An Independent Report by the Karen Human Rights Group
May 24, 1999 / KHRG #99-04

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Notes on the Text

In the interviews villagers often refer to ‘loh ah pay’; literally this is the traditional Burmese form of voluntary labour for the community, but the SPDC uses this name in most cases of forced labour, and to the villagers it has come to mean most forms of forced labour with the exception of long-term portering. Villagers, particularly those in the hills, do not keep track of dates or ages, and as a result sometimes different people give different dates for an event or different ages for the people involved. Wherever possible KHRG has attempted to establish and indicate the most accurate dates and ages possible. All numeric dates in this report are in dd/mm/yy format.

Abbreviations

SPDC = State Peace & Development Council, military junta ruling Burma
PDC = Peace & Development Council, SPDC local-level administration
         (e.g. Village PDC [VPDC], Village Tract PDC, Township PDC [TPDC])
SLORC = State Law & Order Restoration Council, former name of the SPDC until Nov. 1997
KNU = Karen National Union, main Karen opposition group
KNLA = Karen National Liberation Army, army of the KNU
DKBA = Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, Karen group allied with SLORC/SPDC
IB = Infantry Battalion (SLORC/SPDC), usually about 500 soldiers fighting strength
LIB = Light Infantry Battalion (SLORC/SPDC), usually about 500 soldiers fighting strength
Viss = Unit of weight measure; one viss is 1.6 kilograms or 3.5 pounds
Bowl/Pyi = Volume of rice equal to 8 small condensed milk tins; about 2 kilograms / 4.4 pounds
Kyat = Burmese currency; US$1=6 Kyat at official rate, 300+ Kyat at current market rate
loh ah pay = Forced labour; literally it means traditional voluntary labour, but not under SPDC

Table of Contents

Introduction / Executive Summary

Nyaunglebin District (known in Karen as Kler Lweh Htoo) is one of the northern Karen districts, straddling the border of Karen State and Pegu Division (see maps on pages 4-5). It covers an area about 110 kilometres from north to south and averaging 40 kilometres from east to west, bounded by the Sittaung River in the west and the upper reaches of the Bilin River in the east. To the north lies Toungoo District, to the south Thaton District, to the east Papun District, and to the west the heartland of Pegu Division and the Pegu Yoma hills. The District is divided into three townships: Shwegyin (Hsaw Tee in Karen) in the south, Kyauk Kyi (Ler Doh) in the centre, and Mone (Mu) in the north. The District itself is a Karen designation dating back to colonial times; the SPDC regime no longer recognises districts, only townships and States/Divisions.

The westernmost part of the district is a narrow strip of fertile plains which form part of the Sittaung River valley. Just 10 to 15 kilometres east of the river itself, the hills abruptly begin and cover the eastern 75% of the district. Villages in the western plains tend to be larger and more prosperous, and have a mixed population of Karens and Burmans. Some villages are unofficially divided into a ‘Karen section’ and a ‘Burman section’, while in other places one village is entirely Karen and the next village up the road is entirely Burman. Because of the easy terrain, the proximity to central Burma and the roads which already run between Shwegyin, Kyauk Kyi and Mone, this area has been strongly controlled by the SLORC/SPDC military for a long time. As soon as you enter the hills to the east the situation is different; the population is almost 100% Karen, life is harder and based more on shifting hillside rice cultivation instead of flat paddy fields, and there are no vehicle roads except one which goes eastward from Kyauk Kyi into Papun District. Villages are more numerous but smaller than in the plains, averaging only 10 to 30 households in size. In these hills the Karen National Liberation Army [KNLA] is very active in guerrilla operations, and neither the SPDC nor the KNU/KNLA exerts strong control.

Finding itself unable to suppress Karen resistance activity in the hills, in early 1997 the SPDC (then named SLORC) began a campaign to wipe out all Karen civilian villages there. Where villagers could be found they were ordered to relocate westward into the plains; where they could not be caught, their villages were shelled without warning, looted and then burned to the ground, while villagers found afterwards were shot on sight. In 1997 KHRG compiled a list of 35 villages in Shwegyin (Hsaw Tee) township alone which had been completely destroyed [for this and other details of the 1997 campaign see "Wholesale Destruction", KHRG #98-01, April 1998]. A similar number of villages were destroyed in Kyauk Kyi township. Most villagers fled into the hills to live in hiding in small groups of families while trying to grow small patches of rice, and many others moved westward as ordered into SPDC garrison villages in the plains, or to stay with relatives in the comparative safety of larger villages.

Many of those who fled to the plains found they could not survive there; they had no land to plant and there was little work to be found, because villagers in the plains were suffering heavily under the heavy extortion fees and crop quotas imposed by the SPDC military and civilian authorities. At the same time, the hill villagers found they were being used as forced labour by the SPDC much more in the plains, both at Army camps and on local infrastructure projects. Unable to survive under these conditions, many have fled back to their home villages in the hills, only to find that the clampdown on the hill areas is continuing. In most cases the hill villages have not been rebuilt because SPDC patrols continue to move through the area destroying whatever structures they find, destroying rice stockpiles and crops in the fields, shooting livestock and shooting villagers on sight. Those living in the hills and those who have returned from the plains have no choice but to live in hiding in small groups, usually near their home villages or their old hill fields. They try to grow small crops, forage for food in the forest and flee further into the hills whenever SPDC patrols come near.

At the same time, something is happening which has never occurred to such a large extent before: an increasing number of villagers native to the Sittaung River plains, both Karen and Burman, are fleeing eastward into the hills, and some are fleeing southward along the main road through Pegu and Kyaikto, then eastward to the Thai border. In the past the prosperity of the Sittaung valley villages has always made it possible for them to survive even under the burden of SLORC/SPDC demands for extortion money and forced labour, but things have changed in the past two years. The SPDC has increased its military presence in the area in an attempt to increase its control in the hills to the east, and these troops are placing ever-increasing demands for extortion money, crop quotas and forced labour on the civilians. The SPDC in Rangoon is no longer sending them full rations and has ordered them to grow their own food or take it from the villagers; as a result, not only are they taking food from the villagers, but they are also taking their land and forcing them to work to grow food for the Army. At the same time, crop quotas which all farmers must hand over to the SPDC have increased and the corruption of the civilian authorities who collect the crop quotas has grown worse. The farmers might be able to survive this in good years, but most of them have suffered partial or complete crop failures for the past two years running due to droughts when they need rain, followed by floods once the crop is planted. The combination of the crop failures and the increased demands has made it impossible to survive. As though this were not enough, many have found they have to flee a new SPDC force which has been introduced in the area: the Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation death squads.

The Sa Sa Sa, or Sa Thon Lon, is the Bureau of Special Investigations of the SPDC’s Directorate of Defence Services Intelligence (DDSI), and its Guerrilla Retaliation squads have been handpicked from Battalions based in the region, reportedly under the direct orders of DDSI chief Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt. They began operations in the region in or around September 1998, and currently operate in the plains area east of the Sittaung River, covering Shwegyin, Kyauk Kyi and Mone townships. The Guerrilla Retaliation squads operate secretively in small groups, but with a clearly stated purpose: to execute without question everyone suspected of any present or past connection with the KNU or KNLA, regardless of how long ago or how slight that connection may have been. Their obvious purpose is to deliver a message to villagers that any contact whatsoever with resistance forces will be punishable by death, if not now then 10 or 20 years from now. They have already executed dozens of villagers both in the plains and the hills, both Karens and Burmans, guilty and innocent, and the terror they create is now driving many to flee their villages even if they have had no contact with the opposition. Recently they have expanded their operations northward into Tantabin township of southern Toungoo District, and they have also begun searching for people on the western side of the Sittaung River. This combined with all the other forms of oppression the villagers are suffering has driven them beyond their endurance, and villages in the plains as well as the hills are now breaking up.

Armies in the Region

In addition to the Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation units (which are described in greater detail below), SPDC Battalions operating in the plains and hills of the region include Infantry Battalions #26, 30, 35, 39, 48, 53, 57, 59, 60, and 73, Light Infantry Battalions #264, 349, 350, 351, 361, 362, 364, 365, 368, 369, 439, and 440. Some of these Battalions are operating as part of Light Infantry Division #77, and some are operating under Strategic Commands #1, 2, and 3; these Strategic Commands have been set up in the area with 2 to 3 Battalions each. All of the regular SPDC troops in the area are under orders of the Southern Regional Command (Ta Pa Ka in Burmese), which is based in Pegu and commanded by Brigadier General Tin Aye. Each SPDC Battalion has approximate fighting strength of 500 troops, though some Battalions operate in several areas so not all of these are employed within the district. Some of their camps and outposts throughout the district are at Mone, Ma La Daw, Gawlawah Lu (Kyet Taung Mway), Aung Laung Say, Thaung Bo, Saw Mi Lu, Mu Theh, Kyauk Kyi, Yan Myo Aung, K’Baw Tu, Kaw Tha Say, Baw Ka Hta, Ko Sghaw, and Shwegyin. Troops from various Battalions are regularly rotated in and out of these camps, and mobile columns also head up from the plains into the hills, using existing camps in the hills as temporary bases or setting up their own temporary bases in and around villages.

The Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) is not a significant force in the region, but it has two camps at Payah Gyi in Kyauk Kyi township and Maw Lay (Plaw Haw) in Mone township. In total there are reportedly just under 100 DKBA soldiers in the district under the command of Battalion Commander Po Maung from DKBA Brigade 777. About 50 of these troops are at Payah Gyi, where Po Maung is based, and the remainder at Maw Lay are under the command of Bo Law Plah. The DKBA troops are mainly involved in reconstructing the old Klaw Maw pagoda near Payah Gyi, as well as pagodas at Maw Lay and Kyun Gyi. They also sometimes work together with the SPDC troops on operations. More details on their activities are included below under ‘KNLA and DKBA Activities’.

Nyaunglebin District is often referred to as KNLA 3^rd Brigade area, and the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) is very active here. The 3^rd Brigade consists of Battalions #7, 8, and 9; numbers are difficult to confirm, but there appear to be several hundred KNLA troops. These troops no longer firmly control territory in the district, but they hold de facto control over some parts of the hills and engage in extensive harrassment and guerrilla operations. SPDC troops usually do not dare penetrate too far into the hills except in large columns, and when this happens the KNLA and the villagers in hiding clear out of their way until they are gone, then reemerge. In the past the KNLA operated extensively in the plains to the west as well, but while they still make regular forays around the villages on the edge of the plains, they cannot operate as freely as before.

The Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation Units

"They move during the night and they wear short pants most of the time. They go to houses and ask the names of the people, and if the person is on the list they kill them. They were given special authority and a license to kill. They can kill anyone who has helped the KNU. With the authority that they have, people have said that even Operations Commanders can’t comment on their work. The Operations Commander is under them because they are directly controlled by Khin Nyunt." - "Saw January" (M), KHRG human rights monitor (Interview #1, 1/99)

Villagers in the plains east of the Sittaung River and in the western reaches of the hills say that at present there is one thing which they fear more than all the other SPDC abuses in their area, and that this is the SPDC’s new Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation force. No information is readily available on when this special force was first recruited, but it began appearing in the villages of western Nyaunglebin District in September 1998. The force only consists of an estimated 200 troops but they have been handpicked and specially trained. Operating in small sections of 5 to 10 soldiers, they are very secretive, moving by night from village to village. Their self-stated purpose is to summarily execute every villager who has ever had any kind of contact with resistance forces, whether at present or long in the past. They have been carrying out this function brutally, shooting, stabbing, and often beheading their victims and dumping their bodies in the rivers. Operating in Mone, Kyauk Kyi and Shwegyin townships, estimates on the number of people they have executed thus far range between 50 and over 100, though it is difficult to establish any definite numbers. Recent testimonies from villagers fleeing Tantabin township in southern Toungoo District indicate that they have now expanded their operations northward into this area, and they are also going west of the Sittaung River to look for people to target. This expansion of their operational area is cause for grave concern.

Structure and Purpose

This force goes by a variety of names, including Sa Sa Sa [‘SSS’], Sa Thon Lon [‘Three S’], Sa Thon Lon Dam Byan Byaut Kya [‘Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation’], A’Htoo Ah Na Ya A’Pweh [‘Special Authority Group’], Baw Bi Doh [‘Short Pants’, a name invented by the villagers because of the civilian clothing the soldiers often wear], Myanma Ta Oo [‘Burmese Eldest’, i.e. most senior, troops], and Shwit A’Pweh [‘Shwit group’, ‘Shwit’ being the sound of a knife cutting someone’s throat]. All of these names have been used by the troops themselves in front of villagers. Judging by the testimonies of many villagers who have had contact with them and KNLA sources, it appears that their official name is the Sa Thon Lon (or Sa Sa Sa) Dam Byan Byaut Kya, which is translated in this report as Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation.

"[P]eople call them Baw Bi Doh [‘short pants’], but they don’t like that so they ordered people to call them Thad Shin A’Pweh [‘killing and clearing group’]. Later, they didn’t like that either and forced people to call them Shwit A’Pweh [‘shwit’ group]. They say that the sound of cutting someone’s throat with a knife is ‘shwit’." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

"I don’t dare even go near the [Sa Thon Lon] guerrilla troops. If I looked at their faces I’m afraid they’d kill me. In Meik Tha Lin the village headman is friendly with him [Shan Bpu] so he asked him, ‘Teacher! What is your group called?’ Then he [Shan Bpu] took out his knife, put it to the headman’s throat and said, ‘Shwit’. The village headman told him, ‘You can tell me the word ‘shwit’ without having to pull out your knife’. Then he didn’t dare ask more." - "Saw Ghaw" (M, xx), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #29, 1/99)

‘Sa Sa Sa’ is a Burmese abbreviation equivalent to SSS in English; ‘Sa Thon Lon’ simply means ‘Three S’s’. This is an abbreviation for A’Htoo Son Zan Seh Seh Yay Oo Zi Ka Na, which translates as Bureau of Special Investigations (BSI). According to independent Karen sources, this department was first formed by General Ne Win’s BSPP regime in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s with the function of cracking down on the country’s black market and investigating some other crimes. Sometime in the mid-1980’s it was shifted and placed under the control of the Directorate of Defence Services Intelligence (DDSI). DDSI currently has several branches, including Military Intelligence, Special Branch (the police), and the Bureau of Special Investigations (Sa Thon Lon). The Sa Thon Lon still has the function of cracking down on the black market, but the new Guerrilla Retaliation force has also been placed in this department. The reason may be to keep the force under the direct personal control of Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt, Secretary-1 of the SPDC and head of the DDSI. According to villagers and KNLA sources, the Guerrilla Retaliation force was created by his direct order and remains under his control. This is the origin of the name A’Htoo Ah Na Ya A’Pweh [‘Special Authority Group’]. SPDC Battalion Commanders and Strategic Commanders in the area have said directly to villagers that they have no control over the Guerrilla Retaliation troops, and there are reports that regular SPDC troops in the region have shown some enmity and fear toward them. Villagers in the area consistently state that the regular SPDC troops never come near their village when a Sa Thon Lon group is around and vice versa. According to a KNLA source, the Guerrilla Retaliation force reports to Military Intelligence Unit #3 based in Toungoo, though they also appear to have some contact with the regular Army’s Southern Regional Command headquarters in Pegu (commanded by Brig. Gen. Tin Aye). This contact with the Regional Command may only result from the fact that most of the Guerrilla Retaliation troops were selected from regular SPDC units already operating in Nyaunglebin District.

"They told the villagers, ‘If you want to report about our guerrilla group, don’t bother reporting us to the Operations Commander or the Regional Commander. You should go to the centre, to Saw Maung [former chairman of SLORC] and Khin Nyunt to report about us. If you go there to report about us we’ll give you trip expenses.’ After they said that, village heads and elders didn’t dare do anything." – "Saw Tha Pwih" (M, 38), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #50, 5/99)

"The villagers went to complain to the Strategic Command Intelligence but they said they couldn’t do anything. They said, ‘In the past if you came and gave us money we could help you. However, they [the Sa Thon Lon troops] are controlled directly by the regional command so even if you give us money we can’t help you.’" - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #30, 12/98)

"In the past we could run to the Operations Commander or the Battalion Commander for help if someone was arrested and they could help us to buy the lives of those arrested. But now the Operations Commander says he can’t do anything about this group [the Sa Thon Lon] because they have been given complete authority." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"When the Army troops come the guerrilla group [Sa Thon Lon] goes to another village, then when the Army troops leave they come back again." – "Saw Lay Muh" (M, 42), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #53, 5/99)

"Now IB 39 and the Guerrillas [Sa Thon Lon] don’t like each other, even though they are both Burmese. They’ve said that a battle could occur between them." – "Pu Than Nyunt" (M, 60), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #52, 5/99)

The Guerrilla Retaliation troops were specially selected from among the Non-Commissioned Officers (Corporals and Sergeants) of the regular SPDC Battalions already operating in Nyaunglebin District. Based on their subsequent behaviour, it appears that they were selected based on their capacity for brutality. According to some KNLA sources, some of the troops were also recruited from among former KNLA soldiers who had surrendered to the SPDC. None of the villagers interviewed by KHRG have confirmed this, but it would make sense given the purpose of the force; former KNLA soldiers would be able to point out many people who had helped the KNLA in the past. In addition, one woman from Kyauk Kyi township told KHRG that a group of Guerrilla Retaliation soldiers accidentally left a leaflet in her house titled ‘Training Course of Pado Aung San’, which they later came back for. Pado Aung San was the notoriously corrupt forestry minister of the KNU who defected to the SPDC in early 1998; since then, he has denounced the KNU in several statements and appeared to be trying to find a role with the SPDC. It is possible that he gave some portion of the training for the Guerrilla Retaliation troops, possibly in KNU/KNLA strategy or politics.

"They have created the Dam Byan Byaut Kya because they hope people won’t dare be involved with the KNU even a little bit. … They chose 12 people from each Battalion. They only chose Sergeants and Corporals, and they were given training … Wherever they move there are no other SPDC troops moving. They stay in many different villages in groups of 4 or 5, and they walk during the night. The people that they have to kill, they kill immediately." - "Saw January" (M), KHRG human rights monitor (Interview #1, 1/99)

"The Sa Sa Sa in Kler Lweh Htoo district are special troops. We’ve received information that the enemy has collected soldiers who have surrendered from the KNLA, as well as P’Doh Aung San’s [soldiers], Thu Mu Heh’s [soldiers] and the DKBA. These soldiers, along with SPDC soldiers, have received special training and are being sent into each area. They are calling those troops the Sa Sa Sa, but they are also called the A’Htoo Ah Nah Ya A’Pweh [‘Special Authority Group’]." - "Saw Kaw Doh Muh" (M), who is with the KNLA in Nyaunglebin District (Interview #36, 2/99)

"One day they came to my house and took a rest, and when they left I saw a paper that the government had given them. I opened it and saw the title, "Training Course of Pado Aung San", and there were some things there written by Pado Aung San. They forgot it there in my house and came back to take it later. I read it quickly and secretly before they came back for it." - "Naw Thu" (F, 26), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #29, 1/99)

"Some of them are SPDC soldiers and some of them are part of the resistance that was living in the jungle but surrendered to the Burmese. They joined the guerrilla troops and guide them. I only know the name of one of the group commanders, his name is Bo Nagah." - "Saw Ta Roh" (M, 37), xxxx village, Shwegyin township (Interview #32, 12/98)

Most available estimates place the total size of the Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation force at about 200 soldiers. It is organised along the lines of a regular Army Battalion though using smaller numbers, and is apparently divided into four or five main Companies: ‘Mone Thon’ (‘Monsoon’), ‘Mone Daing’ (‘Storm’), ‘Galone’ (‘Garuda’), and ‘D’Pyet Hleh’ (‘Sweeper’); the fifth is ‘Moe Kyo’ (‘Lightning’), though as yet KHRG has not been able to confirm whether this is a Company or just a Section. The main operational unit of this force is the section, consisting of 5 to 10 men. According to the limited information available, it appears that there are five sections in each company (making it different from a regular Army Battalion, which at full strength has five companies, each consisting of three platoons of three sections each). Several of these sections have taken on their own names, such as ‘Nagah’ (‘dragon’), ‘Moe Kyo’ (‘lightning’) and ‘Seik Padee’ (Buddhist prayer beads). A KNLA source provided the following partial list of Sections and Section Commanders which comes from KNLA Intelligence:

According to the same source, Sections 1 through 5 above are part of the ‘Monsoon’ Company, which is commanded by Captain Maung Maung (commonly referred to as Bo Maung Maung) and operates in Mone township and the area between Kyauk Kyi and Na Than Gwin. Sections 6 through 10 are part of the ‘Storm’ Company, commanded by Major Zaw Naing Htun and operating south of the Kyauk Kyi / Na Than Gwin area. The above list is not complete, because according to information available thus far it appears that the force has 4 or 5 companies. Villagers in Shwegyin, southern Kyauk Kyi and Tantabin townships refer to a commander there named Moe Kyo. In Mone and Kyauk Kyi townships, several names recur in the villagers’ testimonies as being particularly brutal: Bo Maung Maung himself (commander of ‘Monsoon’ company), a section commander under him named Sergeant Bo Shan Bpu (also known as ‘Bo Shwit’), another Sergeant named Tint Lwin who is subordinate to Bo Shan Bpu, and a section commander named Bo Nagah (note: ‘Bo’ is simply a prefix attached to the name of a commander). Bo Maung Maung was previously with LIB #351, and Bo Shan Bpu was reportedly with IB #59. According to several accounts, Bo Shan Bpu is ethnically Shan, or at least can speak Shan. Villagers say that several of the Sa Thon Lon troops can speak various languages such as Pa’O, Shan and Karen. Bo Shan Bpu is a pseudonym, as is Bo Nagah (‘Nagah’ means ‘dragon’); Maung Maung may also be a pseudonym. Some of the section commanders use the same names as their sections; for example, Bo Nagah commands the Nagah (‘Dragon’) group, and Moe Kyo commands the Moe Kyo (‘Lightning’) group. Many of these soldiers may be using pseudonyms, because the Guerrilla Retaliation troops are very secretive, and they give very little information to the villagers other than telling them that they will kill everyone who has contact with the resistance.

