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II. Forced Relocation and Restrictions
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In all rural areas of Karen State, the SPDC is trying to bring every village under direct military control even in areas where there is no armed conflict. For many villages, this means that new roads are being pushed into their villages with forced labour and that new Army camps are being set up all around them. As they become surrounded by more and more SPDC troops, the villagers find their burden of forced labour and extortion doubling, tripling, or quadrupling. As a further tool of control, the SPDC has been forcing villagers to build fences around their villages with only one or two gates, and to obtain passes every time they leave the fenced area, even if only to go to their fields (see Photos #B28 through B32). Villagers caught outside of their fenced-in villages without a pass are routinely beaten, interrogated, and taken as porters, or in some cases executed.
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For all villages not directly adjacent to a vehicle road or Army camp, meaning those in the hills, forced relocation orders are issued ordering them to move to Army-controlled sites (see Photos #B21 and B25 through B27). In some cases they are ordered to dismantle their houses before leaving so that resistance forces and the internally displaced cannot use them for shelter, and in some cases the Army goes in and burns the entire village. Fruit trees and plantations are also systematically destroyed (see Photos #B19 and B20). Once in the relocation sites, it is difficult or impossible for the villagers to return to their villages or their fields, and most of them become daily wage labourers. However, there is not usually enough of this work to go around, and they must also spend much of their time doing forced labour because the SPDC troops also look on them as a convenient pool of forced labourers; so many flee back to the hills to avoid starvation and join the internally displaced in hiding (see Photo #B4).
The result throughout Karen State is feudal-style fenced villages controlled by Army camps along the roadways, hills dotted with abandoned or destroyed villages, and tens of thousands in hiding in the forests. For photos of the more direct campaigns to burn and wipe out hill villages, see also the section ‘Attacks on Villages and Village Destruction’ below.
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| B1 | B2 | B3 |
Photos #B1, B2, B3: Some of the 27 market raft-houses which dot the banks of this stretch of the Tha May (Zami) River in south-central Dooplaya District. The people living on these rafts made a living largely by running small shops selling things to the trading boats and others along the river. On November 4th 2000, Captain Min Nai Oo, acting commander of SPDC Light Infantry Battalion #705, decreed that these rafts made it possible for resistance forces to buy goods because they are not under direct SPDC control, so he ordered the people living on them to immediately stop selling things and move to SPDC-controlled relocation sites. He threatened that if they did not do so, SPDC troops would come and destroy the rafts as they have done before. Most of the occupants moved as ordered, and their raft homes now lie abandoned. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B4 |
Photo #B4: Saw B---, age 50 (back, second from right), and his family, from xxxx village in xxxx village tract, northern Papun District. In October 1998 SPDC troops came to relocate his village and captured the whole family as well as some of the other villagers, totalling 16 people aged from 1 year to 67 years. They beat and interrogated Saw B---, then force-marched all 16 people to Mu Theh, an SPDC LIB #349 Army camp along the new Kyauk Kyi - Saw Hta road. The family was forced to settle there. For the first 3 months they were given some food, but after that they were told to find food for themselves. They were constantly forced to do labour making thatch, cutting and hauling logs and bamboo for the Army camp, and were forced to carry Army supplies to Maw Kyaw Ko at the top of La Lah mountain once every week. Every day the relocated villagers also had to send 3 people for forced labour sentry duty. While they were there, the Mu Theh villagers were selling some food to the people in hiding in the hills, and when the SPDC found out about this they executed village headman Pa Baw, who left a wife and two children. Eventually Saw B---’s family couldn’t bear the conditions anymore so they fled back into the hills, but they couldn’t dare go back to their village so they now live in the forest with other displaced villagers. This photo was taken in April 2001. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| B5 | B6 | B7 | B8 |
