Scorched earth victims ordered to rebuild houses

(DVB)–Villagers in Burma’s central Shan state whose houses were razed in the junta’s latest scorched earth campaign this month have been ordered by the army to rebuild their property.

Some 500 hundred houses were burnt down by the Burmese army near Laihka town in Shan state between 27 July and 1 August, uprooting around 10,000 civilians.

Sein Kyi, deputy editor of the Shan Herald Agency for News, said that army officials in the area recently ordered those who fled to return to their villages and rebuild their homes.

“They also shot video and picture footage of the villages being rebuilt to make it look like the army was actually helping the villagers.”

He said the villages were burnt down by army soldiers together with troops from a splinter group of the opposition Shan State Army, known as the Brigade 758.

“Now the army officials are telling villagers it was the Brigade 758 who burnt down their houses, despite warning [the brigade] not to,” he said.

“But actually, it was the [government] troops who burnt down the villages and the Brigade 758 was only accompanying them.”

The order to rebuild the villages follows a press conference held two weeks ago in Bangkok by Shan right groups, who reported that around 40 villages have been targeted in the campaign.

According to the groups, it is the single largest forced relocation in Shan state since a campaign from 1996 to 1998 saw the uprooting of 300,000 villagers, many of whom fled to Thailand.

Some aid materials, brought to the displaced by sympathisers in nearby towns and villages, were reportedly intercepted by the army on August 7.

Sein Kyi said that the materials were recently distributed to the villagers under the army battalion’s name.

Much of the scorched earth campaign has focused on Laikha township, where over 100 villagers, including women, have been arrested and tortured, and three have died. Many of these were displaced by the previous campaign.

Reporting by Aye Nai

READ MORE---> Scorched earth victims ordered to rebuild houses...

China Accused of Ignoring Burmese Junta's Graft

By JIM GOMEZ / AP WRITER
The Irrawaddy News

MANILA — China and other governments with lucrative business deals in Burma are ignoring massive corruption by its ruling military junta, a pro-democracy activist said Thursday.

Ka Hsaw Wa said corruption has become the second worst problem in Burma after widespread human rights violations and afflicts all levels of its government.

Ka Hsaw Wa gestures during a press presentation August 27 in Manila, Philippines. Ka Hsaw Wa, one of six 2009 Ramon Magsaysay awardees, is honored for Emergent Leadership and cited for his "dauntlessly pursuing nonviolent yet effective channels of redress, exposure, and education for the defense of human rights, the environment and democracy in Burma." (Photo: AP)

He spoke to The Associated Press in Manila, where he was named one of six recipients of the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay award, considered Asia's version of the Nobel Prize, for documenting human rights and environmental abuses in his country.

Corruption in Burma should be dealt with urgently, since most people struggle to afford three meals a day, Ka Hsaw Wa said. But obtaining evidence is almost impossible, he said.

"It's simply economic plunder," Ka Hsaw Wa said, adding that "99.9 percent of the ruling junta, from a normal soldier to the top generals, are completely corrupt."

He said corruption within the military should be apparent to friendly foreign governments like China, but they look the other way.

"We won't turn a blind eye to that (corruption), of course," said Ethan Sun, a spokesman at the Chinese Embassy in Manila. He added, however, that trade and economic cooperation "benefit the peoples of both countries."

China has often supported the junta against international pressure in the past.

Most ruling Burmese generals live in sprawling, heavily guarded compounds which are off-limits to the public, he said. When a secret video of the lavish 2006 wedding of Snr-Gen Than Shwe's daughter surfaced on YouTube, it caused outrage in his country.

International watchdogs have consistently ranked Burma among the world's most corrupt nations. Transparency International's 2008 list put it next to last, ahead of only Somalia.

The junta does not publicly respond to accusations of corruption, but it has launched anti-corruption drives mostly targeting low-level offenses. A call to the embassy in Manila was not answered Thursday.

"A lot of countries want to swallow Burma alive, it's so rich in natural resources," Ka Hsaw Wa said. "But they try not to see (corruption) in a way that they can do business there."

While the Burmese government officially restricts logging, middle-level military officers have cut down huge swaths of rain forests for personal profit, he said.

Ka Hsaw Wa, a member of Burma's ethnic Karen minority, was a 17-year-old student activist when the government violently suppressed 1988 pro-democracy demonstrations. After his arrest, he fled to the jungle where he witnessed atrocities committed against villagers, the Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation said.

EarthRights, the nonprofit group he co-founded, filed a case in the United States in 1996 against the US-based oil company Unocal for alleged complicity in human rights and environmental abuses committed by Burma's military in the building of the Yadana gas pipeline. After 10 years of litigation, Unocal agreed to compensate the 11 petitioners.

EarthRights also runs a school in Thailand that trains young people from Burma and other countries in nonviolent social change.

READ MORE---> China Accused of Ignoring Burmese Junta's Graft...

Mutual farming system results in loss of land for farmers

by Phanida

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The mutual farming system in collaboration with private companies has been a disaster for over 1,600 farmers from Dagon Seikkan Township in Rangoon Division, with farmers losing their lands, according to the NLD Peasant Affairs Committee.

The new mutual farming system took off in over 30,000 acres of farmlands in a special agricultural zone last year. But this year, the private companies paid a pittance of only Kyat 20,000 per acre instead of the market price of Kyat 400,000 to 500,000 and then seized farmers’ lands.

"The farmlands were taken over by paying only Kyat 20,000 per acre and farmers are not allowed to till the land.

Moreover farmers were ordered to demolish the farmhouses on the lands. The farmers are seething in anger," the NLD Peasant Affairs Committee Secretary Kyaw Myint told Mizzima.

Over 10 private companies including Htoo, Dagon International, Pinle Koe Thwe, Good Brother, Ahmyother Totetyay, Shwe Nagar Min, Aden Co. worked the farmlands along with the farmers on a mutual farming system by sharing farm produce.

Under the agreement, the farmers, who own the lands, were to get 40 per cent of the profit and get extra money as wages if they worked on their own farmland as farmhands.

The private companies were to provide farming equipments and implements and all production costs. They firms were to get 60 per cent of the profit for investing.

But the private companies seem to have gone back on their commitment and are now paying at a rate, which is much below the market price. To make matters worse the companies are not letting the farmers work in their paddy fields as farmhands. Adding insult to injury they are being forced to demolish their farmhouses. A farmer from Thayetpin Chaung village has lodged a complaint at the NLD office by providing documentary evidence.

An official of one of the private companies working with farmers said that they could not make profits in keeping with the agreement but some companies did make some profit.

"Initially, we agreed. But later it didn't work out. Some companies paid Kyat 20,000. Those who could not work in their land were content with what they got. Some worked in their land and they got something but not in accordance with the agreement reached," he told Mizzima.

"As for the discontent among farmers, some people who bought the land when prices were low would say they are losing their farmlands. It depends on the private companies too. It's impossible to please everybody in every business," he added.

Over 8,800 acres of paddy fields owned by over 1,600 farmers have a dispute regarding profit sharing and ownership in the agriculture special zone in Dagon Seikkan Township. The villages were the dispute exists are Thayetpinchaung, Nyaungbin, Kyisu, Laydaungkan and Thonegwa, the NLD Peasant Affair Committee Secretary said.

It is learnt that some farmers who received refund for their paddy fields have already lodged complaints with the Ministry of Agriculture and the International Labour Organization (ILO).

READ MORE---> Mutual farming system results in loss of land for farmers...

Mae Sot Reacts to Suu Kyi Verdict

By ALEX ELLGEE
The Irrawaddy News

News of Aung San Suu Kyi’s trial verdict spread through Mae Sot’s Burmese community last week, sparking outrage at her extended 18-month house arrest.