"The bad person who goes and kills people is Shan Bpu, but he calls himself Bo Shwit. He is the worst, and he is a Shan. I asked him, ‘Commander, what is your nationality?’ and he answered that he is a Shan national, and his wife is Karen. He is about 28 years old and his hair is long, down to here." – "Pu Than Nyunt" (M, 60), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #52, 5/99)

These units operate as death squads, executing anyone even remotely suspected of having had any contact with the KNU/KNLA, even if that contact ended 10 or more years ago. Their secretiveness, their brutal methods of killing and beheading their victims, in short everything about the way they operate, is intended to terrify the villagers. The overall purpose of this is very clearly to deliver a message to the villagers that even the slightest contact with the KNLA, even involuntary contact such as when KNLA units demand food from village elders, will be punished with a brutal death, if not immediately then whenever this contact is discovered, even 5, 10, or 20 years in the future.

"They are a mobile unit that is trying to cut the connection between the KNLA and the people. They are primarily active during the night, but also during the day. This force is controlled directly by the regional command. The local troops in the area where they are active can’t make decisions for them or reprimand them. The regional commander held a meeting and told them they had to kill 30 people each month in each township. They are to kill 20 villagers who support the KNLA and democracy groups, and the other 10 people are to be anyone they find who has weapons. The names of people who support the resistance groups and democracy groups are written in their books. This group has already killed 2 villagers in each village of Ler Doh township. They’ve also killed villagers in Mone township and Hsaw Tee township. … Among the people they have killed, only a few of them have actually been in contact with us. Most people they have killed are innocent villagers. The names they have in their books are names of people who helped us a very long time ago and haven’t been in contact with us since then, but they look for the people who are listed in their books and they kill them." - "Saw Kaw Doh Muh" (M), who is with the KNLA in Nyaunglebin District (Interview #36, 2/99)

"They came on the first of September [1998]. They said they would patrol for 6 months and make the area A’Pyu Yaung Neh Myay [a ‘white’ area, SPDC terminology for areas which are completely subjugated]. … They are abusing the villagers from all areas. They can’t fight their enemy [the KNLA], so they say the villagers are their enemy for feeding the KNLA; that if the villagers didn’t feed the KNLA then the KNLA couldn’t fight them, so they are finding and killing the villagers." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #30, 12/98)

Initially these units only appeared in the plains east of the Sittaung River of Nyaunglebin District, but testimony from villagers who fled Tantabin township of southern Toungoo District in April 1999 indicates that Sa Thon Lon units are now operating there as well (excerpts from some of these testimonies are included in this report). They also now search for targets in villages on the west side of the Sittaung River. This expansion of their operational area is cause for extreme concern, as it may indicate that Nyaunglebin District has been used as an experimental ground for this type of operation, which if successful will be introduced in other regions as well. The SPDC’s major military offensives and mass relocation campaigns have weakened the resistance forces but have not even come close to wiping them out, and the death squad tactic may be an attempt at a new approach. There may also be elements of internal SPDC politics at play. The tension between the DDSI’s Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt and regular Army leaders such as Gen. Maung Aye is well known, and Khin Nyunt’s initiative in this case may be intended to prove that his tactics are more effective than those of the other Generals. In addition, the creation of the Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation force gives the DDSI an armed wing, which in effect gives Khin Nyunt his own private army. If the force is expanded in numbers and/or in the size of the territory where it operates, it will be important to watch its interaction with the regular Army as well as the dynamics which develop between the Generals in Rangoon.

"You can’t expect us to know their names. They never even allow us to look at their faces - when we see them we have to look down, away from their faces. … They said that the soldiers who came before were supposed to kill the people but they didn’t, so they are now showing the people that they can kill. That’s why we are always afraid." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #30, 12/98)

Methods

"They find people who had contact with the KNU in ‘95 and those who have contact now. If they can find people who have had contact with the KNU at any time in their past, they kill them. Shan Bpu has killed people in Lu Ah, Haw Ko Ghaw, Twa Ni Gone, Myeh Yeh, and Yan Myo Aung too. When we found out that they are going to kill all the villagers who have ever helped the KNU, we knew they would kill us too. Our names are in their books. … They are the Sa Thon Lon. People said that they don’t ask any questions [they kill without interrogation] and they are going to "cut off the tops of all the plants". The second group, Sweeper, will come to sweep up the people and then the third group will come to scorch the earth and "dig out the roots". They will kill all the relatives of the forest people [the KNLA]. The Sa Thon Lon don’t look like they will go and fight [go into battle], they are just going around killing members of the general public. They said that they are going to clear the people out of the countryside, that they have to kill all people who support the forest people and people who give taxes to the forest people. They also said that if the KNLA shoots and kills one of them, they will burn down the village closest to where it happened and kill everyone in the village." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

The operational unit of the Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation force is the section. Each section has 5 to 10 soldiers and moves independently from village to village. Between them they cover the villages of the plains east of the Sittaung River as well as the westernmost reaches of the hills. They do not establish their own camps, but stay in the houses of villagers along their way. Usually they stay in a village through the day, then move to other villages by night. They seldom spend two consecutive nights in the same village. They demand their food and money from the villagers, but when in the villages they order the villagers to look at the ground and not to look in their faces. They do not wear standard issue SPDC Army fatigues. Instead, many villagers say that they often wear civilian clothing, such as T-shirts and sarongs, around the villages, and guerrilla camouflage uniforms by night, or various combinations of civilian clothing and guerrilla camouflage. They very frequently wear camouflage short pants, and this brought about the Karen name Baw Bi Doh (‘Short Pants’) which many villagers call them. Villagers also say that their weapons are not the standard Army-issue G3 and G4 assault rifle but the AK47 and AR assault rifles, which are far better in the jungle. They have also on occasion used M79 grenade launchers, and they do much of their killing with knives.

"They only walk during the night and sleep during the day. … During the day they sleep in people’s houses but they never introduce themselves to the owners of the house, they never make friends with them. They live there with faces of stone and eat whatever they want to. They never look at the faces of the people they are staying with because they are afraid the villagers may be able to recognise them. … They don’t have people staying in every village at the same time, but they move around and sometimes stay in Haw Ko Ghaw, or Thit Cha Seik, or Yay Leh, or Nga Nwah Seit, or Weh Tu, or sometimes in Yan Myo Aung. They move around like that and don’t really have a home base. … They kill people wherever they go." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township, describing the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #19, 2/99)

"People are afraid of them because if you’re walking on the path and you suddenly see them you’re supposed to sit down and you must not look at their faces. If you look at their faces they kick you at once and say, ‘Why are you looking at my face? Am I handsome or something?’" – "Pu Nya Thu" (M, 70), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #4, 5/99)

"As for the short-pants group, the area leader has to collect money for them once a week. Each family has to give 200 to 300 Kyat each week. This money isn’t toward any fees, just for the short-pants group’s food. Every village in Kyauk Kyi township has to pay that." - "Naw Say Paw" (F, 26), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #29, 1/99)

According to the villagers, the sections have lists of people to be killed in each village, and some even claim that they are assigned a quota of people to kill in each township. A consensus on this number appears to be 30, though one villager interviewed claimed that Bo Nagah had said that they are to kill 70 people in each township; if this is so, the number 30 or 70 may have been decreed based on superstitious numerology, which is taken very seriously by Khin Nyunt and other SPDC leaders. In addition, a villager from southern Toungoo District who fled in April 1999 said that the Sa Thon Lon have now ordered villagers in his area to have family photos taken and submit one to the Sa Thon Lon and one to the Army Division. The Sa Thon Lon officer told the villagers that the Sa Thon Lon sections will check the faces of people they meet against their set of photos, and if your photo is not in the set for your village you will be killed.

"Now they’ve said that they plan to kill 30 people per month between Shwegyin and Mone, and 30 more between Mone and Tantabin. Among the 30 that they kill, one will be a bad person and the other 29 will be good [innocent] people." – "Saw Lah Thaw" (M), xxxx relocation site, Mone township (Interview #2, 5/99)

"They forced people to take family photos. We had to take three pictures: one to give them [Sa Thon Lon], another to keep in our house and another to give to the Division. They said that if they see people going anywhere they will ask their village name, look at the pictures from that village and if that person isn’t in the pictures they’ll kill him. Therefore people were afraid and had the pictures taken. Even if they didn’t have the money, they borrowed it from others and had the pictures taken." – "Pu Than Nyunt" (M, 60), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #52, 5/99)

In some cases they enter villages and surround the houses of people they plan to kill and try to catch them that way. Other tactics they use are to pretend to stop for a rest in a villager’s house and then kill him, or to conscript a villager as a guide and then kill him once they are out of the village. Many villagers have fallen unsuspecting into these traps, simply because they have had no contact with the opposition for years and are completely unaware of any suspicion against them. However, people are now aware of the Sa Thon Lon’s tactics and some have fled the village rather than face them, even if they have never had contact with the opposition. In fact, many of the people already killed have been completely innocent but were killed based simply on a remote suspicion or unfounded accusation. The Sa Thon Lon units have not only killed those on their lists, but also people who they encounter outside the villages at night, who are automatically suspected of working with resistance forces. At a meeting called by the Sa Thon Lon in Kyauk Kyi township in December 1998, they told villagers that they are no longer allowed to leave their villages between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. Even during the day, if they encounter people outside of villages they often stop them and beat them for no apparent reason other than to drive fear into them.