Photos #B5, B6, B7, B8: Abandoned houses in Shwe Po Ha village (Photo #B5) and Kyone Sein Chaung Pya village (all other photos), both in Kya In township, Dooplaya District. Kyone Sein Chaung Pya village was home to 55 families. The villages were forcibly relocated in 2000, along with most villages in the region which were not within easy reach of an Army camp. Relocated villagers in the area were ordered to hand over all of their rice to the Army and receive it back as daily rations; while many handed over their rice, they didn’t dare go to the Army every day for fear of being taken for forced labour or beaten, so many are now starving and living on leaves and taro roots. For more information see "Starving Them Out" (KHRG #2000-02, 31/3/2000). [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B9 |
Photo #B9: Abandoned house in Bu Tho township, eastern Papun District. This village was forced to relocate in early 2001, and the SPDC ordered the villagers to dismantle their house walls before moving so that passing SPDC patrols would easily be able to see if anyone is hiding inside. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| B10 | B11 | B12 | B13 |
Photos #B10, B11, B12, B13: Abandoned villages northeast of Kler Lah (Bawgali Gyi) in Than Daung township, Toungoo District. In 1998 the people of several villages in the area were forcibly relocated to the outskirts of Kler Lah, where they are now used as a forced labour pool for road construction and maintenance as well as portering. The villages now lie abandoned and overgrown, though some of the villagers are still in hiding in the surrounding hills. Photo #B10 shows part of Der Doh village, now overgrown; Photos #B11 and B12 show Maw Ko Der village, and Photo #B13 shows the Christian church in abandoned Peh Kaw Der village [for location and other information see the map and text of the report "Peace Villages and Hiding Villages" (KHRG #2000-05, 15/10/00)]. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B14 | B15 | B16 | B17 | B18 |
Photos #B14, B15, B16, B17, B18: Villages abandoned due to forced relocation, April 2001. Since 1997, the SPDC has forcibly relocated more than half of all villages in the plains east of the Sittaung River in Nyaunglebin District to SPDC-garrisoned sites. These photos, taken in April 2001, are from some of the 16 villages in western Mone township which KHRG has already documented as being relocated [see "Death Squads and Displacement" (KHRG #99-04, 24/5/99)]. Photo #B14 shows the abandoned schoolhouse in Ta Maw Ma village; Photo #B15 is from Yeh Kyo village; Photo #B16 shows the abandoned church in Ter Bpaw village; Photo #B17 shows the old school in Po Thaung Su village; and Photo #B18 shows Po Thaung Su village’s abandoned church. In most of these villages, there is nothing left but these buildings and whatever parts of their houses the villagers couldn’t take with them. More details on the forced relocation of these villages can be found in the report "Death Squads and Displacement" (KHRG #99-04, 24/5/99). [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B19 | B20 |
Photos #B19, B20: Coconut palms which SPDC troops cut down and forced the villagers to cut down before forcibly relocating them from villages in the Sittaung River plain, Mone township, Nyaunglebin District, April 2001. All of these villages have been forced to relocate to SPDC-garrisoned sites since 1997 (see description with preceding photos), and the SPDC orders the destruction of anything which could be used as food by the resistance forces or internally displaced villagers. Photo #B19 shows the stumps of an entire coconut plantation cut down in Twa Ni Gone village, and Photo #B20 is from Noh Htaw Hta village. Most of the destroyed trees had taken several decades to grow. Villagers are also ordered to dismantle their houses before moving so they cannot be used as shelter. More details on the forced relocation of these villages can be found in the report "Death Squads and Displacement" (KHRG #99-04, 24/5/99). [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B21 |
Photo #B21: An SPDC-garrisoned forced relocation site just east of the Sittaung River in Mone township, Nyaunglebin District, taken from a distance in April 2001. This particular open field site just south of Weh Gyi village is near the new forced labour vehicle road along the Sittaung River (the photo is taken from this road), and is now home to villagers from Lu Ah and some other nearby villages. More details on the forced relocation of the area villages can be found in the report "Death Squads and Displacement" (KHRG #99-04, 24/5/99). [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| B22 |
Photo #B22: Displaced villagers at a forced relocation site in Toungoo District in November 2000; the woman in the background is ill. Despite being regularly used for forced labour, the villagers are provided with nothing by the SPDC troops or authorities so they cannot afford to obtain medicines. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| B23 | B24 |
Photos #B23, B24: Villagers from northern Toungoo District who have been forced to relocate to the outskirts of xxxx village, seen at the relocation site. Over the past 3 years many villages have been forced to relocate here, and they are now used for forced labour portering supplies and building and maintaining roads for SPDC troops. They cannot go back to farm their own land, yet neither the military nor the authorities provide them with anything. They must now survive however they can, as day labourers or petty traders. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B25 | B26 | B27 |
