Other references to them can be found in 
every KHRG report which mentions the DKBA in Pa'an District.

Many villages in the area have both a Karen name and a Burmese name 
(for example, T'Nay Cha village in Karen is known as Nabu in Burmese).  
We have generally used the name used most commonly among people in 
the area.  Note also that Karen and Burmese village names can be 
transliterated into English spellings in several ways, so differently-spelled 
but similar-sounding names seen on maps or in reports by various groups 
may actually be referring to the same place.

Main abbreviations in the report text:

SLORC - State Law & Order Restoration Council, Burma's ruling military junta
LORC  - SLORC administration at lower levels, e.g. Village LORC, Township LORC
KNU   - Karen National Union, the main Karen opposition organization
KNLA  - Karen National Liberation Army, military wing of the KNU
KNDO  - Karen National Defence Organization, village militia wing of the KNU
DKBA  - Democratic Kayin Buddhist Army, Karen group tensely allied to SLORC
Ko Per Baw  - 'Yellow Headbands', common way of referring to DKBA
Ta Bee Met  - 'Closed Eyes', DKBA's way of referring to KNU and KNLA
IB          - SLORC Infantry Battalion, usually about 500+ strong
LIB         - SLORC Light Infantry Battalion, usually about 500+ strong

			   TOPIC SUMMARY

Executions (Interviews #2,12,17), torture (#12-16), arrest (#12,14-16,18), 
rape (#12), extortion (#1,2,3,5,8,14-18), stealing livestock (#1,2,12,13,15-
18), land confiscation (#1,3,4,13), destruction of land & homes (#1-3,9,13), 
persecution of Muslims (#2-5,8,16), persecution of Christians (#18), 
arrest/torture of returning refugees (#16), Army TV propaganda (#4).

Forced labour:  Roads (#1-11,18), army camp labour (#2,3,5,8,11,12), 
porters (#1,2,5,12,13), forced logging (#1,2,7,8,11,17), forced labour 
getting fuel for brick kilns & baking bricks (#1-3, 7,8), forced labour 
farming (#3,4,10), forced labour for tourism (#1), child forced labour (#5-
12, 18), death/illness/physical abuse during forced labour (#3,5,6,7,9,10,13).

Roads using forced labour:  Pa'an - Myaing Gyi Ngu (#18), Pa'an - Shwe 
Taw - Za Tha Pyin - Kaw Palaung (#1,9,11), Nabu - Myatpadine - 
Kawkareik (#1,2,3,6,8,10), Nabu - Daw Lan - Kyaw Ywa (#2,3,5,6,7), 
Nabu - Tu Kaw Koh - Pain Kyone (#2,6), Kyone Doh - Nabu (#3), Kya In 
Seik Gyi - Win Kat (#2), Way Sha - Ko Lay Wah (Than Ma Ya Taung) 
(#2).  (Note: this list only includes those mentioned in this report, and is 
far from complete.)

A map is included at the end of this report to show locations of these 
roads and main villages.
_____________________________________________________________________________

				  #1.
The following is excerpted from an independent interview with a former 
schoolteacher conducted on 2 May 1996.  She also discussed the situation 
in the schools, and her comments can be found in "Interviews on the 
School Situation", KHRG #96-16, 8/5/96.

NAME:   "Naw Paw Wah"   SEX: F  AGE: 36    Karen Buddhist schoolteacher

I served as a teacher in Kawkareik.  I resigned last year and moved to Pa'an, 
and after that to Irrawaddy Division.  What I have seen is that the whole 
people have to work all the time doing "voluntary labour".

In Pa'an, at the beginning of this year 1996 porter fees were increased to 
1,500 Kyats per month from every household, even including the families 
of civil servants like teachers and nurses.  In November 1995, SLORC 
soldiers who were not from Pa'an arrested people inside their houses to go 
as porters.  Then the Ya Wa Ta called a meeting in our section [towns and 
cities are divided into 'sections' or 'quarters', each administered by a 'Ya 
Wa Ta', which stands for Village LORC] and said we would hire 5 porters 
every month for 10,000 Kyats each.  So our section has to pay 50,000 
Kyats every month plus the usual porter fees.  In addition we have to pay 
500 Kyats [per family] per month for new road construction.  People from 
Pa'an also have to work on the Pa'an - Za Tha Pyin road.  In 1994, the 
SLORC authorities confiscated many acres of ricefields at Pa Kat, east of 
Zwegabin hill.  They didn't give any compensation to the farmers.  Then 
they set up a new town there and divided the land into plots 20 feet by 40 
feet, and they sold these plots to civil servants for 2,000 Kyats per unit.