"They told us not to enter or leave any villages between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. or they would kill us. They said for our villagers to call their children who are in the KNLA to come back and live in the village, or they will kill the parents. They know, they said the names of all the KNLA are in their file, and they said they will kill anyone who has contact with the KNLA." - "Naw Say Paw" (F, 26), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, describing what the Sa Thon Lon said at a meeting in her village (Interview #29, 1/99)

"They are really doing what they’ve planned to do, they are going to kill every relative of the KNLA in our area. They said that there’s only one way for them to win against the Karen and that is to kill all the relatives of the KNU. The Burmese soldiers who are friendly with us and go to the frontline told us that our names are in their book of those to be killed. We don’t dare live there anymore." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"They held a meeting in our village one time, the same morning that they captured my husband. He [Shan Bpu] said that we mustn’t contact people on this side [KNLA]. He said, ‘If you want to contact them, leave with your whole family. If you don’t go, the day that you contact them will be the day you die.’" - "Naw Paw Paw Htoo" (F, 31), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #12, 3/99)

"I fled because they are killing anyone who has ever had any contact with the KNU. There have been times when we’ve met them [KNLA soldiers] along our way and spoken to them, because they’re all people that we know. They kill people for that. … During January of this year [1999] they killed one village headman, Mya Htun, from Meik Tha Lin, and dumped him in the Sittaung river. He was 48 years old and has 5 children. He was unable to avoid being friends with the KNLA [the KNLA approaches the village headmen for food and money]. In their book there are names of anyone who has ever been friends with the KNLA, and I’ve heard that they kill the people whose names are in the book. … To cut all connections [with the KNU/KNLA]. To threaten the public so they won’t dare contact them in the future and won’t dare to give them rations. This is the main objective of their killing." - "Maung Soe" (M, 40), Kyauk Kyi town (Interview #21, 1/99)

"They call themselves ‘Bo Shwit’, because ‘shwit’ is the sound of thrusting a knife into someone to kill him. They are murderers. … Huay!! I can’t say how many tens of people they’ve killed. Any place you go you’ll hear about the people they’ve killed, they’ve killed people in almost every village. They haven’t killed anyone in xxxx yet, but they’ve killed people in Myeh Yeh, Hsi Mu Plaw, Si Pa Leh, and Meik Tha Lin, which is across the [Sittaung] river from our village. Their commander is Bo Maung Maung. I don’t know their base, they just travel from village to village. They don’t make camps, they just stay in people’s houses. They walk the whole night without sleeping." - "Naw Lah Paw" (F, 21), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #28, 1/99)

The Sa Thon Lon troops sometimes shoot their victims, but more often kill them with knives by cutting their throats or stabbing them in the chest. In most cases it appears that they do not interrogate or torture their victims beforehand, they simply kill them. Some Sa Thon Lon soldiers have even told villagers that Sa Thon Lon stands for ‘No Interrogation’. However, after killing them they often mutilate the bodies, presumably to deliver a stronger message to the other villagers. Villagers interviewed for this report described many instances of beheadings, and in some cases the heads were then displayed as a warning to all villagers. In November 1998 they shot dead villagers Saw Aye from Myeh Yeh village and Po Theh Pyay from Ter Bpaw. They then ordered local villagers to build stands of bamboo, one along the path to Kyauk Kyi and the other on the path to Mone, and displayed the heads on these stands; the villagers were forced to guard the heads for a month, under threat that if the heads disappeared they would be replaced with their own. In another incident, after shooting dead Saw San Myint in Baw Bpee Der village on December 27^th 1998, they beheaded him, hung his head over the path to Mone town, and stuck a cheroot in his mouth. The Sa Thon Lon troops often dump the bodies of their victims in the rivers, though sometimes they leave them where they lie and forbid the villagers to move or bury them. For many villagers, the mutilation of their relatives’ bodies and the inability to give them a proper burial or cremation is almost as much a crime as the killing itself.

"Before they kill people they tie their hands behind their backs. Most of the people are not shot, instead their heads are cut off with a knife and their bodies are thrown in the river. They normally call people on sentry duty from the village to bury the bodies after they kill them." - "Maung Soe" (M, 40), Kyauk Kyi town (Interview #21, 1/99)

"They cut out people’s tongues, cut their ears off and cover their faces with their own intestines. They do that so the villagers will be afraid. Now if we hear their voices, our hands and knees tremble and we can’t do anything. The women are very afraid of them… all the villagers are afraid of them." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #30, 12/98)

"The group that kills people now is the short-pants group [Sa Thon Lon]. They have been there since about two months ago. If they think you’ve done anything wrong they never ask any questions, they just summon you and kill you at once. They said that if they kill anyone the villagers have no right to say anything, to report it or to hold a ceremony for the dead people." - "Naw Say Paw" (F, 26), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #29, 1/99)

Many villagers have managed to escape execution by fleeing the village before the Sa Thon Lon comes for them. In these cases the Sa Thon Lon troops come to the village and confiscate or destroy all of the villagers belongings, as well as their house, land, and livestock. If there is a crop in the field they have on occasion ordered the other villagers to harvest it and hand it over. The Sa Thon Lon troops know that many of these people have fled to villages on the west side of the Sittaung River because it is outside their usual area of operations, so they now occasionally go to villages west of the river and check family registrations from house to house, searching for the people they want. As a result, many people living west of the river are afraid to accept relatives or guests from the east any longer.

"Some of the people they tried to arrest fled and escaped. When they can’t catch people they commandeer their belongings in the village, such as their land, farmfields, fishponds, cattle and buffaloes. They take everything they see in the person’s house and sell it." - "Saw Ta Roh" (M, 37), xxxx village, Shwegyin township (Interview #32, 12/98)

"In Leh Gkaw Wah village of Kyauk Kyi township, they accused Ko Maung Aye and Bee Win of helping the KNU and were going to arrest them. They fled and escaped so they confiscated their cattle, chickens and buffaloes and took all their belongings from their houses. They took those things to Baw Ka Hta camp." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #30, 12/98)

"Lately, people who don’t dare stay in their villages have been going to other places that are safer such as to town or to the other side of the river [to the west of the Sittaung River]. So the Sa Thon Lon have gone to towns and villages on the other side of the river looking for people they want. They are checking family registration lists at each house. When they find people they want, they kill them and make problems for the families that took them in. Because of this, people in towns and villages on the other side of the river don’t like to take in villagers from eastern villages when we run to them anymore. They don’t even like us to go and visit them." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

The KNLA has tried to attack the Sa Thon Lon force on several occasions but with very little success, and they have tried to target Bo Shan Bpu himself at least once. In late February or early March 1999 the KNLA ambushed a passenger vehicle on the road near Kyun Bin Seik in Mone township, thinking that Bo Shan Bpu was inside because he always forces the drivers of passenger vehicles and motorcycles to transport him around rather than using Army vehicles. The driver and a passenger were killed, but Bo Shan Bpu had already got off the car some time before. The KNLA soldiers ordered everyone out of the car and burned it. Afterwards, the Sa Thon Lon punished the villagers by forcing every family in the villages from Weh Gyi to Kyun Bin Seik to pay 3,500 Kyat, allegedly to pay for the cost of the car. In addition, Sa Thon Lon commanders Bo Maung Maung and Bo Shan Bpu have both told villagers in southern Mone township that for every Sa Thon Lon soldier killed by the KNLA, they will execute 10 villagers.

"When the Sa Thon Lon are in our area they use the villagers as their cover. They said there must be no sounds from weapons. If there is the sound of a weapon that causes one of them to die, they will kill 10 of our villagers. Shan Bpu and Bo Maung Maung both said that." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #8, 4/99)

"I’ve heard that they have already killed 30 people between Shwegyin and Kyauk Kyi. When the group commanded by Bo Nagah came, they said they are supposed to kill 70 villagers in the area between Shwegyin and Kyauk Kyi. They must kill exactly 70 people, then the group that comes when they rotate their troops will also kill 70 people. Each of their groups must kill 70 people. … They are killing a lot of people in Shwegyin and Kyauk Kyi areas. I’ve heard that they have also killed 30 to 40 people up in Mone township. They are killing there as they are here. The [SPDC] guerrilla troops are moving everywhere east of the Sittaung river. Usually they kill one person at a time, but they have killed 2 people at a time and also 8 people at a time. I’ve also heard and seen that they have gone to Nyaunglebin township and Kyauk T’Ga township [west of the Sittaung River] and are killing people there. They are doing in the towns the same as they are doing here [in the villages]." - "Saw Ta Roh" (M, 37), xxxx village, Shwegyin township (Interview #32, 12/98)

Killings of Villagers

"When they came and captured my husband, we were all in the house: my mother, my children and me. When they called him to go with them, I told my husband, ‘Don’t be afraid, pray to God.’ Then Shan Bpu took his knife and held it to my throat telling me not to speak. He said, ‘Don’t say anything! Don’t open your mouth! Or you will die!’ I was afraid and couldn’t speak. At first only two Burmese came for my husband, but later Bo Maung Maung arrived and tied my husband’s hands behind his back and covered his face with one of his old sarongs. They took a guitar string and tied it around his neck. … They didn’t say anything after that and they killed him that evening. They pulled him from place to place and then killed him at Teh Su while we were still in Yan Myo Aung. … The sadness I suffer from is so deep I can’t describe it. It’s like I’m in the dark. When they first captured my husband I couldn’t eat for 2 days but still my stomach felt full. I prayed all day and night. We also had the problem of not having any rice at that time so I had to find rice. I have many children and had to find food for them before every meal. My children didn’t know what was happening, they were playing and laughing innocently. … We didn’t have contact with the KNLA and we don’t have a well known name, the Burmese soldiers had never asked about us before, so how could we have known that they were going to come and kill us?" - "Naw Paw Paw Htoo" (F, 31), xxxx village, Mone township, describing the killing of her husband Saw Mah Htoo (a.k.a. Gah Gyi, age 37) in November 1998 (Interview #12, 3/99)

It is difficult to establish the exact number of villagers already executed by Sa Thon Lon units in Nyaunglebin District, but villagers and KNLA sources estimate somewhere between 50 and over 100. Most victims have been Karen, but there have also been many Burmans killed because there are many Burmans in the Sittaung River plains who sympathise with the Karen resistance. Many of the killings go completely unreported and in some cases people simply disappear so even the local villagers cannot be sure. KHRG has collected information on a number of killings which have been witnessed or are known to have happened, most of which have been corroborated by the testimony of several villagers. A list of 151 of these killings by the Sa Thon Lon and other SPDC units since 1997 is included on page 81 of this report. One factor which is very consistent in the villagers’ testimonies and other information is that many of those systematically executed by the Sa Thon Lon have either been completely innocent or have only had some rudimentary contact with the KNU or KNLA which occurred years ago. Many never did more than act as a guide a few times for a KNLA column or give them some rice. Some of those killed have been village elders who had no choice but to have contact with the KNLA, because the KNLA approached them to demand food and taxes from their village.

