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[Note: Clicking on a photo will provide an enlargement of the photo]
Toungoo District (named Taw Oo in Karen) forms the northern tip of Karen State, sandwiched between Karenni State to the east, Shan State to the north, and Pegu Division to the west. The vast majority of villagers in this region are Karen. Many live in small, difficult to access villages in the very steep and forested hills covering most of the district. Further west, the hills let off into the gentler terrain of the Sittaung River valley near Toungoo town.
For two to three years now the villagers in the western plain of the district have faced heavy burdens of forced labour on roads, army camps and the Pa Thee dam project, while some of their villages just east of Toungoo town were forcibly relocated to make way for the dam. Things have been even worse for the hill villagers in the east of the district, as over the past two to three years the SLORC/SPDC has steadily increased its troop presence in this previously inaccessible area. Several villages in the region were destroyed to force the people to move to SLORC/SPDC-controlled areas, and villagers throughout the hills of Tantabin (Taw Ta Tu) township were forced to build a road from Baw Ga Li Gyi (Kler Lah) to Bu Sah Kee, opening up much of southeastern Toungoo District to the SPDC Army. Several Army camps were subsequently established along this road, at Kaw Thay Der, Naw Soe, Si Kheh Der and Bu Sah Kee. The new road is not passable during rainy season, so villagers have to do forced labour as porters carrying supplies to and from all of these Army camps, then they have to do forced labour rebuilding the road after every rainy season. They also face regular demands for Army camp labour from these units, and suffer from regular looting and extortion of money.
Battalions operating in the area include SPDC Infantry Battalions (IB) #26, 30, and 48, and Light Infantry Battalions (LIB) #535 and 707, all under the Southern Regional Command, and LIB #234 from the Western Regional Command. Their troops rotate every 4 months, and the Battalions are regularly changed; IB 39 was there in 1998 but was replaced by IB 48. There is one Strategic Command (usually consisting of 3 Battalions) from the Na Pa Ka, which is the Western Regional Command based in Arakan (Rakhine) State of western Burma, and there have been reports of troops from the Rangoon Military Command in the area as well. The Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) is active in the hill areas of most of the district, performing guerrilla operations, harassment and ambush of SPDC columns. The Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) and other SPDC proxy armies are not present in the region.
Like in other areas, the SPDC forces try to undermine the KNLA activities by targetting the villagers. Most villages which do not have an SPDC camp and are not along vehicle roads have been ordered to relocate; more than 10 villages have been ordered to move to Baw Ga Li Gyi (Kler Lah) alone since the beginning of 1998. Rather than move as ordered, most people still stay in their villages or the surrounding forests, dodging the SPDC patrols which come through the area. Those who moved as ordered were provided with nothing at the relocation sites and could only build small bamboo huts in which to live. Unable to farm or earn a living and with no support, many of them have fled back to the forests around their villages. People found hiding in areas around the outlying villages and villages which are perceived as uncooperative have been treated brutally. Villagers found in their fields in outlying areas are either grabbed to be porters, shot dead or brutally executed and robbed on the spot. SPDC patrols have been passing through hill villages burning houses, pulling up rice crops before they are ready to harvest, and systematically hunting out and destroying the villagers’ hidden rice stockpiles.
As a result villagers of Hsaw Wah Der, Bu Sah Kee, Klay Soe Kee and many other outlying villages are now all displaced, living in their farmfield huts or the forests outside their villages and dodging SPDC controls which come through the area. They survive by trying to grow cash crops such as cardamom and betelnut, then travel to SPDC-controlled villages to sell it and buy rice. The trip to the SPDC-controlled villages is dangerous; some have been killed or taken as porters when they encounter SPDC patrols on the way, and others have been arrested and tortured on arrival in the big villages. However, even more villagers could find themselves in these circumstances as the SPDC continues to clamp down on the area.