Having read the news on the Internet, heard it on the radio or via word of mouth, everyone in Mae Sot was almost instantly aware that the democracy leader would spend the 2010 election campaign in her crumbling two-story house in Rangoon.

For many, Mae Sot acts is the bridge between the tight fists of the junta and Thailand’s democracy. Many political dissidents, who run the risk of lengthy prison sentences in Burma, flee to Mae Sot to operate in relative safety. As a result, many feel especially connected to their hero, Suu Kyi.

Political activists were deeply angered by the Insein Prison court’s verdict, seeing it as the work of a corrupt, dictatorial government.

“I think it is extremely unfair and a brutal act of the military regime,” said a leader of a prominent youth activist group. “It’s clearly all a trap, and we are likely to see trap after trap until the very end.”

In the lawyer community that has been forced to flee to Mae Sot as a result of challenging the junta’s legal system, many are fuming at the court proceedings.

“I am so angry with their behaviour” said Nyi Nyi Hlaing a prominent lawyer now working in Mae Sot. “They said no one is above the law, and then days later they act like they are above the law.”

“The verdict is not legal because they used the 1974 constitution law which was broken in 1988, so they don’t have any law to judge the case on,” said Nyi Nyi Hlaing.

“The government was not chosen by the 1974 constitution, making them an illegal government so they cannot judge Aung San Suu Kyi. I don’t need to say whether the verdict is illegal or not legal because the whole ordeal has been illegal since they arrested Suu Kyi.”

The same sentiments were reiterated by U Myo, a spokesman for the Burma Lawyer council.

“I think that the verdict is entirely wrong in a legal aspect and totally unfair,” said U Myo.

“The charge upon her itself is completely wrong since the responsibility lies upon the security personnel guarding her house.”

A major grievance among the lawyer community is Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s interference with the court proceedings, which they argue is an illegal act.

U Myo explained that the Criminal Procedure Code Section 401 (5) stipulates that only the president is allowed to exercise his or her power over the court.

“Than Shwe is not the president of state because the 2008 Constitution will come to life only after the first session of the 2010 Parliament” said U Myo. “So no one can affirm whether Than Shwe is president now. Thus he could not exercise the power in the said Code to put her under house arrest for one and half year. He has acted in total disregard of the judiciary and has interfered in a case which ought to be acquitted in higher courts. This verdict shows that there is no rule of law in Burma.”

Ko Bo Kyi, a joint-secretary of the Mae Sot-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Burma, had another view on why Than Shwe intervened in the court proceedings.

“Than Shwe was just playing, because many high-ranking officers don’t agree with the verdict, and he wants to try to please them. He also wants other countries to be pleased and ease some of the pressure. Because he is an expert in psychological warfare, we can tell he is just doing it for psychological reasons not for the good of Burma.”

One of the major concerns in the Mae Sot activist community is that without Suu Kyi there can be no real democracy or fair elections in Burma.

“If Aung San Suu Kyi is not included in Burma’s political process, then Burma will not get peace and it will be difficult for national reconciliation” Ko Bo Kyi said.

The Karen communities have also followed the news closely, seeing Suu Kyi as the only way out of their decades-long conflict with the SPDC in Karen State. Although not all Karen wholeheartedly trust her, they see her as a beacon of hope that there may one day be national reconciliation.

David Thackrabaw, vice president of the Karen Nation Union, told The Irrawaddy that he saw the trial as “a plot by the junta to exclude Suu Kyi from the coming election.”

“Her verdict has created even more mistrust of the junta because they cannot treat the Burmese political organizations fairly, so it’s absolutely sure that they will not treat the ethnic organizations fairly” he said.

For the KNU and all Karen people her continued detention is a sign that Karen will continue to be pitted against Karen, all for the benefit of the SPDC. It’s also a sign that thousands of villagers will continue to flee the armed clashes, leaving behind everything they know and own to settle on Thai soil.

News of the trial has spread through the refugee camps surrounding Mae Sot. An English teacher working in the Mae La refugee camp told The Irrawaddy he was surprised to hear that so many of his students had already heard about the verdict.

Asked how she felt about Suu Kyi being sent back to house arrest, a 20-year-old Karen girl said that she “felt so sorry because she is an old lady, but we are not surprised because she is such a massive threat to the generals.”

The migrant worker community that has settled in Mae Sot, forced out of Burma as a result of economic hardships, see their future as being closely tied with the future of Suu Kyi.

“If Suu Kyi is released then all our country’s problems will be resolved” said a woman from Mon State who works in a knitting factory. “If she is freed and is our leader, then I can leave Thailand and live happily in Burma with my family.”

News of the verdict also swept through the brothels in Mae Sot. Like other migrant workers, sex workers left Burma with the hope of making money to send back to their family, but many young girls end up in the sex industry.

One 23-year-old sex worker from Karen State said doubted the government would allow Suu Kyi to participate in the elections even if she was released.

“We know the government is so unfair they will not share their power with her,” said the sex worker.

Even the poorest people in the Mae Sot community, people who work in the rubbish dump to make enough money to survive, have followed the events.

One woman from Karen State, who settled around the rubbish dump five years ago with her family, recalled how many people from the dump sat around a radio, waiting for the announcer to give the verdict.

“When they announced that Suu Kyi was to be sent back to house arrest, we got so angry we lost our minds and begun cursing the radio,” she said.

Mae Sot also has an artist community that followed the news closely.

Tee Lay Tee, a seven-man comedy troupe that was formed in 1998 with the help of the famous comedian Zarganar, who is now serving a 35-year prison sentence, performed at a large show in Rangoon in 2007 where they acted out a joke highlighting the government’s oppression. The Democratic Voice of Burma broadcasted the joke, forcing the group to flee to Thailand to avoid the same fate of their mentor, Zarganar

“When we were living in Burma, we were unable to make shows the way we wanted because there is no freedom of speech,” said a member of the group, now based in Mae Sot. “The moment we criticized the government even the slightest we were forced to leave behind our families and country to come to Thailand.”

He said Suu Kyi is so highly respected that even though the government sentenced her to further house arrest, it can only control her body and is unable to control her soul and the love she has from the Burmese people.

“The government can only imprison Suu Kyi’s body; it will never arrest her mind or spirit” he said.

The Burmese communities in Mae Sot continue to have high hopes for Suu Kyi and remain confident that she is the one person who can bring peace to Burma.

A construction worker summed up the feelings of many people who admire her.

“Like everyone I know in Mae Sot,” he said, “I would take her punishment any day so that she can save our country.”

READ MORE---> Mae Sot Reacts to Suu Kyi Verdict...

Rio 'spy' case: Stern Hu officially charged

By John Garnaut

(SMH) -Chinese prosecutors have finally approved the formal arrest of Rio Tinto iron ore chief Stern Hu and three Chinese colleagues, laying charges of bribery and obtaining commercial secrets, news agency Xinhua reported overnight.

The brief report did not say the four had been charged with stealing state secrets, raising the prospect that authorities have significantly downgraded the case.

Xinjing Bao newspaper reported the case was being investigated under Article 219 of the Criminal Law code which is a commercial secrets provision rather than a state secrets provision.

"That puts it in the business context rather than the realm of state secrets," said Jerome Cohen, professor of law at New York University. "This would seem to be a lowering of the temperature somewhat."

Foreign affairs officials and the Ministry of State Security last month claimed Mr Hu and Liu Caikui, Ge Minqiang and Wang Yong had been stealing state secrets to cause huge economic losses to China.

If the state secrets accusations against Rio Tinto's China iron ore team have been dropped, this would open the way for a far more transparent judicial process, lighter sentenses and perhaps even the possibility of Mr Hu being deported back to Australia.