Photos #B25, B26, B27: In February/March 1998, several villages away from the main car road in this part of Dooplaya District were forced to move and build their houses here as shown in Photo #B25, along the roadsides in xxxx village, Kya In township. Since that time they have regularly been forced to do labour maintaining the road, and were also forced to build the monastery (right foreground) and pagoda (background) shown in Photo #B26 and the school shown in Photo #B27. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B28 | B29 |
Photos #B28, B29: After forcibly relocating villages in the xxxx area of eastern Papun District in the first part of 2001, SPDC Division #44 troops forced the villagers to fence themselves in, allowing only the one entry and exit point shown in Photo #B29. Their movements are now tightly controlled, and they are regularly called for various forms of forced labour by the Army camp. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| B30 |
Photo #B30: Villagers in xxxx village, Dweh Loh township, Papun District, work on a fence that SPDC Division #33 ordered them to make around their village in late April 2001. Most villages under SPDC control are now ordered to fence themselves in, leaving only one or two entry points and posting forced labour sentries on these at all times. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| B31 | B32 |
Photos #B31, B32: xxxx village, Papun District. Officer Bo aaaa from SPDC LIB #30 ordered the villagers to build a fence around the entire perimeter of their village with only one entry and exit point. The SPDC forces many villagers to do this, supposedly to restrict the movements of resistance forces, though the main result is to restrict the activities of the villagers. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
[Clicking on the sample photos shown in the introduction below will take you to the description of that photo. Clicking on a thumbnail above a photo description will provide an enlargement of the photo. It is recommended that you view this set with your web browser window maximised.]
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As described above in the section "Forced Relocation and Restrictions", a major part of current SPDC strategy is to restrict, fortify and control villages near Army camps, and to forcibly relocate all other villages, such as those in the hills, to Army-controlled sites. However, many villagers have already been through such forced relocations several times over the past 20 years, and prefer to flee into the forest rather than go through it again. They know that in the relocation sites no food or assistance is provided, there is little or no chance to grow crops or do paid labour, and the villagers are constantly used for forced labour. After a few months people start to starve and die of disease, the military commanders relax the restrictions so that people can forage for food, and everyone begins escaping back to the hills or the home village, only to be forcibly relocated again just a few years later. This had led to the present day situation that when the SPDC orders a village to relocate many people flee to other villages or to the forest instead of the designated relocation site. In areas such as Papun District the villagers flee before the soldiers can even deliver a relocation order.
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There are now several hundred thousand internally displaced people living in the forests of Karen State and Tenasserim Division. To prevent them from being able to survive in hiding or return to their villages, the SPDC has sent dozens of Battalions into such areas to burn and destroy the houses (see Photos #C4 through C9 and others), destroy the crops and food supplies, and shoot displaced villagers on sight. The troops burn the villagers’ farmfield huts (see Photo #C10) and destroy crops in the field by burning, trampling, uprooting or landmining them, or by burning off the field too soon before planting time to make it impossible to plant a crop (see Photos #C1 through C3 and C18). When they enter abandoned villages to destroy them they even slash holes in the bottom of cookpots so that they can no longer be used by villagers (see Photo #C13). They specifically hunt out the villagers’ rice storage barns, carry away whatever rice they want and dump the rest on the ground or burn it to destroy it (see Photos #C14 through C17).
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Villages still in place are also subject to marauding columns of SPDC troops who show up and loot all the houses (see Photos #C19 and C20), and ‘punishment’ by SPDC troops who routinely shell or shoot up the nearest villages after they have fought a skirmish with resistance forces. Photos #E1 through E3 show the effects after SPDC troops fired rocket-propelled grenades into a defenceless village because there had been fighting with KNLA forces nearby, and Photos #E11 through E14 were taken after another similar incident when SPDC troops opened fire on a village with small arms. Reprisal attacks such as these have led some villagers to build bunkers beside their houses to protect themselves (see Photos #C21 through C23).
