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ILO: FORCED LABOUR IN BURMA-29



[ILO COMMISSION OF INQUIRY ON FORCED LABOUR IN BURMA, SLICE
29]


21
 
Ethnicity:           Rohingya 
Age/sex:             50, male
Family situation:    Married with wife, one son, two daughters 
                     and one son-in-law
Occupation:          Farmer (7 khani [2.6 acres] of land) and
                     fisherman
                     Rakhine State (village had 25,000 to      
                     30,000 inhabitants)


The witness left Myanmar at the beginning of January 1998. He
was forced to work for the military in Myanmar. Land
cultivation. He had to do this for the Rakhines. Rice and
peanuts were the crops involved. The growing season spread
over three months. He could not do anything else during that
period. Also, in the dry season, he had to clear the land and
put up fencing. He was not paid. Portering. He had to do this
twice a week (by rotation). The rest of the time he could work
on his own land. Sentry duty. This was night work. On numerous
occasions he witnessed acts of violence by NaSaKa members.
There was a torture cell at the NaSaKa camp. The NaSaKa used
stocks. These were used as a punishment for the workers who
were ill or refused to work. He had personally been used more
than once to pull a plough like a buffalo. On one occasion,
100 other people received the same punishment for being slow.
The day lasted six hours. Finally, as regards taxes, twenty
five per cent of his produce had to be given to the NaSaKa. He
received no compensation for this.
                       ____________________
 
22

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             66, male
Family situation:    Married with three sons and one
                     daughter
Occupation:          Farmer with 7 khani (2.6 acres) of land


The witness left Myanmar at the end of 1997. There was a
NaSaKa camp near his village in Rakhine. The camp was built by
the men from his village. He said the NaSaKa had requisitioned
him for work. His (eldest) son had given him the money to pay
for a substitute. Each time, his son had to pay 50 kyat. He
lost count of the number of times he had to pay. He estimated
that he might have paid this sum on average five to seven
times per month. The son had to use his savings or sell his
possessions (chickens, chillies) to be able to give his father
this money. His son (the eldest one, the others being too
young) did work for the NaSaKa, particularly transporting wood
from the forest to the camp. His son has had to bring wood to
the camp at least ten times a month over the last twenty
years. The son was beaten with a stick by NaSaKa members on
three occasions because he was slow. He also had to pay taxes
on numerous occasions. They had to draw on their savings to
pay. If they did not have the money, they had to sell their
possessions (livestock, chickens). The amount of the taxes
varied. The witness told of his despair. He had no work, no
country and no future. 
                       ____________________

23 to 28

Ethnicity:           All Rohingya
Age/sex:             65, male (witness 23); 30, male (witness  
                     24), 58, male (witness 25); 35, male      
                     (witness 26); female (witness 27); and    
                     24, male (witness 28)
                     Rakhine State


(Witnesses 23 to 28 were interviewed together)

The witnesses left Myanmar between one and two months ago.
They had to do work for the NaSaKa on several occasions. Some
of them had to work on average ten times per month (for
instance, growing rice: witness 24). In early January 1998,
witness 25 saw his son beaten because he fell asleep while on
forced sentry duty for the NaSaKa. His son's leg was broken.
he did not receive medical treatment. Witness 23 was used
three times to pull a plough like a buffalo, as a punishment.
                       ____________________

29

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             45, male
Family situation:    Married with one son and three daughters
Occupation:          Farmer with nine khani (3.4 acres) of his
                     own land
                     State (military camp one km from his      
                     village)

The witness left Myanmar at the beginning of 1998 because of
the forced labour, which prevented him from providing for his
family's needs. The order usually came from the military, who
passed it through the village head. All males over the age of
12 had to perform forced labour. It was not paid. He generally
had to take his own food. He could not refuse. Each family had
to provide one man. It was possible to pay a substitute or
make bribes. In his case, he did not have the necessary money.
He was maltreated on several occasions. He was given no
medication or medical treatment. Construction of embankments.
He had to do this approximately twice a week, every two
months. Some 500 people worked with him. The work was overseen
by a Rakhine. It was performed at a Government shrimp farm. He
was neither paid nor compensated in any way whatever. He was
physically maltreated. He was beaten on at least six occasions
with a wooden stick when he took a rest. He did this kind of
work four months before his departure. Agriculture. He had
to bring his own plough. He had to do this one month a year
for six years. A sector was assigned to ten families. The work
generally began around 6.30 a.m. and ended at nightfall. He
was allowed one hour's rest at lunchtime. He was not paid. He
did not receive any rice in compensation. He was subjected to
physical ill-treatment. Portering. He had to do portering two
months a year for six-and-a-half years. The assignments lasted
between one and four days each time. Around 120 other porters
were requisitioned to work at the same time. He had to bring
his own food. There were no shelters to sleep in. He had to
carry goods and munitions for the military from one camp to
another. He did not see any armed conflicts. The loads weighed
around 40 kg. He was subjected to maltreatment, generally
inflicted because he had not understood the orders (language
problem). He was beaten at least twenty times (beaten with a
stick and kicked). He reported back pains which are presumably
the result of these beatings. Woodcutting. He had to cut the
wood required for the building of soldiers' housing or to be
sent to other districts. He had to do this work one week per
month for six-and-a-half years. He could be away for more than
a week on this work. He slept in the fields. On each occasion
he worked with at least twenty other men. He did not have to
pay taxes.
_______________________

