Articles

The Burma government and a Thai company have agreed to pay compensation to farmers for damaging or taking their land while building the Asian Highway network link between Myawaddy and Kawkareik in Karen State. Saw Maw Htoo, Chairperson of the Karen National Union Kawkareik Township office, told Karen News that the KNU, Burma government, and company representatives held a meeting…

Karen leaders have met to discuss the classification of the Karen people in the upcoming national census. Padoh Saw Maw Htoo, chairperson of KNU in Kawkareik Township said in an interview with Karen News, that the KNU held a forum on February 10th to discuss the forthcoming census. “We called on the village heads and urged them at the meeting…

The Democratic Karen Benevolent Army (DKBA) has invited villagers displaced by the Burma Army to stay with them. The DKBA has told villagers from the Tha-Mee-Lay village, Hle-Gu Township, to come and stay with them after the villagers were forced from their homes by the Burma Army on February 4. The displacement involved around 150 families – about 500 people…

General Saw Lah Pwe, head of the Democratic Karen Benovelant Army (DKBA), is recovering from what is thought to be throat cancer in a hospital in Singapore, a DKBA commander confirmed to Karen News. DKBA Tactical Commander General Saw San Aung said that General Saw Lah Pwe’s condition had improved, but that he needed to go through a further “four…

The Karen National Union’s (KNU) Vice-Chairperson, Padoh Naw Zipporah Sein, urged Karen people to recall the four founding objectives of their struggle. Padoh Naw Zipporah Sein was speaking at a ceremony marking the 66-years since the Karen held a massive march in Rangoon to demand equal rights from Burma’s government, then newly independent from the British. “Today is one of…

The United Nations special envoy on human rights in Myanmar, Mr. Tomas Ojea Quintana, met with community-based-organization’s in Mae Sot on Feb 10, as part of a fact-finding mission. A source at the meeting told Karen News that the topics discussed included religious discrimination, political reform and the pro-democracy movement in Burma. Mr. Quintana is preparing a report on Burma…

Landowners in Hpa-an Township are frustrated that they have to pay yearly rent to use lands that once belonged to them, but were confiscated by the military in 2003. Villagers claim that the property, that includes land from four villages in Aein Duu village tract, costs the villagers 300,000 kyat a acre in fees paid to the military to continue…

The building of shelters to replace those destroyed by a fire last week in Umpeim Mai Refugee Camp, Tak Province, is being delayed by a lack of building materials, claims a camp official. Saw Wah Htee, the chairperson of Umpiem Mai refugee camp, explained that a lack of basic building materials was causing the delay. “Currently, we can’t build the…

The conflict, which has lasted for more than two years, has seen the displacement of an estimated 80,000 Kachin people and reports of human rights abuses continue to emerge. Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian organization that delivers aid to displaced people, expressed concern over ongoing Burma Army attacks, including the alleged looting of a village in January by government forces.…

Even as Burma opens up to the world under President Thein Sein’s nominally civilian government, serious human rights abuses continue to occur, including sexual violence, extra-judicial killings and illegal arrest, says rights groups. On the first day of May 2012, ‘Ngwa Mi’ (not her real name), 48, hid alone in a church in the Kachin Town of Pang Wa, on…