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| C1 | C2 | C3 |
Photo #C1, C2, C3: Farmfield huts and crop fields burned by SPDC troops in Tenasserim Division as part of their campaign to consolidate control over the region, March 2001. Photo #C3 shows a group of villagers who have been displaced by the campaign standing in the ruins of their ricefield. Villagers normally burn off hillfields before planting, but if it is done too early a proper crop cannot be planted; SPDC troops have taken to doing this as one of the ways to wipe out the food supply of the internally displaced villagers. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| C4 | C5 | C6 |
Photos #C4, C5, C6: Villagers look at the remains of their houses in May Daw Ko village, Toungoo District. On January 3rd 2001 a combined column of SPDC Infantry Battalions #48 and 59 came to the village and burned it. For several years now, SPDC forces have tried to force the population out of the hills of eastern Toungoo District. For further information, see "Peace Villages & Hiding Villages" (KHRG #2000-05, 15/10/2000) and other related KHRG reports. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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Photo #C7: The burned remains of a house which villagers from Kler Lah village, Toungoo District, had built in their betelnut plantation. Though Kler Lah is under firm SPDC control and is classified a ‘peace’ village, the villagers are not allowed to spend any time in their fields or plantations outside the village. SPDC troops burned this hut in January 2001. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| C8 |
Photo #C8: A merchant of the village stands beside his burned house in xxxx village, on the bank of the Salween River in Papun District. This village adjacent to the border with Thailand was attacked and burned by SPDC troops in July 2000, causing the villagers to flee across the border. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| C9 |
Photo #C9: A burned house in Pah Ko village, Naw Yo Hta area, northern Papun District. Two SPDC columns combined in mid-January 2000 to burn 10 villages in the area. All of the villagers are now in hiding in the forest. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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Photo #C10: The remains of a farmfield hut in the Ler Mu Plaw area, northern Papun District, burned by SPDC troops in early 2000. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| C11 | C12 |
Photos #C11, C12: All that remains of some of the houses burned in Naw Yo Hta village, northern Papun District, after it was burned by SPDC troops in early 2000. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| C13 |
Photo #C13: The bottoms of cookpots owned by Karen villagers in Bilin township (Thaton District), showing how SPDC troops destroyed them in April 2001 by slashing holes in them with their bayonets. When SPDC troops rampage through villages looking for valuables and porters, they make a point of destroying whatever they cannot take with them in order to make life impossible for the villagers. Slashing holes in the bottom of cookpots, rendering them useless, is one of their most common offenses. For villagers living on the brink of survival in outlying areas, new cookpots can be difficult if not impossible to obtain, and more expensive than they can afford. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| C14 | C15 |
Photos #C14, C15: As part of the campaign to depopulate the hills of eastern Toungoo District, SPDC troops from Infantry Battalion #90 came to the area of Bper Loh village on March 23rd 2001 to destroy shelters and food supplies used by displaced villagers. They destroyed whatever rice they couldn’t carry away with them. Photo #C14, taken several weeks later, shows one site where they dumped the rice on the ground and burned it; some of the grains which survived the fire have already germinated green shoots. Photo #C15 shows a stream where the troops dumped some of the rice, where much of it has already grown from the seed. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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Photos #C16, C17: Unhusked paddy grain which SPDC Division 44 troops scattered on the ground and burned when they destroyed villages in Meh Nyu Hta area, eastern Papun District, in April 2001. The villagers were ordered to relocate to a fenced site beside an Army camp. In Photo #C16, a villager gathers up whatever unburned grains he can for food into the metal half-drum on the left. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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Photo #C18: Hill rice fields in Meh Thu village tract (Dweh Loh township, Papun District) in late June 2001. The villagers from Ner Kee, Ker Kaw and Paw Wah Der villages had prepared these and other fields for planting, but in early June 2001 SPDC columns from Light Infantry Battalion #119 came into the Ker Kaw Law valley and patrolled through the fields every one or two days, so the villagers couldn’t dare plant a crop. The villagers, now in hiding, say that there are 39 hill fields which they have not been able to plant as a result, so many of them may face starvation later in the year. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| E1 | E2 |