"Preliminary investigations have showed that the four employees, Stern Hu, Liu Caikui, Ge Minqiang and Wang Yong, had obtained commercial secrets of China's steel and iron industry through improper means, which had violated the country's Criminal Law," reported Xinhua, citing a statement from the China's Supreme People's Procuratorate late last night.

"Prosecution authorities also found evidence to prove that they were involved in commercial bribery," the report said.
"Investigations have also revealed that there were suspects in China's steel and iron enterprises who were providing commercial secrets for them."
John Garnaut is China correspondent for the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald .

READ MORE---> Rio 'spy' case: Stern Hu officially charged...

DKBA ramps up civilian abuses and set sights on Brigade 6

IMNA, Mon Son

Karen people are fleeing in droves to Thailand as the Democratic Karen Buddhist Association (DKBA) commits ongoing human rights abuses.

The Thailand Burma Border Consortium (TBBC) recently reported on the tense situation to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the Thailand-based Karen Refugee Committee (KRC).

According to the report, about 200 Karen people have reached the Tha Song Yang district, Tak province in the last 24 hours alone, mainly taking temporary shelter at the Mae U Su site.

The report also detailed DKBA abuses such as forced recruitment, portering and the extortion of money, food, and livestock. Such abuses have become push factors for Karen migration and the creation of many Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

This month the DKBA and the Burmese army have launched a joint offensive against the Karen National Union (KNU), the main political party of the Karen people. Brigade 7 area has already fallen and the combined forces are now targeting Brigade 6, which includes 18 villages between Three Pagodas Pass Township and Kyainnseikyi Township.

The general secretary of the KRC said, “The number of Karen people arriving in Thailand has increased to 500 people [in the Tha Song Yang district]. Since [fighting began] between the KNU and the DKBA, Karen people have fled to Thailand. Karen people are seeking shelter from the NGOs and the Thai government.”

According to a July 19th story by the Human Rights Foundation of Monland, the Burmese military’s Southeast Command (SEC) has begun using a variety of internal tactics in Karen State, including using DKBA name registries to require two baskets of rice per household, with a 10,000 kyat penalty for failing to provide this.

READ MORE---> DKBA ramps up civilian abuses and set sights on Brigade 6...

Crackdown on Passport Brokers Linked to Leaked Photos?

By SAW YAN NAING
The Irrawaddy News

At least 10 passport brokers in Rangoon have been arrested by the Burmese authorities during a recent crackdown, according to sources in Rangoon.

Sources close to several passport brokers and the passport issuing office in Rangoon said Burmese intelligence officers had detained dozens of people suspected of dealing in Burmese passports.

The authorities also reportedly questioned staff at the passport issuing office in Rangoon.

One inside source, as well as a Rangoon-based journalist, told The Irrawaddy on Wednesday that the authorities had cracked down on passport brokers because of the “massive corruption” involved in the trade.

Another Rangoon-based source said, “Many people are leaving country at the moment, and they don’t return. So, the authorities want to restrict it.”

Meanwhile, some reports said the crackdown was linked to the army officers who went into hiding over the “Shwe Mann scandal.” It is thought the wanted officers from Naypyidaw would try to leave the country with passports procured through brokers.

Recently, Burmese intelligence officials reportedly launched a crackdown against the army officers suspected of leaking information and photographs about Gen Shwe Mann’s secret trip to North Korea.

Ten high-ranking Burmese army officers were reportedly arrested for leaking confidential information, and will be court-martialed and could face the death penalty if convicted, said a Burmese intelligence official.

Sources said that four suspected Burmese officials had acquired passports through brokers and had already fled the country. Another two were reportedly arrested while in the process of acquiring passports.

The Irrawaddy could not independently confirm the report.

Some officials suspected of complicity had also gone into hiding, sources in Rangoon said.

The Bangkok-based English-language newspaper The Nation reported recently that several senior Burmese officials and some journalists were sacked some weeks ago after publication of photographs and video footage of secret tunnels in Burma surfaced in the international media. Photographs and video footage of a tunnel construction site in Burma were also published by Burmese media organizations.

During his seven-day visit to Pyongyang, Shwe Mann signed a memorandum of understanding at the defense ministry with North Korea’s Chief of General Staff, Gen Kim Kyok-sik, to formalize military cooperation between the two nations.

READ MORE---> Crackdown on Passport Brokers Linked to Leaked Photos?...

An enduring byproduct of war

By Daniella Nayu

July 20, 2009 (DVB)–For half a century, Burma’s jungles and mountains have hosted a conflict where conventional weaponry has been traded for tactics designed to forever scar the ethnic population of the country.

The byproducts of the world’s longest running internal conflict, grossly under breported, have been so severe that international lawyers and rights groups believe that the ruling junta in Burma could warrant investigation for war crimes. Perhaps most chillingly, young girls have been subject to appalling sexual violence at the hands of a military bent on creating a means of intimidation that will far outlast the brandishing of a gun.

System of Impunity, a 2004 report by the Women’s League of Burma (WLB), describes the case of a 13-year-old Shan girl, Nang Ung, who was detained by Burmese troops on false charges of being a rebel. “She was tied up in a tent and raped every day for 10 days [by five to six troops each day]. The injuries she sustained from the repeated rapes were so severe that she never recovered. She died a few weeks after her release.”

Naang Ung’s story has been echoed in every ethnic region of Burma for generations. Burmese rights organisations suggest that military rape of ethnic women has been rife in the country for the last five decades since the consolidation of military rule, and shows no signs of abating.

“It can happen in homes, in the villages, in the forests, in the paddy fields, whether the woman is working alone or whether they are going to their villages,” said Cheery Zahau, an activist from the India-based Women’s League of Chinland (WLC). “In some circumstances they just rape the women in front of the men.”

Sexual torture and violence often accompanies such acts. Testimonies from victims show cases of both old women and young girls being gang-raped by up to 20 men, while others report that women who have endured days of rape are then shot in the vagina or have their breasts cut off. Crimes in Burma, a report released in May by the Harvard Law School, said that on many occasions there had been “no attempt to conceal the bodies of dead women who were raped and subjected to other acts of violence.”

Such descriptions are perhaps indicative of a military which has been partially brutalized by debasement, poverty and high levels of institutionalized corruption. Yet this cannot account for all cases. During an interview, Cheery relayed an account of a woman from Chin state whose son had just been killed by the military. After she was gang-raped, the mother was strung up on a wooden cross: “She was hanging outside of the camp the whole night in the freezing winter weather,” said Cheery. “Why would they make the cross to hang the women? The cross is the symbol of Christianity in Chin state; it’s one of the mockeries against their beliefs.”

Religious persecution adds weight to a belief common among ethnic groups that the generals are attempting an ethnic cleansing campaign to strip non-Burmans of their identity. The regime’s suspected policy of ‘Burmanisation’, as referred to in a number of official reports including one by Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), could also help to explain such widespread attempts to impregnate non-Burmese women. While some are convinced on ‘Burmanisation’, the UN’s torture rapporteur for Burma in 2006 reported that state-sanctioned violence against women was used as a control mechanism, and as “punishment” for allegedly supporting ethnic armed groups and “a means of terrorizing and subjugating the population”.

According to Ben Rogers, the Southeast Asia advocacy officer for CSW, it is important to note that “these incidents documented are not simply isolated acts by individual, badly behaved frontline soldiers”. Reports have shown that a high percentage of rapes committed by the Burmese military have been orchestrated by officers. Furthermore, an alarming number have been gang rapes. Moan Kaein, from the Thailand-based Shan Women’s Associated Network (SWAN), stated that 83 percent of the rapes SWAN had documented in Shan state were committed by officers, while 61 percent of all military rapes were gang rapes. Furthermore, there have been reports of officers ordering their men to rape ethnic women on threat of death. “Those who refuse to rape will be shot and killed,” Captain Ye Htut from Pah Klaw Hta army camp was quoted as telling his men in the Karen Women’s Organisation (KWO) report, Shattering Silences.

