Karen News

Mai Luh, 6, was getting a hard time from playmates who poked fun at him over his looks. Mai Luh, born with a cleft palate, had experience discrimination from birth because of his facial disfigurement. In Mae Sot Hospital on the Thai-Burma border, a medic from Mai Luh’s home village recounts the story of how Mai Luh’s father abandoned him…

A Thai based advocacy group, representing ethnic Kachin women, has issued a statement condemning the latest military offensives by the Burma Army in Kachin State, that threatens the lives of “tens of thousands of civilians.” The Kachin Women’s Association of Thailand (KWAT) said it abhorred the latest violence in Kachin State. Government soldiers continued to attack Kachin Independence Army positions…

To increase their respective chances at the 2015 elections three Karen political parties have agreed to work together to avoid unnecessary competition between them at the polls. The three Karen political parties, the Karen State Democracy and Development Party (KSDDP), the Karen Democratic Party (KDP) and the Kayin People’s Party (KPP) formalized its alliance in Hpa-an on November 22, 2014.…

After six-year-old That Pine had been ill for four days, That Thin took the boy to a clinic in Myawaddy just across the border from Mae Sot in Thailand’s Tak province. Father and son went there twice, paying a sizeable 60,000 kyat (about US$60) in fees, but the doctors claimed to be stumped. “His condition became worse. He did not…

This week, which marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the women of Burma reiterated their call for an international investigation to look into the continuing use of rape and sexual violence against women in Burma, and address the issue of military impunity. The situation since the so-called reform process began is no different from before…

Burma’s armed forces are using systematic sexual violence on a “widespread scale,” a report by a women’s group advocating on ethnic women’s rights in Burma has found. The report, by the Women’s League of Burma, an umbrella organisations that represents 13 organisations, accused the Burmese military of using rape as a strategy of war. In a statement released today to…

Following its officially registration with the Federal Electoral Commission, the Karen National Party (KNP) established an executive committee on November 15, 2014. The KNP’s, newly elected secretary, Mahn Kyaw Nyein, told Karen News that the executive committee will work towards getting its officers in charge of respective portfolio in place as soon as possible. “The Executive Committee will act until…

A Hla Ka Myin village leader is determined that the population of voting aged people in his area are verified and ready to vote in the 2015 Election in Karen State. The village elder, Saw Htay Kyaw Myo, told Karen News that he began the verification process on November 13, 2014. “In gathering data, the first and most crucial thing…

An artillery attack against the Kachin Independence Army’s Military Academy, that left at least 23 officer cadets dead and a further 20 injured, was unprovoked and endangers the push for a nationwide peace agreement, a Kachin advocacy organisation has asserted. A statement by the Kachin Alliance, a network of Kachin community organisations based in the United States, condemned the attack…

Families moved by the Burmese government to make way for a special economic zone in Thilawa have been living in deplorable conditions, leaving them hungry and sick, a report by a human rights organisation has found. The report, by the New York based, Physicians for Human Rights, said that the Burma government had violated international standards when it moved the…