"Since 1998 the SPDC has been commanding guerrilla troops [Guerrilla Retaliation units]. … One night at 9 o’clock they entered Shan Su village and arrested Ko Kyi Hmwe, the 43 year old son of U Poh Bin. I saw them kill him outside of the village. They did that sort of thing in other villages also. They stabbed U Than Myint from Ma Oo Bin village [also in Shwegyin township] with a knife, they did it in the middle of the village. While he was working on his pond, they went and called him and then killed him without asking any questions. In Leh Gkaw Wah village [southern Kyauk Kyi township], which is near Ma Oo Bin, they called Maung Ba Aye down from his house and killed him without asking anything." - "Saw Ta Roh" (M, 37), xxxx village, Shwegyin township (Interview #32, 12/98)

"On 22/11/98 they killed a villager from Kya Plaw village who was over 40 years old. They accused him of helping the KNU in the past and killed him between Kya Plaw village and the old village of Ler Wah. They cut out his tongue and cut off his ears. On 27/10/98, they accused another man of being part of the backbone of the KNU. They took him to the top of Po Noh Po village and killed him. They didn’t allow people to go and bury that man. … They also killed two other Burman villagers, U Aung Baw and Khin Win, from A’Tet [Upper] Twin Gyi village in Shwegyin township. They killed them at the same time. U Aung Baw was 52 years old and Khin Win was 32 years old. They slit their throats near the Sittaung river and kicked their bodies into the river. People didn’t see the corpses." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about Sa Thon Lon killings (Interview #30, 12/98)

"In our village they have killed 2 people, a wife and her husband. In Weh Gyi they also killed 2 people at night after the movie had finished showing. They captured them that night and killed them at once. In the morning the village head went to them and asked about the two villagers they had captured, but they told the village head they had not captured them." - "Maung Sein" (M, xx), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about Sa Thon Lon killings in November 1998 (Interview #33, 12/98)

The killings carried out by the Sa Thon Lon units to date can be divided into two main categories: systematic executions of people they have targetted, and ad hoc killings of people they find in farmfield huts or meet along the pathways. When they target a specific person for execution, a Sa Thon Lon section usually enters the village sometime in the night, surrounds the person’s house and orders them to come out, then takes the person away and executes them outside the village. On occasion they will have another villager go to fetch the suspect, or will call the suspect to go with them as a guide and then execute him/her once they are outside the village. One typical example occurred in Yan Myo Aung relocation site in November 1998. A Sa Thon Lon section led by Bo Shan Bpu and Bo Maung Maung asked various village headmen at the site for the whereabouts of Saw Mah Htoo (a.k.a. Gah Gyi). One of the Burman headmen said that he knew of him. That night the Sa Thon Lon group surrounded Saw Mah Htoo’s house, tied him up and marched him away. When his wife tried to protest, Bo Shan Bpu held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her. They marched Saw Mah Htoo to Yay Leh village, executed him and threw his body in the Sittaung River. Saw Mah Htoo and his wife never even knew they were under suspicion, because the only contact he had had with the KNLA occurred years ago when he would sometimes act as a guide for them. In a similar example which occurred on the evening of November 15^th 1998 in xxxx village on the west bank of the Sittaung River, Sa Thon Lon troops came to kill villager Maung A---, but caught his wife Ma S--- instead. Maung A--- ran to escape and they fired at him but missed. They began beating Ma S--- on the head intending to kill her, then cut off her ears to steal her earrings, slashed part of her mouth off and left her for dead. However, she lived and her brother secretly carried her to a hospital. When the Sa Thon Lon found out about it, one of them went to the hospital and threatened her, after which she had to leave the hospital and now lives in hiding, as do her husband and brother.

"They captured her, tied her up with rope and then beat her head until her head was broken. Her husband ran away, and they shot at him while he was running but he wasn’t hurt. Then they tried to finish killing her. They were beating her to death with a gun butt, but she wouldn’t die so they slashed her with a knife. They cut off her ears. There was a set of ornamental earrings worth over 10,000 Kyat in her ears. They slashed her chin and her face and left her to die, but still she didn’t die." - "Maung Sein" (M, xx), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, describing how the Sa Thon Lon tried to kill his sister in November 1998; they left her for dead but he carried her to hospital, and she survived (Interview #33, 12/98)

"I went to see her in xxxx hospital but I don’t recall her name. She is a smart woman and speaks bravely. She told us that the Sa Thon Lon soldiers were coming to kill her husband but when they came her husband ran away. She spoke bravely to the soldiers so they got angry at her and cut off her mouth. When the doctors asked her about her story, she answered truthfully and told them that the soldiers had said, ‘You’re a woman who can speak very well so I’ll cut off your mouth.’ The doctor sewed her mouth [back together]. They [the soldiers] thought that she was dead but she wasn’t. When she was in the hospital, they heard about it so they went to the hospital. They couldn’t kill her in the hospital because there were doctors, nurses and police around. He told her, ‘You are very lucky! I thought that you died but you are still alive, so if you have to leave the hospital you’d better go somewhere that I can’t find you or you’re dead.’ She is a strong woman, her mouth, ears and skin were cut off but she is still alive." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"On November 11^th 1998, Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation troops led by ‘Bo Nagah’ [a pseudonym] killed Saw Ba Aye and his wife Naw Dah at the same time without asking any questions. They said that this couple had supported the NLD since 1988 [note: the NLD did not even exist until 1989], and that this is why they had killed them. The couple were from Leh Gkaw Wah village in Kyauk Kyi township. When they were killed their son Maung Lay Lay was only 3 months old. Now his relatives have to take care of him and they are living in fear, spending only one day in each place. He is not getting enough milk and is very weak." - incident report from KHRG field reporter

"They killed two people in Byin Gah and they also killed people in Yay Sha and Taw Ma Aye. In Taw Ma Aye they killed Uncle Pa Thu Po Pah, he is over 50 years old. They called all the villagers of Taw Ma Aye to go and give ‘obligation’ paddy. When they went, they asked Uncle Pa Thu Po Pah, ‘What is your name?’ He said, ‘Bo Gkay’, and then they tied him up, pulled him to Lay Tee and killed him. This group, if they capture anyone there is no coming back." – "Saw Tha Pwih" (M, 38), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #50, 5/99)

Many of those beaten and killed are not specific targets, but simply villagers found outside their villages or relocation sites by the Sa Thon Lon troops. Sa Thon Lon units have issued orders that no villagers are to be outside their villages between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m., and that even when they are allowed outside they must have a pass and are not allowed to have any food. People caught outside their village at night or caught with food are generally executed, while those caught without a pass or with an expired pass during the daylight hours are severely beaten. One of the worst killings of this nature occurred in November 1998, when a group of four Twa Ni Gone villagers and two Myeh Yeh villagers had gone from Yan Myo Aung relocation site to fish at some ponds near their home village. They had a pass, but a Sa Thon Lon unit found them in a hut with some rice and accused them of feeding the resistance. The two Myeh Yeh villagers were released, but the four Twa Ni Gone villagers were taken into a patch of scrub and shot dead. The gun jammed when they tried to kill the fourth victim, a schoolboy in his late teens, so they killed him with a knife and then seriously mutilated his body. The four killed were all male: Saw Gka Bweh, Maw Nyunt Po, Saw Lay Heh and Shaw Po Gkeh. A month later, 5 more Twa Ni Gone villagers were executed under almost identical circumstances. On November 18^th 1998 in southern Mone township, Sa Thon Lon troops saw Po Theh Pyay from Ter Bpaw village and Saw Aye from Myeh Yeh village along a path because they had returned from the relocation site to fish. They called to the two villagers, but they ran because they were afraid and the troops shot them in the back. The bodies were then beheaded, and the Sa Thon Lon group forced the villagers to display the heads along two nearby pathways for an entire month. On December 27^th 1998, Bo Maung Maung and Bo Shan Bpu led Sa Thon Lon troops into Baw Bpee Der village, where villagers were having a volleyball tournament for Christmas. They opened fire on the villagers, killing Saw San Myint, who was in his early twenties. They beheaded him and hung his head along the footpath to Mone with a cheroot stuck in its mouth as a warning to the villagers. These are only a few examples of some of the killings, both systematic and random, which are being carried out by the Sa Thon Lon troops; many more examples are provided in the table on page 81, the field reports and the texts of the interviews with villagers which appear in the Annex to this report, and even these are only a partial sample of the killings which have already occurred and are still occurring throughout the district.