“When we document all these cases, none of the perpetrators are punished,” says Cheery, referring to WLC’s 2007 Unsafe State report. Despite international publications of reports that specifically name high-ranking officials and officers involved, no actions have been taken by the Burmese government to punish perpetrators even though such crimes are illegal under Burmese law. “This impunity suggests it is a deliberate policy, and is condoned by the regime,” says Rogers.

While the consequences of rape can be horrific – they include unwanted pregnancy, contraction of HIV, and psychological damage for both victim and family – support for victims is virtually non-existent. Even women who manage to flee to the borders have no real hope of any professional psychological assistance, given that they are often not officially recognised by their country of arrival. While some women have been pushed to suicide, others are forced to keep their rape a secret in order to avoid social stigmas.

“The only solution for them is silence, and often they get rejected by their communities,” says Cheery, while Moan Kaein claims that “some husbands will not accept their wives after they have been raped”. Some women also get accused of “sleeping with” Burmese troops and are told to leave their villages.

There is also the real chance of retaliation from troops and government officials. Rape victims and their families have been the most severely punished when such sexual crimes have been reported. According to press releases from the Women’s League of Burma (WLB), four girls aged 14 to16 from a village in northern Kachin state were arrested and jailed after they relayed to independent Burmese media about having been gang-raped by three army officers and four soldiers from a local military base.

Reports of state-sanctioned rape have been consistently met with a tide of public smears within Burma, as well as mass intimidation and deliberate distraction by the military. The problem has been further aggravated by callous retorts from the Burmese government, including the release of a report, License to Lie, attacking authors of License to Rape.

Perhaps more worrying are threats of violence and even death against those who report such cases. System of Impunity describes how the local military officers threatened to “cut out the tongues and slit the throats” of villagers who had dared speak out to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) during their visit to Shan State in January 2003. On 1 June this year, Kachin News Group reported that Kachin youths had been “brutally assaulted” for having prevented the gang-rape of a Kachin girl by four soldiers.

Inaction following international condemnation has also served to dampen hope that ethnic women and campaigners will see change in their lifetimes. On the 24 June, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that “If we ignore sexual crimes, we trample on the principles of accountability, reconciliation and peace. We fail not just women but all people." The statement coincided with the one-year anniversary of the Security Council’s adoption of resolution 1820 (2008), which notes that “rape and other forms of sexual violence in conflict zones can constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity or a constitutive act with respect to genocide”.

The irony of Ban’s proclamation is that sexual crimes in Burma were ignored on his recent visit to Burma earlier this month, just as they are ignored by countries like China and Russia who supply weapons to the junta and by neighboring countries which provide no support for the raped women pouring over the borders. “We call and call,” says Blooming Night, joint secretary of Karen Women’s Organisation, “but nothing happens”.

Increased militarization in many ethnic regions in lieu of the 2010 elections has led to increasing concern for the safety of women living there. “When we documented Unsafe State [in 2007], there were about 33 army camps. Now there are 55 camps, so they’re spreading” says Cheery, adding that “as long as [Burmese] troops are there, there will be sexual violence”. Burma shows no sign of abating its aggressive expansion of the military. If, as it would seem, rape of ethnic women is a byproduct of this, perhaps we should expect the stories of Naang Ung and the thousands of other women and children to continue echoing throughout Burma.

READ MORE---> An enduring byproduct of war...

Soaring investment in Burma 'could hurt' population

(DVB)–Foreign investment in Burma has soared in the past year, with China’s ramped up economic interest in the country accounting for the majority of the rise, said a Burmese government report yesterday.

According to the report, released by the Ministry of Planning and Development, investment leaped from $US172.7 million in the 2007/08 fiscal year to $US984.9m.

The ministry announced that 87 percent of the total investment had come from China, with the majority of its investment focused on the extractive sector.

Reports show that small Chinese companies are focusing on Burma’s hydropower, mining and oil industries.

Economic analysts are concerned however that the extra investment will have no valued impact on the economy as Chinese companies attempt to yield quick results.

Burma expert and economist Sean Turnell, from Macquarie University in Australia, said that the Burmese economy is too risky for investment in infrastructure sectors, with the level of poverty in Burma so extensive that there is no attraction to consumer sectors.

“Burma attracts wild cat companies who come in and out to make dirty money,” said Turnell.

“Burma is at the grip of a resource curse; the extra investment will help the generals stay in power but will not benefit the local people.”

Environmental groups are also concerned that the increased investment will further worsen human rights violations occurring as a result of the resource extraction project.

It is believed that a large chunk of the investment will be going to build the Shwe Gas fields over the coming years.

Spokespeson for anti-pipeline campaign group Shwe Gas Movement, Win Aung, believes that the extra investment from China is only adding to the difficult situation that many people in Arakan state, where the pipeline will begin, already face.

A significant proportion of the Arakan population rely on fishing, and in times of gas or oil exploration, the government often cuts off fishing areas.

“Fishermen are restrained from fishing so they are unable to feed their families,” said Win Aung.

“Military battalions are sent into protect the construction and they create many problems as they confiscate land.

“The government should be directing foreign investment into education and health so the people of Burma will benefit in the future”.

Reporting by Alex Ellgee

READ MORE---> Soaring investment in Burma 'could hurt' population...

Used Car Business Accelerates in Burma

By LAWI WENG
The Irrawaddy News

Hundreds of used cars, mostly made in Japan, are stockpiled in the Burmese border town of Myawaddy, awaiting the arrival of Rangoon-based car dealers, said a border businessman.

Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Friday, a car agent in Myawaddy, said “At some gate points we have 50, 150 or even 500 cars.”

Sometimes 10 cars are sold in single day, including Toyota Land Cruisers, Nissan and Toyoto Hilux and Parado. Prices range from 300,000 baht (US $9,000) to 70,000 baht ($2,100).

Many Rangoon businessmen, including representatives of Tay Za and Zaw Zaw, who are both close associates of Burma's ruling generals, have come to purchase cars, in addition to family members of high-ranking generals, he said.

He said Tay Za and Zaw Zaw’s marketing envoys came twice in one week and bought several cars at a time.

Burma has launched cars auctions at several locations in recent months, according to businessmen, who said the auctions generate income for many people who then buy new cars.

Many of the used Japanese cars in Myawaddy are a decade old, but in many cases they are replacing cars in Rangoon that are several decades older and badly damage. Usually, the used cars arrive through Thai agents.

In June, the Sakura Auto Auction Centre of Sakura Technical Services Co Ltd opened in Cherry Garden Housing in South Okkalapa Township in Rangoon, marking the first time a commercial business has been allowed to sell new cars.

On opening day, the auction sold four new Toyota Land cruisers with a floor price of 300 to 370 million kyat (US $277,778 to $342,592); 50 new model Toyota with a floor price of 100-220 million kyat (US $92,592 to $203,708); and 20 used Toyota with a floor price of 4-100 million kyat (US $3,704 to $92,592), according to Rangoon-based car dealers. Car prices are ridiculously inflated in Burma compared to Western prices.

Businessmen in Rangoon believed that Sakura company is close to influential generals.
Normally, Burma's regime allows only a few thousand new cars to be imported each year.

According to rumors, businessmen say permission to import new cars is done through only two persons in the country—Snr-Gen Than Shwe and vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye.

