An Independent
Report by the Karen Human Rights Group
August 4, 1995 / KHRG #95-29
The following is from an interview with a 56-year-old man from Myaungmya Town, deep in the Irrawaddy Delta west of Rangoon, who left the Delta in June 1995. The Irrawaddy Delta is populated by a few million people, 50% of them Karen and 50% Burmans. In recent decades it has been sealed off from the outside world more than almost any other area of Burma, and the Tatmadaw (Burmese Army) has been able to get away with any form of repression it likes. In 1991, the Karen National Union managed to send some soldiers and weapons into the Delta in an effort to restart the resistance struggle there which had been quiet for decades, but the troops were exposed. In events which became known as the Bogalay Crisis, the Tatmadaw launched a huge offensive into the area to wipe out the small number of KNLA forces and all seeds of civilian resistance. Villages were burned, helicopter gunships strafed villages and schools, and thousands of Karen community leaders, pastors and schoolteachers were arrested, sentenced en masse and imprisoned. The Tatmadaw began a brutal campaign of repression, killings and disappearances against Karen in the area, which still remains almost completely unknown to the outside world. As a result, the SLORC now feels confident enough of its control in the area that it has recently opened up some parts of it to tourism.
The personal details of this man must be omitted for his protection. Even though he is now far from the Delta, he was still so afraid to talk that he would not discuss certain issues, and some of his account is probably softer than the true reality of the situation there.
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In Myaung Mya, people are not still being arrested. Some NLD elected MPs were detained for about 2 days and then released. That was 3 years ago. Now I think they're not attending the National Convention [SLORC's meetings to draft a constitution]. They are U Bo Pyu [son of a journalist and government minister who was assassinated together with Aung San] and U Aung Kyin. In the 1991 Bogalay Crisis, many were arrested. I knew some of them from Myaung Mya and Bassein Districts. They were sentenced to one or two years in prison. Two old men died soon after their release. One was Mahn Ba Nyein, 63 years old, and the other was Pa Nyar Say, about 70 years old. They were from Bassein. They were ex-Karen soldiers, but they had retired 30 years ago already.
Bogalay is quite far from Myaung Mya. I knew of one battle there [in October 1991] between Infantry Battalion 11 from Bassein and Karens. It was near Ohn Bin village, Bogalay Township. The SLORC troops lost about 60 or more. Then the Karen soldiers managed to move to Nga Pu Taw. There were about 40 of them. All of them were new recruits except for one KNLA soldier. He got injured in his leg, so he stayed along the way while his soldiers moved on. He shot about 15 SLORC soldiers before they killed him. After that many villagers were arrested, but I don't know exactly because it was quite far from us.
Since then our family has had to work as forced labour on road construction, such as the Labutta-Rangoon and Myaung Mya-Rangoon roads, and the Bassein International Airport project. On the Labutta-Rangoon road, we had to work through the whole hot season this year. We had to excavate the ground, cut iron rods, and carry sand, stones, and bags of cement. There is also some bridge construction in Myaung Mya, and there are some Chinese engineers there. The authorities pay money for bridge construction work, like 50 or 100 Kyats per day, but not for road construction. On most of the road construction work each person has to go for a 15 day shift for the year, because they call labourers from 26 townships [all of Irrawaddy Division], so there are a lot of people. The Myaung Mya-Rangoon and Labutta-Rangoon road projects started 3 years ago. Neither road is paved.
In 1991 and 1992 we had to work on Bassein International Airport. There were more than 10,000 people who came from 26 townships. My sons had to go for 8 or 10 days. They had to raise and level the ground about 18 feet high over a very wide area. [Making runways for jumbo jets; other witnesses have described thousands of people stamping down dirt with their bare feet to make these runways.] The authorities arranged transportation [to the worksite] by issuing orders to all boat owners. The boat owners and the people received nothing. There was a medical team at the workplace, but it was insufficient for the whole crowd. Some people died because of snakebites. This work finished in 1992. [The airport, however, is still not complete, and there has been more forced labour on it since then.]
Every Saturday, each family from Myaung Mya must send one person for cleaning the roads, the school compound and the hospital compound. All this work is under control of the local Law and Order Restoration Council. Soldiers are not involved - they are at the worksites away from towns.
About 3 or 4 years ago, people refused to join the Army. But now, I think some people want to be soldiers because it is the only chance to survive. It is very difficult to live as a normal civilian. We are always afraid of the Army. One pyi [about 2.5 kg.] of rice costs 50 to 60 Kyat. Civilians have to give about 5 kg. of meat to the Army every time they kill their own cows or pigs. The soldiers also force us to rebuild their barracks, to make fences and to stand as sentries for the security of their Battalion compound. Last year, soldiers from Infantry Battalion 93 in Myaung Mya demanded to use a boat with an engine from Thein Lar village in Myaung Mya township. So the villagers collected money for the boat, and then they gave the boat to the soldiers to use. But when the soldiers left, they just went and sold the boat and took all the money instead of returning to the village. In Myaung Mya Town, we don't have to go as porters for the soldiers. But in remote villages, people have to give porter fees to the Army or go as porters. Our family has to pay 80 Kyats each month as "sentry fees".
The electricity is always "browning out". In our section of town, people wanted to get a public phone booth. The authorities agreed, but they collected money from our section for it, 300 Kyats per house. Later I heard that a rich man from Rangoon in our section had donated enough money to pay for the phone booth. So I guess the authorities just kept all our money, but nobody dared to ask.
They order us to decorate and rebuild our houses, every year after rainy season. This year, the order said we also have to build a wall in front of the house, and if we don't we'll be driven out of our houses and forced to stay somewhere else. They only want to see good and beautiful houses, especially along the main roads and streets. So I had to buy galvanized sheets [for the roof], bricks, and cement from the black market. [Black market building materials are at least 3 times as expensive as those bought on the SLORC market (contrary to international myth, there is no free market in Burma), but buying materials on the SLORC market requires official approval, which requires significant bribes and more time than it takes for the Army to kick you out of your house.] In 1990, about 50 families were forced to resettle from the poor part of town. They were driven out, and then those families had to buy a new piece of land by giving 5,000 Kyat each to the authorities. The authorities destroyed their old houses, then sold all that land to the rich people. After the Bogalay Crisis, the SLORC made a plan to combine all the villages into huge villages with about 1,000 families. But now I hear nothing more about it, maybe because it would affect rice production [the Delta is a major rice-producing area]. In 1991 many villages from Bogalay, Nga Pu Taw and Moulmeingyun townships were forced to move, but now I hear they are allowed to go back again.
Members of USDA have to give their monthly membership fees, but I don't know how much. [Union Solidarity Development Association, SLORC's attempt to create a mass support organization through coercion, began in late 1993 / early 1994; civil servants must join or lose their jobs, many students must join or be expelled, and in some areas farmers must join or lose their land.] USDA can be considered as a wing of the Army. They train their members to be paratroopers, even the girls.
Things are getting worse. Corruption is everywhere, from buying a ticket for the steamer to the justice system. Law enforcement is ineffective. Five months ago, a Japanese tourist's bag was stolen right on the jetty where there is a heavy presence of security forces. He was travelling alone and he lost all his money, so the schoolteachers collected money and gave him enough to go back to Rangoon. Then the Japanese looked at the money and he cried, right there. The police knew who stole his bag, but they didn't do anything.