Larger villages along the vehicle roads, such as Kler Lah (Baw Ga Li Gyi), Kaw Thay Der (Yay Tho Gyi) and Naw Soe, are under tight SPDC control and have Army bases adjacent to the village. These villages are known as ‘Nyein Chan Yay’ (‘Peace’) villages, in reference to an informal agreement existing between the village elders and the local military that they will cooperate with all SPDC demands and in return will not be forced to relocate or have their houses burned. The leaders of these villages receive constant demands for ‘porter fees’ and other forms of extortion money, food and materials. The Army also sends regular demands for porters, and to avoid sending people on long-term frontline portering duty the villages have to pool their money and pay labour agents to hire itinerant labourers from Toungoo town to fill the Army’s demands. However, even after paying all this money the villagers regularly have to go for ad hoc forced labour portering Army rations to outlying camps; women often do this forced labour because the men fear that they will be held for several months if they go. The villages also have to provide rotating forced labourers for Army camp labour and as messengers. All vehicles transporting goods or passengers to and from Toungoo have to pay bribes to all of the SPDC checkpoints along the way. This causes the price of rice to be 1,000 Kyat more per sack in Kler Lah than it is in Toungoo, and has also led to a shortage of transport because some drivers have left to find work elsewhere. Villages which are slow in complying with demands for money and forced labour are threatened with having their people and vehicles prohibited from travelling to Toungoo, or with having their homes burned, despite their designation as ‘Peace’ villages.
People in the ‘Peace’ villages have also had to do forced labour clearing the route for a new road from Toungoo to Mawchi, over 100 kilometres to the southeast in southern Karenni (Kayah) State. A road already exists from Toungoo to Kler Lah, and they are now continuing this road towards Mawchi along the route of an old pre-war road. Much of the actual road construction is being done with bulldozers, but villagers have been forced to do all the initial clearing of the road route by hand. Many farmers with fields along the route could not plant a crop in 1998 for fear of being taken for additional forced labour by the soldiers along the road. Construction is still ongoing and is far from complete, and there have been reports that construction is also ongoing from the Mawchi end of the road using the forced labour of Karenni villagers.
For more information on this situation, see the KHRG reports "False Peace: Increasing SPDC Military Repression in Toungoo District of Northern Karen State" (KHRG #99-02, 25/3/99) and "SPDC Orders to Villages: Set 99-A" (KHRG #99-01, 10/2/99).
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Caution: These photos are very graphic.
Photos #T1, T2: The bodies of Saw Gko Dtoh Gkeh (foreground), male, age 42, Sgaw Karen Christian, single, a farmer from Sha Kyi Po village, and Saw Bee Dteh (background), male, age 45, Sgaw Karen Christian, married, a farmer from Lay Dtee village. In their area of Tantabin township, villagers are living in hiding in the forests and farmfield huts, gathering betelnut and betel leaf from their plantations and selling it so they can buy rice to eat. On 17 January 1999 at 10 a.m., a group of eight villagers had met and were sitting talking in one of their farmfield huts near Wah Paw Pu. A group of 30 SPDC soldiers from Infantry Battalion #48 heard them talking from a distance and quietly approached until they were only 10 metres from the hut, then opened fire without warning. The villagers tried to run blindly. Six managed to escape, but Saw Bee Dteh was hit in the stomach and Saw Gko Dtoh Gkeh was hit in the thigh. The troops then entered the hut and blew their brains out from close range with assault rifles. The troops then took all the money they found in the hut and moved on. They were patrolling to ‘secure the area’ for road reconstruction between Kler Lah (Baw Ga Li Gyi) and Bu Sah Kee. [Photos: KORD. For more details on the incident see "False Peace", KHRG Report #99-02]
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Photos #T3, T4: Village medics try to treat Saw S---, who was wounded while fleeing the hut where Saw Gko Dtoh Gkeh and Saw Bee Dteh were killed (see photos T1 & T2). The wound shows the amount of damage that can be done by an assault rifle bullet even if it is only a flesh wound. [Photos: KORD]