Some wealthy persons in Rangoon are seen driving Hummers and Italian sports cars.
According to a salesperson with Sakura Auto Auction Centre, the company will import new cars monthly.

READ MORE---> Used Car Business Accelerates in Burma...

China's secrecy laws are a secret

(SMH) -The options for Australian miner Rio Tinto, or indeed anyone, to help four employees detained in a Chinese state secrets investigation are limited, lawyers say, as laws leave great latitude to investigators and prosecutors.

Under China's sweeping laws, the health and even the birthdays of the current leadership are considered state secrets.

Almost anything else can be classed as secret, especially economic data, as China moves from a system where everything once belonged to the state to the current free-for-all where everyone scrambles for any advantage they can get.

Stern Hu, an Australian citizen, and three Chinese colleagues were detained this month for stealing state secrets to aid Rio in price negotiations for iron ore, which is used in steelmaking. At least one Chinese steel executive is also detained and the probe has reached many of the largest mills.

The murkiness of state secret laws puts foreign investors potentially at risk when dealing with state-owned entities and potentially sensitive economic information.

Australia's Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said yesterday the world was watching the case and warned significant economic interests are at stake.

The case has also raised concerns about rights under China's legal system that are more commonly heard from human rights activists than from businessmen.

"This case makes as clear as any does that business people also have human rights," said Jerome Cohen, a professor at New York University School of Law. "They ignore at their peril what are perceived as purely human rights cases, since, as this case illustrates, they can be next."

Consular visits

Chinese diplomatic protocol prevents Australian consular official from asking Hu about anything other than his physical welfare. After their first visit last Friday, Beijing is not required to allow another visit for one month.

During investigations, neither the defendant nor the lawyer have access to documents on which a case in based, and lawyers cannot challenge the "secret" designation, Cohen said.

Lawyers are often not allowed to see their clients until the state security apparatus has concluded the investigation and formally handed the suspect over for prosecution. That can take months, or even more than a year.

Defence lawyers in such cases themselves have a legal "obligation to guard secrets", said lawyer Guan Anping, who took on state secrets cases in the past.

Trials involving state secrets are held behind closed doors, and family members of defendants are barred.

The diplomatic fuss could benefit Hu in areas where Chinese authorities exercise discretion, for instance in allowing earlier access for his lawyer or increased privacy in consultations.

His three Chinese subordinates, and any Chinese executives caught up in the investigation, have far less protection. Rio could hire a lawyer for its Chinese employees, but not much else.

Article 111 of the Chinese code, which refers to illegally providing state secrets or intelligence to organisations or people outside the country, leaves a lot of room for interpretation. Sentences can vary from six months to death, and some foreigners have been expelled after conviction in the past.

"Intelligence" could include information that may be public in China, but considered embarrassing if aired abroad.

Exiled Uighur businesswoman Rebiya Kadeer, who China says was the mastermind behind ethnic riots in Xinjiang, was jailed for mailing newspaper clippings to her husband.

Chinese employees

Chinese-born foreign nationals are particularly vulnerable. Their language and cultural skills mean they navigate the Chinese system well but their loyalty is supposed to be to China first.

That poses a problem for the many multinationals who rely on Chinese employees to advise and carry out operations in China, recognising their ability to bridge foreign and Chinese cultures.

The Chinese business culture is additionally confusing because of the hybrid form of many state-owned companies, which are listed entities but also integral to a state-directed economic model that China adopted from the Soviet Union.

One legacy of the system is that a "state secret" can be in the hands of a commercial enterprise, and the cost of a raw material - such as iron ore - can become of national interest.

Reuters

READ MORE---> China's secrecy laws are a secret...

Crime Rates, Begging, Mental Illness Increase in Sittwe

Dhaka (Narinjara): People in Arakan State have been facing an economic crisis that has contributed to increased rates of crime, begging, and mental illness across the state, particularly in the capital Sittwe, said a woman from the city.

She said, "The rate of beggars, crimes, and lunatics are increasing day after day in Sittwe, which is the outcome of the economic crisis in our state. I have never seen many beggars on the streets of Sittwe before, but now there are many beggars in Sittwe who are roaming the town to ask for food and other assistance."

According to a source, most poor people in Sittwe are working as rickshaw pullers but the daily earnings of rickshaw pullers is inadequate for their families' daily survival. The rental price of a rickshaw is also 700 kyats per day in Sittwe.

"In Sittwe, the number of rickshaws is higher than the number of travelers. The rickshaw pullers have difficulty getting money from the job. Sometimes, the rickshaw pullers can not pay the rental charge to rickshaw owners as they do not have enough money from working. So the family members come out into the streets to beg for food and money," the woman said.

The economy in Sittwe is not doing well right now and everybody is facing financial difficulty. Because of this, the rate of begging and crime have also increased in the capital.

"Most women in Sittwe now avoid walking on the street with jewelry because many robberies have taken place in Sittwe recently. In the last month alone, there were three day time robberies in Sittwe," she added.

Even though robberies are increasing in Sittwe, those who are committing the crimes have not been arrested by police and remain on the streets.

While crime and begging increase, mental illness is also increasing in Sittwe, with the majority of those afflicted being men.

U Tha Kyaw, a store owner, said, "Most of the people have lost their businesses in the Sittwe in the last two or three years. Many of them have turned to drinking alcohol after their livelihoods collapsed. They then lose their minds."

Another source said that some youths in Sittwe are engaging in drug abuse and some are also suffering from mental illness as a result of that abuse.

In Arakan State, the economy is getting worse by the day and no one has been left unaffected. Despite this severe situation, the military government has no apparent plan to help the situation or boost the economy in the state.

READ MORE---> Crime Rates, Begging, Mental Illness Increase in Sittwe...

Kawdut Headmistress' extortion

10th grade students have to give headmistress 20,000 kyat

WCRP (Rehmonnya): 10th grade students were required to pay 20,000 kyat to the headmistress in Kawdut village, Ye Township, Mon State, said a local source.

The families of the students who passed their exams were expected to each shoulder the fees; 31 of 60 students passed in March.

According to a teacher, the Kawdut headmistress said that, “this year we have to repair the school, so the students who passed the exam have to pay 20,000 kyat per each.”

Student parents became upset upon hearing about this request. One parent said, “The school is new and they built a stone school. We don’t see where the school needs repairs and why they said they have to pay for school repairs we don’t understand. In other villages, if the students pass the exam they are given a prize. We never see the other villages [pay as we do].”

The normal registration fee for the Kawdut village 10th grade students is 4,200 kyat; this cost does not include textbooks and other materials.

According to a teacher from a Mon school in Kawdut village, “when my brother attends grade 10th, we have to spend a lot of money for school costs. I may think, after 10th grade I don’t have to pay any [further] costs, but now I have to pay 20,000 kyat again. I cannot pay this money because I have no money to pay. This year is not the same as last year, because we have economic problems.”

As a result of continued economic strains, many villagers from Kawdut, a mainly agrarian community, have migrated to Thailand.

The excessive and oftentimes arbitrary school fees in Mon State have been widely reported by the Independent Mon News Agency. In a recent article they discovered that although the government education ministry claimed to provide free textbooks in Mon State, many still had to pay 3,000 kyat a piece.

READ MORE---> Kawdut Headmistress' extortion...

12 Elders Face Charges for Repairing Bridge

Rambree (Narinjara): 12 village elders in Rambree Township in Arakan State are facing criminal charges brought by the township authority for rebuilding a small bridge in the village without permission of the local authorities, reports a villager.

He said, "12 villagers are now facing trial in the court after township chairman Aung Kyaw Zaw filed charges in court against them for reconstruction of the bridge in their village."