30

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             30, male
Family situation:    Married with wife, mother, two brothers   
                     and four sisters
Occupation:          Owner of a small grocer's shop
                     Rakhine State (village had 4,000 to 5,000 
                     inhabitants; the village was relocated    
                     some four years ago with other Rohingya   
                     villages. It was originally sited close   
                     to a main road. It was moved near to the  
                     sea.)

The witness left Myanmar at the beginning of 1998. He had to
work for the military. He was not paid. No one could look
after his business while he was away. All the Rohingyas had to
do forced labour. His brothers and father also had to do
forced labour. There was no woodcutting or transporting of
wood in his area, since there was no forest. All the work was
done for the military. He was physically ill-treated. Five
days before his departure for Bangladesh, he was beaten
because he had been unable to carry the load allotted to him.
He suffered from back pains as a result of this beating. It
was possible to pay bribes: 1,000 kyat would buy a week's
rest. He did not personally have the resources to pay for a
substitute. The orders came from the military, but were
transmitted through the village head. The soldiers sometimes
came directly to people's houses. One kind of forced labour he
had to do was carrying stones. He had to do this three months
a year for 15 years. Every working day involved ten trips with
stones. The last time he had to do this was a fortnight before
he left. The tools were provided by the military. The stones
were mainly used in road-building. They had to be crushed. The
road on which he worked was a seven kilometre road in the
district of Sittway (Akyab). He also had to work building
bridges. He also worked on the construction of military camps.
Each family had to pay 50 kyat if a new military group came to
the region. In addition, on one occasion he was taken as a
porter to Shan State.
                     _______________________

31

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             45, male
Family situation:    Married with four daughters, four sons    
                     and two grandchildren
Occupation:          Rice farmer with 12 khani (4.5 acres) of  
                     land
                     (village had 300 families; several had    
                     left the village)


The witness arrived in Bangladesh with his family at the
beginning of 1998. Orders for labour generally came from the
military, but were transmitted through the village head. If
the village head did not provide the necessary labour, the
military came directly to the houses. When he was away, no one
could tend his land. For that reason, he wanted his sons to do
the work for the military. However, the army preferred him to
his sons, as they were less strong (being around 15 years
old). All the men in his village had to do work for the
military. His brother was murdered after having denounced (in
rudimentary English) the practices of the NaSaKa to the UNHCR.
He was hanged. Building military camps. For six to seven
years, he had to work on camp construction for around ten days
a month. He had to make the wood and bamboo structures. One
hundred and fifty persons were requisitioned for this work on
each occasion. He also had to build houses for the Rakhines.
He did this work five days before leaving for Bangladesh. He
was paid. He was sometimes subjected to maltreatment. A man
from his village had been killed five days before his
departure for Bangladesh for having refused to do the work
demanded of him. The family of the deceased had also left the
village. Portering. He did portering for the military on more
than a hundred occasions over three years. Between Kulung and
Akyorata (24 km). The assignments generally lasted for a day.
He had to do it four times a month. Between 100 and 150
persons were requisitioned each time. They all came from his
village. He was paid 15 kyat (a negligible sum) by the NaSaKa
for each assignment. If he fell behind, he could be beaten.
The last time he had to act as a porter was the day before he
left for Bangladesh. Clearing grass. He had to do this five
times a month for six to seven years. He was not paid. He also
had to pay 100 kyat per month to the NaSaKa in taxes.
                     _______________________

32
Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             25, male
Family situation:    Single; two brothers (one deceased) and
                     three sisters (father died in July 1991)
Occupation:          Farmer (rice paddies and vegetables) --   
                     16 khani (6 acres)
                     Rakhine State (village had 1,700          
                     families)