"When they killed the four Twa Ni Gone villagers at the fishpond hut I was also in one of the fishpond huts. Those people were keeping some rice in their fishpond hut because they were staying there and needed to eat. They were villagers who had been forcibly relocated but had come back to work at their pond. When the soldiers saw their rice they accused them of feeding the KNLA, so they killed them. First they asked them questions and brought them to our hut. We had a pass to stay in our fishpond hut. … But the soldiers took the four Twa Ni Gone villagers away to kill them, and then we heard the sound of the gun: Doan, doan, doan, doan. One of the four killed was a schoolboy. He was in 10^th Standard [Grade 10], so he was about 20 years old." - "Saw Ghaw" (M, xx), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #29, 1/99)

"They killed Saw Gka Bweh, Maw Nyunt Po, Saw Lay Heh and my cousin Shaw Po Gkeh. When the Burmese shot at him their gun didn’t work, so they dug out his eyes with a knife, cut open his belly and cut open all his intestines. It was Shan Bpu who killed him." - "Saw Tha Doh" (M, 18), xxxx village, Mone township, describing the murder of his cousin in November 1998 (Interview #13, 3/99)

"That first time they killed 2 people who were single and 2 who were married. Then the next time they killed 5 people - they were all Twa Ni Gone villagers as well. That was on December 26^th or 27^th [1998]. Three of those people were single and two were married. All the people they killed were Karen. … They killed them for being friendly with the KNU. It’s part of their ‘dig out the roots’ policy." - "Pu Hla Maung" (M, 57), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #22, 1/99)

"They killed Saw Aye and Po Theh Pyay while they were fishing in their boat [in November 1998; Saw Aye was from Myeh Yeh and Po Theh Pyay from Ter Bpaw]. When they saw them, they demanded that they come to them. When Saw Aye and Po Theh Pyay got to them, they ordered them to raise their hands and then they shot them dead. After killing them, they cut off their heads and took them to Ter Bpaw and Po Thaung Su. They hung one of the heads on the path to Mone and the other on the path to Ler Doh [Kyauk Kyi]. They ordered people [villagers] to guard the heads and said that if the heads were lost they would be replaced by the heads of those who had been guarding them and lost them. People on sentry duty watched them all day and night. They finally threw the heads away when they were decomposing. They had been hanging there for over a month before they finally ordered them thrown away." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

"They hung one of the heads on the path out of the village that goes to Mone and another on the path to Ler Doh. We had to cut bamboo and weave it into stands like those used for drinking water and then put the heads on them. … [T]hey ordered people to do sentry duty around those heads and if the heads disappeared, they said the villagers would have to replace them with our own heads. They kept them there for over a month and then another Army group came and forced the villagers to bury the heads." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #8, 4/99)

"On October 15^th 1998, Sa Thon Lon Guerrilla Retaliation troops entered Thit Cha Seik village in Mone township and burned down the houses of village chairman Nga Soe and secretary Tin Win. Later they fired three M79 grenades into Ter Bpaw village. The grenades hit village headman Po Thaut Kya’s house, killing his 2 daughters Naw Mu Lay, age 8, and Naw Dah Dah, age 2." - incident report from KHRG field reporter

"In our area, if we add it up, they are killing 2 or 3 people per day, but we are busy working so we don’t have time to listen to that and we don’t hear about it. Even though we’re not listening for that news, we still hear of people dying every day, because the enemy is killing many people." - "Maung Baw" (M, 30), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #39, 12/98)

Other Sa Thon Lon Activities

"One of them got married in Nga Nwah Seit. His name is Bo Maung Maung, he is from the Sa Thon Lon. He asked the girl’s parents to give him their daughter, and she didn’t like him but she had to marry him. People in the countryside are forced to marry them. They wrote letters to each of the villages and the village leaders had to collect enough money from all the villagers to pay for the food that was going to be prepared and for the clothing and jewellery, a necklace and earrings for the bride. The elders from my village of Yan Myo Aung collected money from the villagers and the whole village had to pay 17,000 [Kyats]. I don’t know what other villages had to pay but big villages had to give more. He [Bo Maung Maung] showed movies in each village before the wedding to make money. Each person had to pay 50 Kyats for each night the movies were showing regardless of whether they went to see the movie or not. In our village they showed movies on two nights so we had to pay 100 Kyats each. One movie was an English movie and the other was Burmese, but I don’t know the titles of the movies because I’m not interested in movies. The village elders couldn’t do anything, they could only tell us that we had to pay whether we went or not, so some villagers went and watched the movies. After the wedding he [Bo Maung Maung] had a house built in Nga Nwah Seit. It was a brick house and the villagers had to bring the bricks as well as build the house. All the expense and labour that went into that house came from the villagers." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

Though killing is their main function, the Sa Thon Lon units are also involved in several other activities, some of which are deliberate efforts to intimidate the villagers and some of which are the random and brutal acts of undisciplined soldiers. Their overall purpose is to terrify the villagers so that they will not support the opposition, and to achieve this they make a point of trying to frighten villagers whenever they see them. Ordering villagers not to look them in the eyes, refusing to tell them anything, constantly moving and arriving by surprise in the middle of the night are all tactics intended to disorient and frighten the villagers. Sa Thon Lon leader Bo Shan Bpu makes a point of hitting villagers before he even speaks to them whenever he meets them along the pathways. One villager told KHRG that he and his teenage friends met Bo Shan Bpu along a path near their fields - he immediately slapped them all in the face, then asked them their ages and beat them for being younger and yet taller than him. Another villager described how his 67-year-old father was stopped by a Sa Thon Lon unit when going for SPDC forced labour with other villagers; the leader beat all of them for not having passes, but gave his father an extra beating because he was the eldest and should therefore "know better".

"My uncle asked me to help by pounding his paddy so I went to do that, and on the way back I and two of my friends met the Short Pants. I was with my friend M---, he is 16 years old. … They asked us about our passes and we showed them to them. Another one, Shan Bpu, came up to us and he didn’t say anything, he just slapped my face 3 times and punched the three of us in the stomach once each. He asked M--- how old he was and when he answered that he was 16 years old, Shan Bpu punched him in the chest and said, ‘Why are you taller than me if you are 16 years old?’ I couldn’t say anything because a soldier held a knife at my throat and if I’d said anything he would have killed me. He asked again, ‘Why are you this big if you are only 16 years old?’ Then he slapped his face again. … Shan Bpu said, ‘Nga lo ma Kayin myo, pyang!’ [loosely translates as, ‘You Karen sons of my whore, get out of here!’]. Then we rode our bicycles home." - "Saw Tha Doh" (M, 18), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #13, 3/99)

"They even beat my father-in-law who is 67 years old. They force villagers to go back [from the relocation sites] and clear the paths in their old villages. Every morning villagers are going back to their own villages to cut the scrub. One morning in December, they came and saw villagers going to clear their old village. They asked for their passes but none of them had a pass, so they beat them all with fresh bamboo they had cut in the area. On that day, my father-in-law went instead of me because I had to go and give my paddy to the central [command]. … They beat each of them 2 times with the exception of my father-in-law. He [the Sa Thon Lon commander] said that the others were young and had little knowledge, but that my father-in-law is old and should have enough knowledge to show some respect but didn’t. So he was beaten 12 times. He is 67 years old and his head shakes all the time. … When he returned after being beaten he got a fever, and we had to give him an injection of penicillin." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #8, 4/99)

"We hadn’t done anything, we were just going to carry our paddy and they saw us, called us to them and then beat us. Most of us were Karen, but there were 3 children among us and they were Burmese. Some were 35, 40 or over 50 years old, and the children were about 10 years old. Eight of them called us over to beat us. First they just asked us, ‘Where do you live?’, and we told them we live in xxxx. They forced us to lie on our stomachs on the ground. They beat us with 8 cane sticks until all but one of the sticks were broken. They beat us here, on our legs. Thirteen of us were beaten, and they beat each of us ten times. The children were only beaten 3 times each, but they beat the rest of us with all of their strength. While they were beating us their officer [Shan Bpu] ordered them, ‘If they move, shoot them dead at once’. Two of them were beating us, and the rest were aiming their guns at us." - "Naw Lah Paw" (F, 21), xxxx village, Mone township, describing her beating by Bo Shan Bpu’s Sa Thon Lon unit in December 1998 (Interview #28, 1/99)

"When we were sitting and talking about how to get our living, the guerrillas [Sa Thon Lon] came suddenly. My friends saw them and ran away. I didn’t run, because the Burmese soldiers always told us not to run when we see them. I stayed, and they came and asked me, ‘Who was that running?’ Before I answered he hit my head here and it bled. … He hit me with his gun barrel, my face was cut here and my head was bleeding." – "Saw Tha Pwih" (M, 38), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #50, 5/99)

In order to preserve their element of secrecy and surprise, the Sa Thon Lon units have also been ordering villagers to kill their dogs. Many villagers keep small dogs which they take with them to the forest, particularly when hunting, and which provide security at night in the village by barking at strangers. Sa Thon Lon units do not want the villagers to know when they are arriving in the night, so when dogs bark at them they order the owner to be brought forward. They then order the owner to kill his dog, and in addition they beat or fine him as punishment. In the villages of T’Kaw Pwa, Way Sweh, Nga Byaw Daw, Twa Ni Gone, Haw Ko Ghaw, Lu Ah, and Weh Gyi, all in Mone township, Sa Thon Lon units issued orders in late 1998 for all villagers to kill their dogs. In T’Kaw Pwa village alone the dead dogs filled two bullock carts, and the villagers had to discard them outside the village. Some villagers tried to hide their dogs, but when these were found later the troops threatened to kill the owners if they wouldn’t kill their own dogs, and most people complied out of fear.

"The Sa Thon Lon are moving in the area at night and don’t like the dogs because they bark at them when they want to move secretly. They ordered the village headmen to tell people to kill all their dogs or they would beat the owners. They are really doing what they threatened to do. After killing the dogs that bark at them they beat their owners. Some of us loved our dogs and didn’t want to kill them, so we tied our dogs in hiding places. It’s not easy for them to be tied up all the time for many days, so we untied them sometimes. There was one night that they came and people didn’t know they were coming. The dogs barked at them so they asked, ‘Whose dogs are these?’ People had to go and get the owners of the dogs, and when the owners came they said, ‘If you are going to kill your dogs then kill them now, but if you aren’t going to kill them then I’m going to kill you.’ The dog owners were afraid of dying so they had to kill the dogs they loved. My dog was very good and obedient, so I was very upset but there was nothing I could do. Finally I had to kill it. When I killed it my children were crying loudly, but we had to kill it because we feared for our own lives. Our dog had to die for us. In T’Kaw Pwa village, people had to give them a list of all the dogs and then people had to kill all the dogs in the village. The dead dogs filled two bullock carts, and the people had to take them and throw them away in the fields." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"They beat the dogs to death and then they beat the owners of the dogs [which bark at them]. If they shoot the dog dead, then they beat the owner and also demand 500 Kyats for the cost of the bullet after they beat him. They have ordered villagers in the area of Way Sweh, T’Kaw Pwa and Nga Byaw Daw villages to kill all their dogs. … Now there are no dogs there. I even had to kill my own dog. In Yan Myo Aung 10 dogs were killed, but in Twa Ni Gone, Haw Ko Ghaw, Lu Ah, Weh Gyi and T’Kaw Pwa all the dogs were killed." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

The Sa Thon Lon units have threatened villagers with forced relocation and burned houses on occasion. They have also ordered villagers who have already been forcibly relocated to return by day to their old villages in Mone township to cut down all the fruit and other trees in the village and to clear scrub along the sides of footpaths, presumably to protect the Sa Thon Lon and other SPDC troops from ambush by eliminating cover for resistance forces while also making it harder for the villagers to find food in their villages. (For more information on forced relocations see below under ‘Villages in the Sittaung River Plains’.) One villager stated that in March 1999, Sa Thon Lon units in Kyauk Kyi township began ordering villagers to build fences around their home villages, with only two gates for access. Villages in Tantabin township of Toungoo District have also been forced to fence in their villages.