Photos #E1, E2: Naw H---, age 9, from xxxx village, yyyy township, Papun District. On April 13th 2001, an SPDC column from Light Infantry Battalion #xxx on the move encountered KNLA forces and fought a skirmish over an hour’s walk away from her village. After the fighting, the SPDC column headed on towards Papun but as they passed xxxx village they ‘punished’ the village for the fighting by firing several rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) among the houses without warning. Naw H--- and her mother were wounded by shrapnel from the RPG shell that landed on their house. In the photos she shows scars of some of the wounds she received. See also Photo #E3 below. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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Photo #E3: One of the rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) shells which SPDC Light Infantry Battalion #xxx fired without warning at xxxx village on April 13th 2001 (see Photos #E1 and E2). This particular shell failed to explode on impact. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| C19 |
Photo #C19: Saw T---, 45, a village head in xxxx village, Papun District, who described how an SPDC column came to his village on the morning of February 27th 2001, ordered everyone out of their houses and then looted everything from the houses and destroyed all belongings which they couldn’t carry away. They then forced many of the villagers to go with them as porters to carry ammunition and rice. His village and other villages in the area were also forced to supply 300 to 600 thatch shingles each for the Army camp, and Saw T--- says that in the past he has been bound and beaten for failing to comply with such orders. He says that on March 13th 2001 the SPDC commander called village heads to a meeting where he told them, "Make sure you give whatever I ask. If you don’t give it, things won’t go easy for you." [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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Photo #C20: Naw P---, 35, and her 3 children. A Karen Buddhist from xxxx township (Thaton District), she told how on February 6th 2001 a column of SPDC Light Infantry Battalion #xxx came into the village and shot, killed and ate her only cow and the cow of another woman in the village without any compensation. She says that every time the troops come to her village the villagers are also forced to give them rice and go back to the camp with them as forced labour porters and guides. In addition, she says that every year in dry season the people of her village must go for forced labour rebuilding the local vehicle road and clearing the bush along the roadsides. The combination of forced labour, looting and constant extortion make it difficult for many villagers to support their families. [Photo: KHRG researcher]
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| E11 | E12 |
Photo #E11, E12: Saw L---, 45, from xxxx village (yyyy township, Papun District). In February 2001 he was heading home from his ricefield when he met a column of 50 soldiers from SPDC Light Infantry Battalion #xxx (under Light Infantry Division #77) commanded by Major aaaa. The Major ordered him to go with the column as a porter, and he tried to refuse but they forced him to shoulder a load of almost 40 kilograms (88 pounds) and go with them. On the morning of February 23rd they encountered KNLA soldiers near zzzz village and there was a battle. During the fighting Saw L--- tried to flee, but the SPDC soldiers saw him and shot him in the thigh, so he fell and was recaptured. After the battle they punished the zzzz villagers by opening fire on the completely undefended village, killing a 28-year-old woman named Naw Bleh and wounding a woman named Ma T--- (see photos below), then entered the village and looted the houses of rice, clothing, gold jewellery and other belongings after the villagers had fled. They left Saw L--- behind with no treatment. Photo #E12 shows one of the wounds on his left thigh. See also Photos #E13 and E14 below, which document the results of the attack on the undefended village. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| E13 | E14 |
Photos #E13, E14: Ma T---, 50, from zzzz village in yyyy township, Papun District. She was shot in the arm on February 23rd 2001 when SPDC Light Infantry Battalion #xxx ‘punished’ her village for a battle which had occurred nearby by opening fire on the undefended village, then looting the houses (for details see description of Photos #E11 and E12 above). Another woman from the village, 28-year-old Naw Bleh, was killed. These photos were taken over a month later, but her wound had not completely healed. Whenever SPDC soldiers are attacked they routinely respond by ‘punishing’ the villages in the area in ways like this. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
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| C21 | C22 | C23 |
Photos #C21, C22, C23: Bunkers dug by the villagers in xxxx village, Lu Thaw township, Papun District, to protect them if there is any fighting between SPDC and KNLA in or around their village, or if SPDC troops shell the village without provocation. Each household in the village has dug their own bunker, the best of which have both logs and dirt for overhead protection. [Photos: KHRG researcher]
Forced
Labour / Forced Relocation & Restrictions
/ Attacks on Villages
Detention & Torture / Shootings & Killings / Flight
& Displacement
Landmines / Soldiers
/ Children