The witness left Myanmar in the course of January 1998 because
he could no longer tolerate the abuses of the authorities. The
NaSaKa took his land from him in 1995, leaving his family only
the ground on which their house stood. His father was killed
by the NaSaKa after contacting UNHCR because one of his sons
had not come home after an assignment. Work for military
camps.  He had to do various different types of work for the
battalion 21 camp: clearing the forest and carrying rations
between the main road and the camp (one kilometre). He had to
do this from 1995 onwards. As he no longer had any land, he
worked for the military in the evening and was a day labourer
by day. He occasionally received two kilos of rice and one
kilo of dal. He had suffered ill-treatment. As the military
camp was adjacent to his house, the soldiers came to fetch him
directly or used a loudspeaker to call him when he was needed.
He has been beaten because the pace of his work was not
satisfactory. Some 2,000 people had been requisitioned to
build one military camp. Portering for military operations. In
April 1991 he worked as a porter for military operations in
the hills against opposition forces. He had to carry the
baggage. He had to do this on two occasions. Each time, 400
people had worked with him. He was not paid, but he was fed.
The porters were frequently ill-treated. He said 50 died on
one of these assignments, and 25 on the other. Some porters
who could not keep up with the pace of the march were pushed
off the hillsides. The soldiers frequently assaulted girls at
night. Rape was commonplace over the last two years or so. The
girls were rounded up and offered to the soldiers. He 
personally saw this happening. His own sister had been
assaulted less than a month before. He was present. He
resisted, but was beaten and forcibly taken to another room.
                     _______________________

33

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             35, male
Family situation:    Married with one daughter and two sons
Occupation:          Farmer with nine khani (3.4 acres) of     
                     paddy fields (this was an area where      
                     there is only one rice crop per year).
                     State (very remote coastal village)

The witness left Myanmar at the beginning of January 1998
because he was no longer able to provide for his family. This
was his first time in Bangladesh. The Government had seized
half his land in 1996 and the rest in 1997, leaving him only
one khani. The NaSaKa set up camp in his village in 1996/97.
Before that period he had not been subjected to forced labour
(very remote village). He worked on embankments for shrimp
breeding ponds. He had to do this 15 days a month for seven
months. Ninety to 150 people worked alongside him on this. He
received two kilos of rice. He could not refuse. He knew men
in his village who had been tortured because they had refused
to do work. They were kept in a dark room. That episode had
occurred about a year ago. He could not pay to be replaced or
bribe the soldiers. He last did this work 12 days before he
left. With regard to portering, he had to go with the army in
April 1997. This was an operation against the RSO. The army
deployed the porters in the front line in such a way that the
RSO would hit them first if they opened fire. He had to carry
equipment, food and munitions. He had to stay 41 days in the
deep forest with the military. There were 90 other porters
with him. Apparently, no one died that he knows of. He was not
paid. To feed himself, he received a daily ration. He was
beaten on three occasions with a wooden stick. Taxes. He had
to pay taxes to the NaSaKa amounting to 150 to 200 kyat a
month. The NaSaKa or the village head came directly to his
house to collect the payment.
                     _______________________

34

Ethnicity:          Rohingya
Age/sex:            50, female
Family situation:   Widowed with three daughters and
                    one grandson
Occupation:         Husband was a small trader (grocer)
                    Rakhine State

The witness left Myanmar at the end of 1997. Her husband died
four years ago. She sold the shop. She worked in her village
as a day labourer for neighbours. She had seen people forced
to work on road-building (earth moving) and the construction
of military camps. Her husband had worked on the construction
of a road between her village and Buthidaung four and a half
years ago. She last saw forced labour two months before she
came to Bangladesh. This was on road repairs and the building
of a military camp. In the former case, 50 people were moving
earth. A Rakhine was overseeing the work. She saw soldiers
physically maltreating villagers. She had to pay taxes
amounting to 30 kyat to the military just before leaving. She
did not know the reason for this payment. These taxes were
collected by the village head.
                     _______________________

35 and 36

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             30, female (witness 35); 45, female       
                     (witness 36)
Family situation:    Witness 35 widowed with one son; witness  
                     36 married with two sons and one daughter
                     Rakhine State (there was a NaSaKa camp in 
                     the village)

(The two witnesses gave evidence together)

The witnesses arrived at the end of 1997. They had seen forced
labour being performed for the NaSaKa. The NaSaKa members came
to the house of a neighbour of witness 36 just before she left
for Bangladesh. Twelve to 20 persons were requisitioned on
this occasion to carry baggage. The same had occurred several
times before. The assignment could vary and might last between
half-a-day and a day, about four times a month. Villagers were
also requisitioned to clean the NaSaKa military camp.
                     _______________________

37

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             35, male
Family situation:    Married with three sons and two daughters
Occupation:          Farmer (paddy fields) - ten khani (3.8
                     acres)
                     State (there was a NaSaKa camp in the     
                     village)