The village elders from Paradan Village in Sikon Village Tract in Rambree rebuilt a small bridge with reinforced concrete after the bridge was damaged. The bridge had collapsed on 5 June, 2009, after a group of cattle crossed over it.

"The bridge was rebuilt by the village elders with donations from local people, but there was no permission from the township authority for the bridge construction. The people are innocent and they did not know they needed to inform the local township authority of the bridge construction. So the people just reconstructed the bridge," the villager said.

When Rambree Township chairman Aung Kyaw Zaw heard the news, he became angry with the village elders because they failed to inform him of their plans.

Afterward, the chairman summoned the village elders to his office in Rambree to admonish them and forced them to sign a paper stating they had abused the law. "After signing, the township chairman charged took action against the village elders and charged them in court," the villager said.

Now the elders have been facing trial in court every week and have been unable to attend to their own agricultural work this rainy season.

Many of the public paths and bridges in rural areas of Arakan State have been renovated and constructed by local people with their own funds because the government fails to maintain the infrastructure as needed. It is rare for such legal action to be taken against villagers doing such work in Arakan State.

READ MORE---> 12 Elders Face Charges for Repairing Bridge...

Counter people with people: Home Minister Maj. Gen. Maung Oo

by May Kyaw

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Home Minister of the Burmese military junta had at a point of time exhorted the staff members of the General Administration Department at a meeting to ‘counter people with people and counter politics with politics’.

In the Home Ministry’s directive, a copy of which has been leaked and is with Mizzima, the Home Minister Maj. Gen. Maung Oo had given such a blatant instruction to officials of the General Administration (GA) Department at a meeting in Naypyitaw Home Ministry’s Meeting Hall on 20 January 2007.

“Counter people with people, counter politics with politics. There is no need to get involved personally. Do it carefully and do it daringly,” he had directed.

In the six-page directive, he had instructed organizing of NGOs so as to be pro-government, to mobilze people, not to confront the army, to go in for fund raising for the welfare of the Home Ministry staff members and to monitor the activities of the ‘National League for Democracy’ (NLD).

Moreover Maj. Gen. Maung Oo had also said that the staff of the Home Ministry should use their power for their livelihood instead of begging.

“Regarding smuggling, arrest them. Report to the authorities, anything you seize from them, either a car or a motorcycle. Surrender them to the customs department. You will get 50 per cent reward money from these goods. So you don’t need to beg, but arrest them for your living,” the directive says.

He had also talked of the junta’s plan of holding mass rallies against the opposition forces in late 2007 to senior officials in the GA Department across the country.

Following the saffron revolution in September 2007, protest rallies were organized by the junta backed civilian organisation - ‘Union Solidarity and Development Association’ - in some States and Divisions across the country.

The meeting presided by the Maung Oo was also attended by the Burmese Deputy Home Minister and Director General of the General Administration.

During the meeting, Deputy Minister Brig. Gen. Phone Swe advised GA officials to build trust and win the respect of ethnic people in their respective regions and to prepare for joining a political party.

Director General Myat Ko also informed the ‘District Peace and Development Council’ (DPDC) Chairmen and ‘Township Peace and Development Council’ Chairmen to thoroughly scrutinize before giving recommendations to establishment of social organizations and to make office expenses frugally.

The DPDC and TPDC are under the jurisdiction of the Home Ministry’s GA Department. While most Chairmen of DPDC has military backgrounds, a few are selected from the civilians and there are a total of 62 districts in the Burmese administration.

Divisional and State level PDC are controlled and are under the charge of the commander of the military regional command in their respective regions.

READ MORE---> Counter people with people: Home Minister Maj. Gen. Maung Oo...

Burmese Army orders civilians to pay cash gifts at wedding

By Takaloo, Rathidaung (Narinjara): The Burmese Army based in Rathidaung in Arakan State has recommended that people carry cash gifts to an army official’s wedding, according to local businessmen.

“The Acting Commander from LIB 536, told us to take cash gifts to the army official’s wedding, if we attended the ceremony. We had to give in to the demand in fear of retaliation and since it was an army official’s wedding,” he said.

The wedding ceremony was held on February 3, 2009, for Corporal Thaung Tun Oo and his warrant officer Tun Myint’s daughter Nwe Nwe Soe at Ray Thon Ray Hall for the Rathidaung-based Light Infantry Battalion 536.

“The amount of cash was mentioned along with the invitation for a particular businessman and VPDC Chairman, as ordered by the acting commander of Light Infantry Battalion (536) Major Thein Nine to be given during the marriage,” the businessman said.

The Burmese Army had demanded Kyat 30,000 from a shrimp trading center, Kyat 15, 000 from one general store, Kyat 10,000 from a rice-mill and Kyat 15,000 to Kyat 30, 000 from a motor-boat owner inRathidaung Township, as gifts at the army personnel’s wedding.

Despite being unwilling to spend such a lot of money due to a crisis in their businesses, all the invited businessmen had to pay the recommended amount to avoid future problems with the army, another businessman said.

“The army had recommended a compulsory gift amount to be offered to the couple at the ceremony, while they were inviting us. Our businesses are not doing well currently and we were not willing to give such a lot of money. However, we had to pay because we are afraid of their interference in our business,” said the businessman.

The VPDC Chairmen of the township were also ordered to give not less than Kyat 5,000 by the army, a Chairman said.

According to local villagers, most of the chairmen had collected the cash from the villagers, citing the orders of the army.

According to a local source, Burmese Army battalions stationed in Arakan State used to collect illegal toll tax from local businessmen and rich men, whenever the army held any army official’s wedding ceremony or religious festivals.

READ MORE---> Burmese Army orders civilians to pay cash gifts at wedding...

Wa crashes, militia booms

S.H.A.N.

The growing tensions between the Burma Army and the ceasefire groups since April have practically put a stop to the United Wa State Army’s drug operations along the Thai-Burma border, according to an informed source from eastern Shan State.

“All those previously working with the Wa in Mongton, Monghsat and Tachilek (the three townships facing Maehongson, Chiangmai and Chiangrai) are either closing shop or moving up to the north,” he said.

The resulting vacuum is being filled up by the junta-backed militia forces that are being expanded, trained and armed by the Burma Army to be employed in the event of war with either the UWSA or Shan State Army (SSA) ‘South’, or both. The best known among them are Punako and Kya Tey in Monghsat township and Nampong in Tachilek township.

Each of them is said to have one heroin factory in their respective areas assigned by the Burma Army. “Anyone who wants to grow poppies has to get himself/herself registered with the local militia,” he said. “And if any of them needs a starting capital, they will furnish it on condition that the loan will be repaid in kind. The crop is also not to be sold to outsiders except those authorized by the group concerned.”

The “king of kings” among them appears to be Punako, led by Ai Long, his younger brother Kyaderh and their brother-in-law Kya Ngoi. The group first came to the attention of the Thai media when its drug market cum transit point at Maejok, opposite Hmong Kaolang, Mae Fa Luang district, Chiangrai province, was overrun by the SSA ‘South” on 8 February 2002. (Saraburi Coal Mining, a company from Thailand that had won a local contract in Monghsat has been recently assigned by the Burma Army to build a road across the Maejok-Hmong Kaolang border)

Aside from producing and trading in drugs, the group is also running a protection racket for drugs coming from outside its territory. “Not unlike Naw Kham (who is running another racket in the Golden Triangle, between Burma, Laos and Thailand),” he remarked. “Also like Naw Kham, the group is also paying kickbacks to the junta commanders from the local up to the regional command.”