In Pa'an, people hate the soldiers very much.  A Private's wife can wear a 
lot of gold.  The vendors in the market say they do not want to sell things 
to soldiers.  But soldiers are the only ones who have money to buy a lot of 
things.

In Irrawaddy Division I visited my relatives in Bassein, and I saw that there 
is road construction there too.  The Chairman of SLORC, General Than 
Shwe, found a beach northwest of Bassein called Nga Saw beach, and he 
named it "the most beautiful beach in Burma".  Then many Battalions were 
transferred there and started to prepare it for Visit Myanmar Year.  The 
local villagers had to construct a new road from Nga Saw to Tha Lat Kwa, 
close to Bassein.  The height of the road [embankment] is 12 feet and the 
width at least 50 feet.  There were bulldozers there but they only worked if 
the villagers gave money for the fuel and operating costs.  Many coconut 
trees and mango trees were cut down to clear ground for bungalows and 
barracks for the soldiers.  I heard that after the villagers finish moving 
the earth [to make the road embankment], the Chinese will come and tar the 
road.  I don't know which Chinese, from China or from Burma.

For me the worst place was my native village, xxxx near Myatpadine.  The 
villagers there have had to build the Nabu-Myatpadine road for the last 3 
years, and every rainy season the rain destroys the road again.  This year 
many more Battalions have been stationed in the area, and the villagers have 
to work for them many ways.  Three years ago, villagers never cut trees 
between our area and Kyone Pine, because it was declared a forest preserve 
by the KNU.  But within 4 months, because of demands from the SLORC 
Army's brick kilns and to build their buildings, the villagers were forced to 
cut down many trees.  Now there are almost no trees left north of Kyone 
Doh, and it is very hard for the villagers to find leaves for roofing.

For road construction, each family has to dig and carry the earth to make a 
road, must make a hole 50 feet long by 2 feet wide by 6 feet deep and carry 
all that earth.  I know a bachelor about 45 years old who had to work alone 
to do this for about a month.  Some villagers also have to go to work on 
other roads.

DKBA monks are also active in Karen State.  I heard that DKBA monks 
practice drills with arms at Myaing Gyi Ngu.  This February, a group of 
monks with weapons came to Kawkareik Hospital because one of them was 
wounded.  They shouted loudly at the hospital, and a nurse told them not to 
shout and not to bring guns, especially monks.  The monks were very 
angry.  They learned that the nurse is a Christian, and the next day they 
came to find her so the hospital authorities hid her and gave her a month's 
leave from duty.  The DKBA members are also terrible.  In March 1996 
they stole 4 buffalos from Noh Kaw Tay village, close to Nabu.  The owner 
of the buffalos heard that his animals were driven to Thailand by the 
DKBA, so he asked the DKBA officer to take action.  But the officer said, 
"If you have no evidence, you must pay 400,000 Kyats, and also be killed."  
Then the buffalo owner went to the SLORC Army officer, who said, "It is 
the time of organizing [i.e. supporting and enlarging the DKBA], so we 
cannot take action against them."
_____________________________________________________________________________
				 #2.

[The following account was given by a Karen Army medic.]

The villagers from Kyone Doh and Kawkareik areas are very tired of 
building new roads; Myatpadine - Nabu, Nabu - Daw Lan, Nabu - Tu Kaw 
Koh, Nabu - Kawkareik, and Way Sha - Ko Lay Wah (Than Ma Ya 
Taung) roads. [For details on Way Sha - Than Ma Ya Taung, see "Abuses 
in Tee Sah Ra Area", KHRG #96-15, 1/4/96.]   Every village in the region 
has to work.  If a person can't go, they have to hire a substitute for 150 to 
200 Kyats a day.  Some villagers from Naung Hta Pung village complained 
to soldiers about their ricefields being destroyed because of the road 
construction, but the reply was, "We'll buy your fields by giving 100 Kyats 
per acre" [the officer was just being sarcastic; 100 Kyats is worth less than 
US$1].  Rubber plantations in Pata and Nabu have also been destroyed for 
the road construction.

