Situation Update | Than Daung Township, Toungoo District (November 2011)

The following situation update was written by a villager in Toungoo District who has been trained by KHRG to monitor human rights conditions. It is presented below translated exactly as originally written, save for minor edits for clarity and security.[1] This report was received along with other information from Toungoo District, including three incident reports, two interviews, two other situation updates and 204 photographs.[2]  

Human rights abuses still happening in Daw Pa Ko [Than Daung] Township

The military government changed to U Thein Sein’s USDP [Union Solidarity and Development Party] government and the [USDP] government took power after six months, this year. This year, at the beginning of October, a new southern commander whose name is Bo [officer] Nyo Thaung, came and took responsibility in the area. Under his control are the army [Tatmadaw] units at Ta Pa Ka [Southern Command Headquarters], which are IB [Infantry Battalion] #92 and LIB [Light Infantry Battalion] #603. These units fought with the KNLA [Karen National Liberation Army] in Daw Pa Ko [Than Daung] Township in the Htee Tha Saw area, east of W--- village. After that, the SPDC[3] soldiers entered W--- village and destroyed things. They took villagers’ possessions and money, and they killed villagers’ animals and destroyed several things.

Village locations and occupations

W--- village is located in the Ht--- area, east of the Day Loh [River] in Daw Pa Ko [Than Daung] Township. It is far to the northeast of Than Daung Gyi Town, about 15 miles (24 km), and it is also east of the Day Loh River, where the surface of the earth is only mountains. East of the Day Loh, there are over 30 villages, but in the Htee Tha Saw area, there are only nine villages. There are nearly 300 households and the population is between about 1,500 and 1,600. The villages are: (1) Th---, (2) Bp---, (3) K---, (4) M---, (5) A---, (6) R---, (7) W---, (8) P---, and (9) L---.[4] 

Most of the people who stay there [in the Htee Tha Saw area] are Geko, Gebar or Bres [Karen] and they are Karen ethnicity. Their religion is Roman Catholic.

The villagers who stay there do agriculture such as [cultivating] betelnut, betel leaves and cardamom; and some plant paddy in hill fields and a few farm [paddy fields] near the river bank. We saw that for their livelihoods, they always have to work hard and they do not have time to rest. The produce that they get, they sell beside the Tha Yin Ker – Htee Tha Saw – Leit Tho vehicle road; some go and sell it in Than Daung Gyi and some sell it in villages beside Than Daung Gyi. If there are no disturbances to their travelling, it takes two or three days. Especially, this year, it was raining a lot and the river became bigger, so for the villagers’ travelling, it became a problem for them to cross the river.

Because the villagers have faced problems for many years, the weather was also bad [in 2011], and the SPDC came and destroyed the villagers’ agricultural workplaces and disturbed their travels, they do not have enough food now and they have to stay in poverty.

The Htee Tha Saw area is governed by two groups, which are the Burmese government and the KNU [Karen National Union] government. So the people who stay there have to be friends with the [two groups of] governors in a sensible way. The Burmese government does not keep the area as a fighting area, but the area is near a place where the SPDC and KNLA keep fighting, so we see that there is no difference between the fighting area and the area under SPDC control. Whether the SPDC troops have to send rations to their camps or whether their columns are active on patrol, the villagers have to carry loads, guide and clear bushes from around the electricity poles. They have to go at least three or four times a year between Law Pee Tar and the Leit Tho area of Toungoo. If they do not go for forced labour, they have to pay at least 3,000 kyat (US $3.90)[5] for each day that they do not go. The villagers have to get a written permission document for travel as the SPDC requires.

SPDC locations

In the Than Daung [Township] area, the camps that SPDC units occupy are Thaw Yin Ker, Htee Tha Saw, Gk’Lay Ta, Yar Ro, Tha Kweh Bploh. Now IB #92 stays and is active there. Above the vehicle road, in the Leit Tho, Daw Mar Der and Bp’Ho areas, LIB #603 stays and is active there under the Southern Command.

Commander Kyaw Min Thu of MOC [Military Operations Command] #2 came and stayed in Leit Tho and manages operations from there. For the area west of Day Loh in the Than Daung Township area, IB #124 takes security, and in eastern Than Daung, around the Day Loh River, the MOC #9 battalion which stays and is active there is LIB #378.

Destruction and loss of villagers’ property

On October 12th 2011, a column of soldiers from SPDC IB #92 and LIB #603 was active and fired mortars and small arms in W--- village. They also shelled farms, fields, plantations, orchards and forest. After that they entered W--- village and destroyed villagers' possessions and houses. Villagers whose houses were destroyed were: Saw P---, Saw W---, Saw G--- [see No. 14 in the table below], Saw A---, and Naw T--- [see No. 13 in the table below]. The walls, floors and roofs of their houses were destroyed.

Table A.1: Villagers’ cardamom, money and other property stolen or destroyed[6] 

When the SPDC fired heavy weapons and small arms in the village, immediately, the villagers went out of the village without any food or clothes. The SPDC saw this and so did whatever they liked with the things that they [the W--- vllagers] had left behind.

At that time it was raining all day and night so the villagers who fled into the forest, especially the children and elderly people, got sick and are [sick] even now. Because the SPDC entered and destroyed [the village] and were active in the area, villagers did not dare to go to their fields, cardamom orchards and betelnut orchards, and they could not work or prepare paddy for a week. Their paddy and fruit got rotten, so that has affected their income and caused problems for their families to be able to eat.

When the SPDC entered and destroyed things, they also destroyed things in the Roman Catholic church including a statue of Mary. They fired at it with a gun so it broke into two or three parts. They broke pictures and materials in the church so it made the Christians very sad.

At that time [in October], the SPDC column was active in the area, so villagers who stayed there did not dare to travel and could not work in suitable weather, so they had to go in fear and were worried. Villagers who stayed in the area did not dare to travel and could not harvest paddy or pick cardamom. It was also the time that the villagers had to harvest their plantations that they had been working on for the year. It was not easy to work at this time, so in the future there will be a food problem for some villagers.

Health care and education

There is no special hospital or clinic in the W--- village area. The villagers use traditional medicine and a few use medicines from western countries when they bring them secretly. The government does not allow the villagers to bring medicine. If they see that villagers bring medicine, they would severely punish them, so the villagers also do not bring [medicine with them]. If someone is seriously sick, they send them to town.

For education, we saw that all villages have school up to grade four in primary school. Some schools were established by the Burmese government and some were established by the villagers. Most children who finish school in the villages do not continue to study, and help their families instead. There is no one who has finished high school who helps the villagers in that area. All the male and female teachers who teach in the area are from other places.

Table 2: SPDC army camp locations:

Conclusion

In this area, the SPDC destroyed villagers’ occupations and their church so the villagers who stay in that area have to suffer in their bodies and also in their hearts. Previously, the weather was not good and it was dry, so some plantation crops died, while others remained but could not bear fruit, so the villagers could only get a small income from their fruit. If we count in percentages, the income that would remain for the villagers is only 30 or 40 percent of what it should be. In order to get enough food the villagers tried to do hill fields, but it rained early so they could not burn the fields very well and some places that they planted paddy were destroyed by rats and wild pigs, so the villagers could get only half the rice [they expected]. According to the information above, the SPDC was also active in the field areas so the villagers could not harvest their paddy, although some villagers went and harvested at night time. For the villagers to get access to services and food and be able to stay safely, they need help to solve the problems that they face.