The witness left Myanmar at the end of 1997. He has had to
perform various kinds of work such as: construction of
military camps; digging work for breeding ponds; woodcutting
and road-building. He had to do digging work for ponds less
than one month before his departure. With regard to
woodcutting, some 50 to 60 people had worked with him. He had
to transport the wood that had been cut and work on the
building of camps. He had to do this work 15 days a month, six
months a year, for around five years. He worked on the
building of the road between his village and Chilkali. The
road was for the exclusive use of the NaSaKa. For five to six
years, 14 to 15 days a month were taken up by forced labour
which had to be done for the NaSaKa. He had been beaten for
refusing to work. He left Myanmar because of the forced labour
and scarcity of employment.
                     _______________________


38

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             40, male
Family situation:    Married with three sons and three
                     daughters
Occupation:          Farmer (rice paddies)
                     Stat (NaSaKa camp in the village)

The witness left Myanmar in early 1998 because life had become
intolerable there on account of the abuses of the military. He
had to perform the same kinds of forced labour as witness 37.
For five to six years, 14 to 15 days a month were taken up
with the forced labour which had to be done for the NaSaKa.
Furthermore, even if the assignment was for a given number of
days, the men had to wait for their replacements to arrive
before they could leave the work. As a result, they always
stayed longer than the expected number of days. The orders
came from the NaSaKa, who used the village head to transmit
them. It was possible to gain exemption by paying the sum of
200 kyat to the NaSaKa on each occasion. He had paid this sum
on four occasions. He could not refuse to work. He was beaten
by the soldiers for arriving late at the place of work and for
refusing to work. He was occasionally paid by the NaSaKa, in
which case he received ten kyat.
                     _______________________

39 and 40

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             30, male (witness 39); 45, male (witness  
                     40)
Family situation:    Married with two sons and one daughter
                     (witness 39); married with two sons and   
                     two daughters (witness 40)
Occupation:          Day labourer (witness 39); Farmer         
                     (witness 40)
                     State (NaSaKa camp nearby)

Witnesses left Myanmar at the beginning of 1998. Witness 40
had to leave because the Government seized all his lands. He
had no means of providing for his family anymore. They had to
perform various forms of forced labour such as sentry duty,
woodcutting and carrying rations. This work was unpaid. For
over four years, witness 39 lost an average of 13 days a month
carrying out work for the military. Between 40 and 50 people
worked at the same time as he did. Witness 39 last had to do
forced labour on the day before his departure. As far as
portering was concerned, the assignments usually lasted one
day. On one occasion, witness 39 had to go into the deep
forest for a seven-day period; he had to accompany the troops
on an operation against the rebels. He did not see any
fighting. However, two rebels were arrested in Rakhine State.
Both witnesses said that if asked, they could not refuse to
work. Witness 39 was beaten about one-and-a-half years ago for
attempting to run away from the work site to which he had been
assigned. He was kept in a darkened room and beaten with a
wooden stick. 
                     _______________________

41

Ethnicity:           Rohingya
Age/sex:             35, male
Family situation:    Married with three sons and four          
                     daughters
Occupation:          Farmer with seven khani (2.6 acres;       
                     vegetables and rice, which meant he could 
                     benefit from two harvests)
                     (most of the inhabitants of the village   
                     were Rakhines. All the Rohingyas left the 
                     village at the end of 1997. There was a   
                     military camp nearby - 15 km from his     
                     home, just outside the village - and a    
                     NaSaKa camp, closer than the military     
                     camp)

The witness had to leave Myanmar at the end of 1997 because,
for the last five years, the military had been seizing 50 per
cent of his harvests annually (50 per cent of 2,800 kilos of
rice). Even by leasing neighbouring land, he was no longer
able to meet his family's needs. He took part in the
construction of the NaSaKa camp and carried out certain work
there afterwards: cutting the grass, maintenance. Three months
before his arrival, he worked on the renovation of the NaSaKa
camp which had begun two years before. He worked as a day
labourer for the NaSaKa camp on average four days a week for
five months over a five-year period. Ten to 12 people worked
with him. The work involved carrying bamboo sticks, attending
to the camp's drainage system and putting up protective
spikes. Any reluctance to do the work could lead to beatings.
He was beaten on several occasions by the NaSaKa. On one
occasion, the inhabitants complained to UNHCR representatives,
who made an enquiry. In reprisal, he and some other villagers
were severely beaten with wooden sticks. He was usually not
paid. No food was provided either. His sons were too young to
be requisitioned for forced labour. However, all Rohingyas had
to do work for the military. Not the Rakhines.
                     _______________________

[END OF SLICE 29]