The road is about the height of an elephant.  There are no drains,  bridges 
for small streams or ditches for ricefield irrigation, so there will be a 
flood on one side of the road and the other side will be dry.  It will affect the 
grazing fields also.  The new roads they are building are not strong enough. 
The old British roads were made of 3 layers of stone and then tarred, but 
SLORC roads are only made of dirt.  They planned to get stones from 
Naung Hta Pung hill, but the explosives didn't detonate so they gave up the 
plan [due to superstition].  Many villagers from Naung Hta Pung fled to 
refugee camps because of road construction, portering labour and 
construction of new battalion camps.  After they flee the SLORC soldiers 
call their relatives and take over the houses and fields of the people who 
have fled.

I think SLORC authorities allocate money for construction labourers, but 
the whole Army is corrupt.  Commanders take all the labour money and 
order the villagers to "volunteer".  Lower-ranked officers order the villagers 
to cut and bring wood for new battalion buildings.  They also order the 
villagers to bring portable sawmills, and later the owners cannot get back 
their machines.  Sergeants order villagers to collect wood for brick-baking 
kilns, and then sell this wood back to the villagers again.  Finally, the 
Privates take livestock and things from the villagers.  Some Indians from 
Nabu told me, "Cars are running, and Indians are running too".  They have 
suffered alot because of road construction and new battalions.  Recently the 
Nabu Muslim graveyard was taken by the Army.  They removed the religious 
items, cleared it and made it a pig farm.  The Muslims are very sad 
about that.

The DKBA there is only serving the SLORC troops.  The SLORC Army 
gives orders and the DKBA implements them.  They collect porter fees, 
arrange villagers to go to road work and prevent villagers from going to 
Thailand.  Maung Chit Thu [a DKBA officer] said, "Roads are good.  We 
can ride motorcycles."  Sure he can ride a motorcycle, but he does not 
know that villagers are crying.  Maung Chit Thu's group from DKBA #999 
[Regiment] killed two villagers during the Water Festival [in mid-April 
1996].  One was a SLORC-appointed village head, Nae Pa Bleh, 41 years 
old.  "Nae" is used for respected elders and ex-monks.  Nae Pa Bleh was an 
ex-monk who was head of Tee Law Thee village.  On April 14, when he 
was coming from the monastery, members of DKBA #999 arrested him 
and accused him of helping KNU.  He was executed outside the village.  
The other was Saw Lah Khin, 50 years old, from Pah K'Lu village.  He was 
charged with helping KNU and shot dead on April 15.  The SLORC Army 
took no action about this.  They said, "Karens kill Karens. It has nothing to 
do with us."  In February at Th'Waw Thaw near Tu Kaw Koh village, a 
former robber who is now DKBA called Bo Sat Lat [literally, "Officer 
Machine-gun"] who is under Tah K'Ler's command killed an animal trader 
named Po Ka Pya from Baw Paw Ko village.  The charge was trying to sell 
7 cows to people in Thailand.  The DKBA prohibits animals and animal 
products, even fishpaste, from crossing the Dawna Range [to Thailand and 
villages near the Thai border].

Now SLORC is planning to build 2 long roads, from Kya In Seik Gyi to 
Win Kat [towards the current KNU headquarters] and from Nabu to Pain 
Kyone.  If they build these roads, thousands of villagers will be in trouble.  
The whole world quickly hears news of forced labour in Mandalay, but I 
think the world hears nothing about forced labour in Karen State.  Please 
send them this information as soon as possible to give a hand to these badly 
deprived villagers.
_____________________________________________________________________________

   - [END OF PART 1 - SEE SUBSEQUENT POSTINGS FOR PARTS 2 THROUGH 4] -