One of the trio, Kya Ngoi, is often seen playing golf with the Military Operations Command (MOC) #14 commander in Monghsat. “While the Burmese commander has only 4 armed bodyguards, he always comes to the golf course with around 10 bodyguards of his own,” he said, “leading to a joke that he must be senior to the MOC commander.”

The Wa, meanwhile, are not completely out of the game. “Their high quality heroin and yaba (methamphetamine) are coming to Thailand via the Mekong and Laos,” he maintained. “With ready cash, you’ll be able to buy any amount you wish to order.”

According to the official media, the regional command in Kengtung, 160 km north of Tachilek, put to the torch drugs worth K 20,177 million ($ 20 million) on the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking on 26 June. Much to the surprise of observers, no flippant statements against the ceasefire groups, all of whom are reportedly involved in the trade were issued by Naypyitaw.

President Barack Obama has called the War on Drugs, waged since 1971, an “utter failure”, according to Newsweek, 1 June 2009 issue.

READ MORE---> Wa crashes, militia booms...

Burmese elite enjoy times of plenty

By Amy Kazmin

(FT) -It’s nearly midnight on Saturday and the dance floor of DJ’s Bar in Rangoon is packed with Burmese youth, grooving to throbbing house music as red, green and yellow light beams flash and slice across the room.

The revellers – young men with hair gelled into modish styles and young women wearing mini-skirts and clutching mobile phones – have each paid a $10 cover charge to enter, a steep price in a land where university lecturers earn just $80 (£50, €57) a month.

Yet the hefty charges are no barrier for these affluent, well connected members of an emergent Burmese elite with money to burn.

“People are spending money – and it’s not just a half a dozen of the regime cronies,” says one foreign diplomat in Rangoon.

Burma’s resource-rich economy, a treasure trove of natural gas, precious gems and valuable hardwood, has long been squeezed by the twin pressures of western sanctions and a military junta with a weak grasp of economics and little faith in civilian technocrats.

That no-win combination has left most of Burma’s 52m people struggling to get by, with their frustration boiling over into mass protests in 2007.

Yet amid the widespread hardship, Rangoon, the dilapidated former colonial capital, is acquiring a veneer of wealth, as a privileged elite enjoys unprecedented times of plenty, two decades after the military abandoned its autarkic “Burmese way to socialism”.

Today, Burmese with the right military connections are profiting from access to natural resources, government construction contracts and privileges including the right to engage in international trade, still tightly controlled by the regime.

In the commodity boom, Burma’s agricultural exports soared to $2bn, up from $300m a few years earlier, doing little for farmers, but enriching urban traders. “There is economic activity going on,” the foreign diplomat said. “The vast majority of trade is with Burma’s immediate neighbours, and there is a lot of investment and a lot of exports.”

Growth in tourism and other forms of commerce has created a small cadre of professionals. “More people are getting management roles and seeing salaries rise,” said the diplomat.

Meanwhile, signs of affluence are everywhere. Stylish-looking new condominiums are sprouting near the city’s lakes, and prime real estate prices have tripled over the past five years. Colonial-era wooden bungalows are being replaced by ostentatious mansions with Greco-Roman columns.

Young men drive souped-up Jeeps painted lemon yellow or ultra-violet while their elders display their wealth in expensive imported Land Cruisers and Pajeros. Swanky boutiques proliferate, with names such as the Sky Princess beauty salon, We and We interior design, and She Shines jewellery.

Yet some savvy Burmese business people say Rangoon’s spurt of highly conspicuous consumption reflects the economy’s deep malaise – including its dysfunctional banking system and rampant inflation – rather than its fundamental health.

Although Burma has about a dozen private banks, they are hampered by regime rules that cap their deposit-taking at just 10 per cent of their paid-in capital, preventing them from channelling surplus household cash into productive investment. According to the IMF, the ratio of bank deposits, and credit to the private sector, to gross domestic product has fallen sharply over the past eight years.

With inflation running at about 30 per cent, many Burmese are pouring their surplus cash into hard assets that they feel will at least hold their value – if not appreciate. “You can’t put it in the bank so you put your money in cars or a nice new house to keep the value of the money,” said one business person.

But Burma’s asset bubble may be about to burst. Many of the Rangoon condos have been developed by companies that received prime urban land as part of their payment for helping to build the junta’s new capital city far to the north and its $3.5bn new airport. Many of the units are unsold, leaving the companies struggling to recover costs.

Senior General Than Shwe, the junta’s head, has apparently ordered the government to balance its budget, which has been in deficit for years, ahead of the regime’s planned elections next year, which could create a squeeze on liquidity and bring the spending spree to a halt.

“No one is getting any more money,” said one economist. “Businessmen are also quite fed up. They want change.”

READ MORE---> Burmese elite enjoy times of plenty...

Informers make life difficult for Rohingya community

Maungdaw, Arakan State (Kaladan): Informers from various departments of Maungdaw are making life very difficult for the local people, according to an elderly person from Maungdaw Town.

The informers are providing wrong information to their concerned departments, to earn various favours as well as money. Therefore it becomes very difficult for the poor local people to survive along with their families, he said.

Dil Mohammed, son of Kalu and Rashid, son of Bawdu from Shewza Village are informers working for the Nasaka’s outpost number 14. They have close connections with Captain Khin Maung Myint (now Captain Aung Htoo). They have been providing wrong information to the Nasaka, like possession of Bangladeshi mobiles, border crossing, trafficking and money laundering. Due to these wrong allegations, many people are facing arrest and have had to pay bribes to avoid being arrested, a school teacher from the village said.

Besides, these informers are also involved in drug trafficking, due to an understanding with the concerned officer in their village and township and also with the help of , Way Tha Maung the brother-in-law of U Shew, who is the Secretary of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) of Maungdaw. He was released from jail last year, he added.

The two informers are working with the help of USDA. They are also involved in smuggling activities from Shewza village, where they have paid money to the officer in charge of Nasaka outpost 14. If someone tries to take action about this, they use the power of the USDA and take the help of other influential people from the administration to dissolve the matter and counter attack them, he added.

A village officer, who tried to support the villagers regarding this matter, had to face many false cases filed against him, by the concerned authorities, a victim of these allegations said.

Due to the wrong information provided by the informers, some Rohingya people lost their houses and lands, as three houses were seized by the authorities last month.

The Rohingya people, who lost their houses, were Goolitta, Zakhair and Dil Mohamed. They hailed from Shawza village of Maungdaw, currently, facing a lot of trouble to survive during the monsoon season, he added.

On the other hand, the informers of the police are causing trouble for the shopkeepers in Maungdaw, accusing them of selling drugs in their shops and asking them for money to avoid arrest, a shopkeeper from Maungdaw said.

This is a master plan of the police and the informers jointly, to keep Yaba tablets in their shops through informers after which the police would raid the shops. Then the police would demand money for the release of the shopkeepers, said the shopkeeper.

“If there were no informers, maybe we could stay peacefully in our town and no one would get into trouble with the authorities,” a student from Maungdaw said.

READ MORE---> Informers make life difficult for Rohingya community...

Hostages and Slaves

By WAI MOE
The Irrawaddy News
JULY, 2009 - VOLUME 17 NO.4

The underground world of human trafficking on the Malaysian-Thai border is one of corruption and broken dreams

ALOR SETAR, Malaysia — “Malaysian migration officers sold me to a human trafficking gang located near the Thai-Malaysian border,” said Lwin Ko, one of thousands of victims of human trafficking in Malaysia.

Like many other Burmese migrant workers and refugees in Malaysia, he was arrested for illegal entry into the country. After processing in an immigration detention center, he said, immigration officers transferred him directly to a gang of human traffickers, who treated him as a “hostage,” or slave, to be held for a lucrative ransom.