"When we were in Yan Myo Aung, Bo Maung Maung came and told us, ‘In this area, if I don’t allow you to live here, you can’t live here. If I allow you to stay you can stay, so cut down the trees and plants in the village so it looks clear.’ Anytime he comes to the village he demands clothing, sarongs and food. When we see a taxi arriving with Shan Bpu inside it, everyone prays and no one feels like eating. He forces taxi drivers to take him wherever he wants to go, and he never pays them. When he came, all the villagers didn’t dare move. Some hid in their rooms and others went to hide in their toilets." - "Naw Paw Paw Htoo" (F, 31), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #12, 3/99)

"In March 1999, when the road construction was almost finished, the intelligence [Sa Thon Lon] soldiers of the SPDC Army ordered villages in Kyauk Kyi township to make fences around their villages. The villages were allowed to have only two gates." - "Naw Ghay" (F, xx), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #11, 4/99)

"They forced us to fence our village and then they forced us to stick sharpened pieces of bamboo around the fence. People have to do that in every village." – "Saw Lay Muh" (M, 42), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #53, 5/99)

"Now they’ve closed everything. They don’t allow people to go to farm. They burned every farm hut and ordered people not to go out of the village. They’ve fenced the village tightly." – "Pu Than Nyunt" (M, 60), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #52, 5/99)

Like other SPDC troops, the Sa Thon Lon units largely support themselves by looting and extorting money in villages. In Kyauk Kyi township, each family in villages where they operate has to pay 200 to 300 Kyat per week which is supposedly for the Sa Thon Lon soldiers’ food. Villagers throughout their entire area of operations have to pay varying amounts of fees to support them. In addition, when they arrive in villages they choose a villager’s house, go to stay there and demand that the house owner prepare food for them. One villager claimed that the Sa Thon Lon group that comes to his village demands at least 5 chickens per day; by Karen standards this is a grossly extravagant amount of meat for a group of only 10 people. They also take whatever they like from small village shops without paying, and demand that the villagers weave or buy fancy traditional clothing for them. The villagers often have to pool their money afterwards to pay for the food and goods they have taken. For transport, they commandeer bullock carts and bicycles, often ordering people with bicycles to deliver messages for them or summon people to them. When Bo Shan Bpu goes back and forth to town and along the roads, he never uses military transport, but instead orders local passenger vehicle or motorcycle drivers to take him wherever he wants to go without payment. His preference for civilian over military transport may be for his own safety; he is a KNLA target, so he may feel that he is safer travelling covertly with civilians.

"They commandeer bulls, carts and bicycles [to carry or send things for them]. Two bullock carts and one bicycle must be ready for their use each day. The bullock carts must take them wherever they want to go, and the bicycles have to send messages for them or go to summon anyone they want to see. In the past, although we had to give taxes and fees we could travel when there was no fighting, but since they’ve arrived people dare not travel or do their work. When people can’t dare go anywhere they can’t think of what to do with their lives." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township, about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #8, 4/99)

"They demanded we give them a chicken every day. We had to buy the chickens for them. When they demanded alcohol they didn’t like the local rice whisky, they liked the alcohol that people sell in town. They demanded things like that for a long time, until the villagers couldn’t support it any longer. … They once held a meeting where I heard them say, ‘Whenever I go out [on patrol] you will hear that I have killed people.’" - "Saw Dee Ghay" (M, 38), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #9, 4/99)

"When they came to our village, they went to the shops and took everything they liked without paying and then left. The villagers had to take up the cost of that. They did it 3 or 4 times. When they first arrived in our village we had to buy them a jacket which cost 5,000 Kyats and 5 or 6 sets of Karen traditional clothing and sarongs. … We don’t dare to wear watches and we hide our nice clothes. When the Sa Thon Lon enter the village and see you wearing nice clothes or watches, they demand that you give all of it to them. When a person from Tint Lwin’s group saw my cousin’s watch, he demanded the watch from my cousin but my cousin said, ‘This is my mother’s watch.’ He slapped his face and took his watch anyway." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township, describing the behaviour of Sa Thon Lon troops (Interview #8, 4/99)

The Sa Thon Lon troops are definitely targets of the KNLA, and as a result they are afraid to travel along the road from Kyauk Kyi to Mone because it skirts the western edge of the hills. To protect themselves, in January 1999 they began ordering villagers to build a new road about 5 kilometres further west, running from Na Than Gwin to Mone along the Sittaung River. The length of this road is 30 to 35 kilometres, and forced labour on it has been intensive because they are in a rush to complete it. Thousands of villagers had to rotate shifts of five days to a week building and smoothing a 4½ foot high embankment and roadbed all along its length between January and March 1999. Sa Thon Lon troops have been supervising the construction, which is now mainly complete except for a number of bridges. Villages have been ordered to provide all the timber for these bridges, and are currently being forced to build them. In April, when Sa Thon Lon commander Bo Maung Maung ordered a final intensive labour week to smooth the embankment, he told the villagers that at the end of the week he would ride a motorbike from Na Than Gwin to Mone and back, and that if he ever had to stop his motorbike because the road was too bumpy the villagers would "know about it". (For more information on this road see below under ‘Villages in the Sittaung River Plains: Forced Labour on Roads’.)

Several Sa Thon Lon soldiers have also forced local girls to marry them. The most notorious case of this involved Bo Shan Bpu in Mone township. In December 1998 he saw Naw O---, a 19 year old girl from Lu Ah village, working in her family’s beanfield. He grabbed her and tried to rape her, and she fled. Later he went to her village and asked her parents and the village headman for her in marriage, even though there are some reports that he already had a wife elsewhere. When Naw O--- heard this she fled her village and went to Toungoo. Then Bo Shan Bpu threatened that if she did not return he would burn the village and kill everyone in it, so her parents called her back and she was forced to marry him on December 25^th. He ordered her to move to Meik Tha Lin but she didn’t want to go, so to encourage her he burned down her family’s house in early January. Realising that after that he would be known throughout the district as the man who burned down his father-in-law’s house, he then burned down all the houses in Lu Ah village. The Lu Ah villagers had to flee, and are now living in small shelters in a field outside Weh Gyi village. All of these details have been confirmed by the testimony of several different villagers from the area. One villager reported that after that time, he arrived at xxxx village with a bunch of pigs he had stolen, intending to use them to buy a girl named Naw L--- in marriage, but when he found out she was away studying in town he forced the villagers to buy the pigs he had brought and then left.

"We saw a girl in Lu Ah treated this way. Shan Bpu asked the village headman, her parents and the villagers to give her to him. Both her parents and the village headman had to tell her to marry him. The villagers told her the same thing. They said, ‘If you don’t marry him they will kill us all, as the village headman and your parents told you.’ Finally, she had to give herself to the Burmese [soldier] because she loves her parents, the village headman and the villagers. … She was crying when they first got married and after they were married she was still crying because she doesn’t like him. Now her husband has called her to go and live in another area but she didn’t go, so he said that she was too attached to her house and returned to burn down his father-in-law’s house. When he had finished burning his father-in-law’s house he was worried that people would say ‘He’s the one who burned his own father-in-law’s house’, so he burned down every house in the village." - "Saw Tee Ko" (M, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #19, 2/99)

"She told her siblings, ‘I feel very sad that I had to sell myself because of all of you. I want to die but I don’t know how to die.’ So her siblings are very sad for her also. Whenever she sees her siblings she tells them she is very ashamed. We told her not to be ashamed. She asked us how to suffer this kind of life and we told her there’s no other option but to suffer like this. Shan Bpu burned the houses of his in-laws and then burned all the houses in the village. He burned all 50 or 60 houses in [Lu Ah] village plus all the bamboo that the villagers were going to use to build new houses. That happened in early January [1999] … They built temporary huts in a place near Haw Ko Ghaw, but then they had to move and build temporary huts in the field near Weh Gyi. … They are living in the fields and can’t build [proper] houses because all of their things were burned." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"He killed four people after he got married. He got married on December 25^th, and on the night of December 26^th he called four people out of the village and killed them." - "Saw Ghaw" (M, xx), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #29, 1/99)

"They raped a woman near Zayat Gyi. She is a teacher and she is Burmese, not Karen. That group calls themselves the Garuda group. Then they had to go back to clear that up so Bo Shwit [Shan Bpu] came to replace them. When the Garuda group was in our area they came and ate in our village and they just interrogated people, they didn’t torture them, but when Bo Shwit came we saw killing and beating." – "Pu Than Nyunt" (M, 60), xxxx village, Tantabin township, Toungoo District (Interview #52, 5/99)

Bo Maung Maung and other Sa Thon Lon soldiers have also reportedly forced local women to marry them. Villagers in Mone township repeatedly complain that every time a Sa Thon Lon soldier marries, everyone in the area is forced to give money as a wedding gift. When Bo Maung Maung was getting married, he sent orders to several villages demanding money for the wedding feast, clothing and jewellery; for Yan Myo Aung relocation site alone, the total came to 17,000 Kyat. Bo Maung Maung then arranged for movies to be shown on two consecutive nights in each village, and everyone had to pay 50 Kyat per night for the movies whether they went to see them or not. After each Sa Thon Lon soldier gets married, the villagers have been forced to buy bricks, take them to the village where the soldier wants to live, and build a brick house and surrounding fence for the bride and groom.

