Photos #2,3,4: The ruins of Kaw Mu Bwa Der village near the Bilin River. All 27 houses were completely destroyed.

Photos #6,7: The remains of xxxx village in the hills between the Yunzalin and Bilin Rivers. SLORC troops approached the village, took up a position on an adjacent hilltop, and without warning began a mortar barrage of the village. The villagers fled in all directions, after which the troops marched into the village and burned every house and shed. When villagers sneaked back into the village later to look, they found everything burned and 3 mortar shell containers left behind on the adjacent hill by the departing SLORC troops. Photo #6 shows some of the villagers among the burned remains of their houses, together with the shell cases; Photo #7 shows the mortar shell cases. KHRG is currently having the markings investigated to find out their origins.

Photo #9: All that is left of Haw Kee village, which used to have 10-15 households.

Photo #12: Villagers from xxxx village, near Yeh Mu Plaw, gather on all that remains of their houses. They are now living in hiding in the surrounding forests.

Photo #14: Remains of a large house with teak posts, Kaw Weh village.

Photo #16: Villagers come out of the forest to get water at the old places, where they know the water is good. They must cross their burned village to get there.

Photo #18: The Christian Church of Kheh Pa Hta village near the Bilin River. The villagers had spent a great deal of money and effort building this church, which had a metal roof, wooden posts and walls and louvered glass windows (this is very rare in the area, as all such materials must be carried long distances over hills on foot or by elephant). SLORC troops burned the church along with the entire village, which had several wooden houses. (See also photo #19)

Photos #20,21: Community buildings such as churches and schools are especially targetted for burning by SLORC troops, as are the nicest-looking of the houses. This was the primary school of xxxx village, built and run by the villagers themselves. When the troops burned the houses of the village in March they missed the school. Then in June a search-and-destroy patrol passed through the village, saw the school still standing, set it on fire and moved on. However, rainy season had begun and the building was too wet to burn properly. Photo #21 shows clearly where the troops tried to start the fire.

Photo #23: A village near the Salween River which was not targetted by the campaign, but it is abandoned anyway because there are SLORC troops based 1½ hours’ walk away at Kyauk Nyat. The troops regularly stormed the village to loot it and capture porters, and in December 1996 they arrested 10 villagers and threatened to kill them if a large ransom was not paid. After paying the ransom, the villagers fled en masse into hiding in the hills farther from SLORC.

Photo #25: Saw Lah Po, Karen, aged 42, single. He was killed in front of his house in his village in Papun District by a passing SLORC patrol on 30 June 1997. [Photo: independent Karen source]

Photo #27: Saw Lah Htoo, Karen Animist farmer, aged 24. SLORC troops burned him to death in his house on July 2^nd. [Photo: independent Karen source]

Photo #29: The remains of a buffalo shot dead and left to rot by a passing SLORC patrol near Yeh Mu Plaw. Many such skeletons can be seen in the area, as the SLORC patrols shoot anything they see moving, human or animal. Killing buffalos is another way to wipe out the villagers’ ability to provide food for themselves. Note the farmfield hut in the background; a week before this photo was taken, in a similar hut just 20 minutes’ walk away a SLORC patrol found an elderly woman working. They surrounded the hut and opened fire into it without warning, killing her, then they burned the hut with her body inside it.

Photos 31,32,33: Shelters built in the forest by villagers in hiding. Most villagers have lost almost everything they had. Each small shelter can have to house up to 8 or 10 people in an extended family. If too many families or shelters occupy the same location, they risk detection by SLORC patrols.

Photos #35-39: A group of villagers from several destroyed villagers who gathered in a well-hidden site, where they have been living on the ground in small leaf lean-to’s since May with very little food and no medicine except what passing Karen Army patrols can give them. Most have nothing to eat but rice and leaf soup, no salt, and not enough rice to last them until they can (hopefully) harvest a crop in November/December. They dare not build bigger huts for fear of detection. Even as these photos were being taken, word came that a large SLORC column was passing not far away and the villagers were extremely tense and frightened.

Photo #41: The children of the displaced have no chance of a school education, no proper food or medicine, and face an over 20% chance of dying before age 5.

Photo #43: A family flees. SLORC troops destroyed their village in March so they fled and build a shelter in the forest. In June, a SLORC patrol was passing near their shelter so they had to flee further into the hills in fear. The baskets on their backs contain all that they still possess.

Photo #45: A family from Meh Way tries to head for Thailand, where they have never been before. Their village was not destroyed, but the people of several other villages were forced to move there and they said that since that time the burden of forced labour and other SLORC demands and abuses has become unbearable. Then they heard SLORC troops will re-establish a permanent base in their village, so they fled. Only the most desperate head for Thailand, because many of the paths are land-mined and the trip involves dodging SLORC patrols and passing within 10 minutes’ walk of at least two SLORC Army camps.

Photo #47: Child inside a shelter, in hiding in the forest near the Bilin River.

Photo #49: This elderly Karen woman was found like this after struggling to live alone in this field hut.  She apparently starved to the point where she collapsed into the fire she had lit for warmth, and died there.  [Photo: Saw TGH]

Photo #52: Two former SLORC soldiers who quit the Army in disgust. The soldier on the left served for 19 years and had the rank of Lance Corporal, but his salary in 1996 was still only 1,100 Kyats [US$5 at 1996 market rates] per month, out of which he had to buy his own uniforms and some of his equipment. He lost his leg in combat in 1989, was paid 30,000 Kyat ‘compensation’ and given a prosthetis, but when it wore out 3 years later the Army would not replace it unless he paid extensive bribes. As a result, he served as an active soldier from 1991-1996 on crutches with no prosthesis (mostly guarding porters being detained at the Army camp). The soldier on the right had a similar story - over 12 years’ service and a leg lost in 1987. He also could not get a new leg, but had somehow managed to keep repairing his original one with nails and bits of wood and wire until he quit the Army in 1997. They said that normally soldiers are forced to bring in 5 new recruits before they are allowed to quit, no matter how long they have served (this results in soldiers prowling the markets trying to coerce impressionable 12-14 year old boys into the Army); however, they were exempted from this because they had lost limbs. For their long service they now receive a pension: 510 Kyats [US$2 at current market rate] per month.