Forced labor

Villagers living along the Tavoy-Kanchanaburi Highway linking Burma to Thailand accuse Burma Army soldiers of demanding they provide trucks to transport foods and munitions for the military. Burma Army battalions under Coastal Command headquarters based at Myitta Sub Township, Tavoy, in the Tenasserim Division have since January this year ordered villagers from Sin Phyu Dai, Wartaw, Amo, Htee Htar, Maw…

A report by the Karen Human Rights Group accuses the Burma Army of extorting, forced labour and bribes from villagers in the Toungoo district. The report placed civilians into two categories. Those that lived in areas under Burma Army control, and those that didn’t. According to statistics released by the KHRG, civilians in the former category were much more likely…

Burma army soldiers arrested and detained four villagers from T’Kuh Khee village in Kyain Seikgyi Township Karen State, after their food supplies were destroyed by Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) fighters, local villagers told Karen News. Post Views: 305

Burma Army battalions operating in the Tantabin Township, Taungoo District, Karen State area have forced villagers to work daily on a rotation to supply frontline bases. A local villager told Karen News that Light Infantry Battalions 376, 541, 540 and 380, under the Military Operation Command 9, have been since the first week of November 2011 until now been forcing…

Despite the government’s calls for ‘peace talks’, humanitarian groups and official Karen political parties claim the Burma Army is still committing abuses against civilians in Eastern Burma. Representatives from the Karen National Union and Burma government officials have met several times recently to try to reach a ceasefire agreement. Civilian sources say while the politicians are talking the Burma Army…

A report from the Karen Human Rights Group accuses the Burma Army of extortion and using villagers for forced labor on army bases. The report issued as a KHRG bulletin was written by a villager in the Nyaunglebin District of Karen State. The villager says last years national election did nothing to change the Burma Army’s abuse of villagers. “The…

Burma’s new government continues to try to convince the international community it is moving to a more freer society, but eye-witness accounts of continued human rights abuses in ethnic states is evidence to the contrary. Earlier this month, villagers claim, seven ethic Kachin women were arrested and forced to labor as porters by the Burma Army’s Light Infantry Battalion 522…

Karen soldiers attacked and destroyed Burma Army food supplies on a controversial highway construction linking southern Burma to Thailand. A source from the Karen National Liberation Army’s 4th Brigade told Karen News, that on September 10, KNLA soldiers burnt and destroyed Burma Army rations that were being transported by a civilian truck commandeered by the army. The KNLA source said…

Burmese and Thai researchers speaking at a conference last week in Bangkok fear that the Dawei Special Industrial Zone planned for southern Burma will have severe negative impacts on thousands of local people as well as the environmental. The 4th International Conference on Human Rights and Human Development held on the 19th of August at Chulalongkorn University featured papers on…

The ethnic people of Burma are having a hard time. Burma Army soldiers are targeting women in the Kachin and Shan State for rape. Villagers are used as forced labour for the Burma Army. Development projects mean forced relocation and slave labour. Half a million ethnic people are displaced in eastern Burma. Village schools have been burnt, health care is…