Migrant workers are apprehended and led to an open area by civilian security volunteers to have their documents inspected during an immigration raid in Kuala Lumpur in 2005. (Photo: AFP)

If no ransom was forthcoming after a few weeks, Lwin Ko would be passed on like many others to work as a crewman on a fishing boat or, for women, to work as household servants or as prostitutes in brothels.

When police arrested him, Lwin Ko, 17 years old at the time, was on his way to work in a Malaysian factory. “I did not have any money,” he said. “If I had about RM 100 [US $28], I could have paid the Malay police to release me.”

After serving six months in prison, he was transferred to a Malaysian immigration detention camp in Juru in Pulau Pinang Province, one of the most notorious detention centers in the country.

After one week, Malaysian immigration officers placed him in a truck with more than a dozen other Burmese migrants.

“We drove for three hours to the border town of Alor Setar,” Lwin Ko recalled. “The truck stopped at a roadside shop near a rubber plantation, where officers had a meeting with traffickers. Then we were moved to a traffickers’ truck where we were put with about 70 Burmese from the Juru detention camp.”

Lwin Ko received money from friends and paid RM 2,300 [$653] to return to his job in Kuala Lampur.

Recently, six victims of human trafficking in Malaysia told their stories to The Irrawaddy. Each told a similar tale, confirming that corrupt Malaysian immigration officers, organized trafficking gangs, and corrupt Thai officials, work in tandem to transfer hapless illegal migrants to human traffickers.

After leaving detention centers, luckless migrants eventually end up in buildings or homes along the Thai-Malaysia border owned by the gangs.

None knew the amount of money the traffickers paid the corrupt officers, but it’s estimated to be somewhere between RM 700 to 1,000 [$198- $286] for each person sold.

One of the victims, Win Tun, 26, who is from central Burma and who worked in Kuala Lumpur, said: “We were arrested by police and immigration officers, and they placed us in the hands of traffickers.”

The gangs told the trafficking victims they had to pay RM 1,900 to 2,300 [$539-$653] if they wanted to return to Kuala Lumpur or Burma. Most gang members, they said, were ethnic Mon from Burma. Gang leaders, however, were usually Thai or Malaysian, who appeared to be well connected to local Thai or Malaysian authorities. Some leaders were reportedly officers in either immigration or police services.

Sithu Aung, 30, who is from Rangoon and worked in Kuala Lumpur, recalled what happened when he arrived at the traffickers’ building.

“They let me call my friends in Kuala Lumpur to ask for money,” he said. “They asked me for RM 2,300 to take me from that border town back to Kuala Lumpur.”

Unlucky migrants who cannot afford to pay for their freedom are usually sold to owners of Thai fishing boats, where they work in slave-like conditions.

According to a Burmese man, a former member of a trafficking gang who is now in hiding in Kuala Lumpur, after Malaysian immigration officers sell victims to a trafficking gang, the gangs usually wait one or two weeks for money to arrive from a victim’s family or friends.

If no money comes by the third week, said the man, who goes by the name Wanna, the hostages are usually passed on to be sold into the fishing industry or into household service or prostitution.

“Taking an illegal migrant is like taking a hostage,” said Wanna. “If they have money, they cannot be freed until we are paid. If they don’t have money, they will be sold somewhere else.”

Traffickers have no fear of authorities, he said, because immigration officials see illegal migrants as “second-class humans.”

Latheeffa Koya, a well-known Malaysian human rights lawyer, said the human trafficking business along the border is nothing more than a form of slave trade in the contemporary world. The problem is transnational, she said, and to be remedied, all nations in the region must cooperate with each other.

“The reasons behind the problems are corrupt law enforcement and xenophobia,” she said. “The Malaysian people and the media have to know about this ugly issue.”

Why are Burmese the main victims in the slave trade on the Malaysian-Thai border?

Aegile Fernandez, the coordinator of Tenaganita, a Malaysian human rights group, explained: “Burmese are highly valuable goods [for traffickers] because as refugees they are not accepted by their own country.”

Some victims who are sold to traffickers had even registered with the UNHCR, the UN refugee agency. But Malaysia has not signed the UN refugee convention, she said, so it goes unrecognized and is of no help.

“We are sad to see that Malaysia has high corruption,” Aegile Fernanadez said. “Officials are so greedy for money. They look at illegal migrants as a valuable resource.”

The situation facing Burmese migrants in Malaysia, who total an estimated 500,000 people, is quite different from migrants from other countries in the region who work in the country. Malaysian human rights groups say that if Malaysian authorities arrest undocumented migrants from Indonesia, the Philippines or Bangladesh, they are returned back to their country through government-to-government cooperation.

However, the Burmese military regime is unwilling to cooperate with any country which has detained illegal Burmese migrants. When faced with immigration problems, even legal migrant workers who are in Malaysia via agents cannot get routine help from the Burmese embassy in Kuala Lumpur.

Sometimes Burmese embassies in Thailand and Malaysia even publish notices in Burmese that read: “Come in person, but don’t come with a problem.”

Of course, human traffickers operate on a two-way street, and also smuggle people out of Burma through Thailand and into Malaysia. All undocumented Burmese migrants interviewed by The Irrawaddy said that they paid up to 100,000 kyat [about US $100] to trafficking agents in Rangoon or Kawthoung, in southern Burma, to be smuggled into Malaysia.

Traffickers in Kawthoung transport migrants to the Thai town of Ranong by boat, where they then depart by bus or vehicle to cross the Malaysian border.

“I was put in a box that they placed in the baggage area of a bus,” said Myint Lwin, who recalled his journey into Malaysia.

Traffickers clearly have the help of local police and immigration officials, said one migrant.

“I saw people in uniform help traffickers in smuggling people from Thailand to Malaysia,” he said. “How else can we come to Malaysia through so many checkpoints?”

How to combat the human trafficking issue in Malaysia and all of Southeast Asia is a major issue for Malaysian authorities as well as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean). Human rights advocates and analysts say all Asean nations have a clear obligation under the new Asean charter.

Migrant issues in the region are recognized as an urgent problem that must be resolved, said Usana Berananda of the department of Asean Affairs in Thailand’s foreign ministry.

But recognizing a problem and taking concrete actions to solve it are not the same. Migrants and analysts are skeptical, pointing out that officials in many Asean countries still view migrants as an enemy, even though many significant industries and businesses in the region survive by employing a migrant workforce, often illegal.

“I do not see any good prospect for Burmese migrants and refugees unless governments in the region give up their bad policies on migrants,” Aegile Fernandez said. “We need the governments to take real action against corrupt immigration officers. However, it will be difficult because the immigration department is also the government itself.”

While activists and honest government officials struggle with the human trafficking problem in the region, average Burmese migrant workers in Malaysia simply hope they can avoid the corrupt officials and traffickers.

“I need to be aware of everything,” said Myint Lwin, who was sold to traffickers in late 2008. “Everything depends on karma. I am just praying to secure myself from arrest and human traffickers in the future.”

Stories such as Myint Lwin’s were outlined in a US State Department report this year, citing credible evidence of Malaysian immigration officials’ involvement in human trafficking. The report estimated that only 20 percent of the victims sold to traffickers by Malaysian officers are able to pay for their return. The unlucky people who cannot pay are passed on into a pitiless world of exploitation.

In June, the Malaysian government denied the US allegations in the report, issuing a statement calling the allegations “baseless.”

“The government has already initiated a few internal investigations, but [the accusations are] baseless,” said Malaysian Home Ministry Secretary Gen Mahmood Adam.

Such words ring hollow to the Burmese victims now toiling on Thai fishing boats or in houses of prostitution.

This story was written during a 2009 Southeast Asian Press Alliance Fellowship program.

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