"Sa Thon Lon soldiers also liked two female students around the age of 16. Those girls were about to write their examinations, but instead they left the school and fled." - "Naw Hser" (F, 40), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #20, 2/99)

"In Shan Bpu’s section, all the soldiers are stupid and impudent because all of them are NCO’s [Non-Commissioned Officers]. When each of them got married, the villagers had to give them money for gifts and money for pigs. When they gave the invitation to the village headman, it had written on it how much money each village had to give and it also said that everyone must go to the wedding and bring money as a gift. It said those who didn’t go must still give 500 Kyats as a forced gift. The villagers had to bring wood and build a house with a fence around the garden for each of them after they got married. They got married one by one and the villagers had to do that each time but they didn’t dare to say anything. … I didn’t go but many people had to go to build their houses. They have to live in nicer houses than ours." - "Naw Paw Paw Htoo" (F, 31), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #12, 3/99)

"You have to work for them all the time. Any time they force you to work, you must go and do it. You have to carry bricks and build houses for their families. If they order you to bring them 30 bullock-carts filled with bricks, you must bring it to them as they say. … We got the bricks from a place beside Yan Myo Aung village. We had to buy them. … We took the bricks to Bo Maung Maung, and then he ordered carpenters and others to build brick houses for them." - "Saw Tha Doh" (M, 18), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #13, 3/99)

Villagers also complain that whenever they have their own festivals, they are under orders to invite the local Sa Thon Lon group, who usually ruin the festival by demanding alcohol and frightening everyone. According to villagers who recently fled the area, villagers in Nyaung Bin Seik village of northern Mone township were having a festival in March in honour of a monk who had died, and Bo Shan Bpu was there. When a young woman was singing on stage people were going up to give her presents. Bo Shan Bpu went up on the stage and tried to grab her, but some local young men drove him off and had to be held back or they would have hit him. Bo Shan Bpu left, but then came back and fired M79 grenades into the crowd without warning, killing one villager and wounding several others. In another example, after killing a villager named U Kyi Hmwe in Shan Su village of Shwegyin township in December 1998, the Nagah section of the Sa Thon Lon came to the funeral ceremony being held by the villagers and started playing cards and drinking as though it were a party. However, in the midst of all these other activities the Sa Thon Lon groups continue to focus on their main function, which is to execute villagers. On December 26^th 1998, the day after his wedding, Sa Thon Lon commander Bo Shan Bpu called four people out of Twa Ni Gone village and executed them, and on the 27^th he killed and beheaded Saw San Myint, a young man from Baw Bpee Der village.

"In Nyaung Bin Seik people were having a festival in honour of a dead monk, and there was a stage show. While one performer was dancing and singing, people were going up to give her presents. Shan Bpu also went to give her a present, but he acted like he would grab her so her friends got angry and jumped up to protect her from him. He got angry too and said, ‘I was giving her a present with good intentions, but you’ve made a scene’. Then he went and fired shells among the crowd and the performers." – "Saw Lah Thaw" (M), xxxx relocation site, Mone township, describing an incident in March 1999 (Interview #2, 5/99)

"We live not too far from the KNLA, so they call us ‘rebels’. They force the villagers to work for them and to give them what they want. They don’t like people asking them questions. They don’t even like people to look at their faces. They’re walking from place to place every day, and if they enter our village we have to prepare whatever they want to eat. They order more than 5 chickens for each meal. … They said that if the villagers were going to have any kind of party, they had to be invited. We invited them to a wedding in the village when we had pork for everyone. However, they didn’t like pork and demanded steamed duck, so we had to steam ducks for them." - "Saw Ner Muh" (M, 30+), xxxx village, Mone township (Interview #8, 4/99)

"He was Burmese, his name was U Kyi Hmwe and he was 45 years old. They accused him of helping the KNU, which he had. They are killing all the villagers who have had contact with the KNU since it was formed, including Burmans. They took him halfway [along a path] and then slit his throat. … While the villagers were having a [funeral] ceremony for U Kyi Hmwe, they came to play cards and drank alcohol as though the villagers were having a party for them. They were happy, but they kill very brutally." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township, talking about the Sa Thon Lon (Interview #30, 12/98)

KNLA and DKBA Activities

"The enemy [SPDC] persecuted us. My mother and father were in contact with the Nga Pway, because we had to feed them too. We have to be afraid of all of them and feed them all, both Nga Pway and the Burmese." - "Saw Yeh" (M, 19), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township; ‘Nga pway’ (‘ringworm’) is SPDC slang for KNU/KNLA (Interview #42, 12/98)

The Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) is very active in Nyaunglebin District, particularly in the hills which cover the eastern three fourths of its area. The KNLA does not have complete control over any area, but they have a form of de facto partial control in the area of villages such as Tee Muh Hta and Tee Nya B’Day Kee in eastern Kyauk Kyi township. SPDC forces do not dare enter these areas except in well-armed and usually large columns. When they do enter, the KNLA soldiers and many of the villagers disappear deeper into the forest and higher into the hills, only to return as soon as the SPDC column is gone. The villagers in these areas, particularly those whose villages have been destroyed and who are internally displaced, sometimes seek shelter or medical help from KNLA units. The KNLA obtains much of its intelligence on SPDC movements from the villagers, and in return warns villagers when SPDC columns are coming into the area. The KNLA units themselves are small and mobile, usually consisting of 20 or 30 soldiers. They engage primarily in hit-and-run ambush and harrassment operations, avoiding large battles. KNLA units also penetrate the Sittaung River plains to ambush SPDC units and to go to villages there to obtain food, taxes and porters, but they cannot stay in the plains for any length of time because there are too many SPDC troops there. In recent months the KNLA has made several incursions into the plains to attack Sa Thon Lon units and they have tried to kill Bo Shan Bpu on at least one occasion, but without success.

The KNLA’s weapons are few in number and old but well maintained, and their ammunition supply is severely limited. They get most of their food from the villagers, demanding it as a form of tax from villages which are stable enough to produce a reasonable crop. Cash taxes are also demanded from the elders of such villages. In Nyaunglebin District these demands are mainly levied against those villages in the hills which have not been destroyed and against villages in the eastern part of the Sittaung River plains. The KNLA also asks for porters, but they only have to go for short periods and are not physically abused; only able-bodied men are taken, and households which have no one fit to go are exempted. Even so, these demands place villagers in a difficult situation because they have no choice but to comply, but after they comply they are accused by the SPDC of supporting the resistance. Many village elders have been killed by the Sa Thon Lon or have had to flee because the KNLA used them as a contact person in the past, even if this happened against their will.

The KNLA not only attacks SPDC patrols, but also those of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), the armed Karen group which was formed in 1994 and is closely allied to the SPDC. The main areas of operation of the DKBA are further south, but they have a small presence in the plains of western Nyaunglebin District. Their two camps are at Payah Gyi village in Kyauk Kyi township and Maw Lay (Plaw Haw) village in Mone township, with an estimated 40-50 soldiers at Payah Gyi and the same number or fewer at Maw Lay. They are under the command of Battalion Commander Po Maung from DKBA Brigade 777 based at Payah Gyi; the local commander at Maw Lay is named Bo Law Plah. Their main activities centre around the restoration of the old Klaw Maw (Kyauk Maw) pagoda near Payah Gyi, the building and restoration of other pagodas near both of their camps and also at Kyun Gyi in Kyauk Kyi township.

"In Payah Gyi DKBA camp there are about 45 DKBA soldiers. They demand that each nearby village provide them 1,200 Kyats and 20 kilograms of rice per month. The DKBA soldiers bake charcoal in the hills, and villagers have to work for them. … The DKBA soldiers have been supervising construction of the Kyauk Maw pagoda since the beginning of 1997. Our village had to send 7-10 people for that pagoda construction. The work involved carrying stones, bricks and sand. … Even non-Buddhists were called to work on the construction." - villager (M, 45) from Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #35, 4/99)

People from the villages near both of the DKBA camps complain that they have had to do forced labour on the pagoda construction, hauling stones, bricks and sand and helping to build the pagodas themselves. Many of those who have been forced to do this labour are non-Buddhists, primarily Christians and Animists. After most of the work on the Klaw Maw pagoda was already done the DKBA continued calling villagers to do forced labour on it, but the villagers who went were used instead to build barracks at the DKBA camp. The DKBA camps also force a few people from each village to do rotating shifts of forced labour doing small jobs and baking charcoal in the hills which the DKBA then sells for profit.

"The DKBA is building pagodas in Klaw Maw and above Kyun Gyi and forced us to go to work. We did that so much that we didn’t have time to do our own work. We had to go for 2 or 3 days and then we had to go for sentry duty [for the SPDC]. Even I had to go because I didn’t have any money to hire people. We now have nothing. We were also forced to cut trees, and now people are being forced to dig dirt for a road. People have to go to do that by turns, 5 days at a time." - "Naw K’Ser Tee" (F, 29), a Christian from xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township who was forced to build pagodas despite her religion (Interview #10, 4/99)

"I had to work on a pagoda for the DKBA a few times. They’re building it on the flat land outside Kyun Gyi. I had to carry stones for 2 or 3 days at a time. Ten people had to go each time, and then we had to go again if it wasn’t finished." - "Saw Dee Ghay" (M, 38), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #9, 4/99)

"They [DKBA] said that they would build a pagoda. They finished building the pagoda but then they continued to order the villagers to work on it, when actually it was ‘loh ah pay’ on the Ko Per Baw [DKBA] living quarters and not on the pagoda anymore. Each of their groups collects 30 baskets of rice each month. They also collect money, cooking oil and many other things. If the villagers don’t go and give it to them, they arrest and beat the villagers." - "Saw Htoo Lay" (M, 25), xxxx village, Kyauk Kyi township (Interview #30, 12/98)

The SPDC no longer supplies the DKBA in the region with rations, so the DKBA camps are now demanding rice each month from the nearby villages. They also demand other food items and cash. At the full moon of March 1999 the DKBA wanted to celebrate completion of the Klaw Maw pagoda, so on February 15^th Battalion Commander Po Maung demanded 30 baskets of rice and 150,000 Kyat from each village tract in the plains of Kyauk Kyi township.

"DKBA troops have based themselves at Klaw Maw pagoda in Kyauk Kyi township, led by DKBA Battalion Commander Po Maung. They have been rebuilding the Klaw Maw pagoda, and wanted to celebrate completion of the pagoda at the full moon of March 1999. They asked support for this from the SPDC but were refused, so Po Maung ordered each of the 15 village tracts in the plains area of Kyauk Kyi township to give 30 baskets of rice and 150,000 Kyat on February 15^th. He said that the village tracts which did not give would be moved to the SPDC relocation site." - incident report from KHRG field reporter

Whenever their troops are attacked by the KNLA, the DKBA reacts against the villagers. After an attack by the KNLA in late December 1998 in Kyauk Kyi township, DKBA troops called in the local SPDC Battalion and the two groups cooperated in forcibly relocating Kya Plaw and Leh Wain Gyi villages to a forced relocation site in the first week of January 1999. After another KNLA attack on November 12^th 1998, the DKBA arrested three villagers from Thu K’Bee village in Kyauk Kyi township and executed them on November 20^th. Th