Description:
The ongoing rape, murder, torture and forced labour suffered by
women living under the Burmese Military Regime in Karen State... Executive Summary: "This report, "State of Terror" clearly documents the range of human rights abuses that continue
to be perpetrated across Karen State as part of the SPDC?s sustained campaign of terror.
The report focuses in particular on the abuses experienced by women and girls and draws on
over 40001 documented cases of human rights abuses perpetrated by the SPDC. These
case studies provide shocking evidence of the entrenched and widespread abuses
perpetrated against the civilian population of Karen State by the Burmese Military Regime.
Many of the recent accounts of human rights violations which occurred in late 2005 and 2006
provide irrefutable evidence that the SPDC?s attacks during this period have increased and
have deliberately targeted the civilian population. The recent dramatic increase in the number
of internally displaced people (IDPs) as well as in those crossing the border in search of
asylum, bears further testimony to the escalation of attacks on the civilian women, men and
children of Karen State.
The report builds on the findings contained in "Shattering Silences", published by the Karen
Women?s Organisation in April 2004. That report detailed the alarmingly high number of
women and girls who have been raped by the military during the years of the SPDC?s
occupation of Karen State. This new report documents the range of other human rights
abuses experienced by Karen women and girls, in particular those of forced labour and
forced portering. The report locates these atrocities within a human rights framework, to show
the direct link of accountability the SPDC bears for the violations committed in these cases.
It also demonstrates the multiplicity of human rights violations occurring, as forced labour is
often committed in conjunction with other human rights violations such as rape, beating,
mutilation, torture, murder, denial of rights to food, water and shelter, and denial of the right
to legal redress. These human rights abuses occur as part of a strategy designed to terrorise
and subjugate the Karen people, to completely destroy their culture and communities. This
report demonstrates very clearly that it is the women who bear the greatest burden of these
systematic attacks, as they are doubly oppressed both on the grounds of their ethnicity and
their gender.
Attacks have continued in spite of the informal ceasefire agreement reached with the SPDC
in January 2004. It is clear that rather than honouring the agreement, the SPDC have
proceeded with systematic reinforcement of their military infrastructure across Karen State,
bringing in more troops, increasing their stocks of food and ammunition and building army
camps across the state. From this position of increased strength the SPDC have conducted
ongoing attacks on villages across Karen State since September 2005. As this report goes to
press over one year later, it is clear that rather than abating, the intensity of these attacks has
only increased. Karen women and children continue to be killed and raped by SPDC soldiers,
are subjected to forced labour, including portering, and are displaced from their homes. In the
first half of 2006 alone KWO received reports of almost 5,000 villagers being taken as forced
labourers, with over five times that many being forcibly relocated from their villages as their
farms, homes and rice paddies were burned. As a consequence, increasing numbers of refugees are fleeing across the border into Thailand and many, many more are internally
displaced.
The world now knows the full extent of human rights violations being committed by the SPDC,
particularly against women and children from the ethnic groups across Burma. The situation
is past critical. The international community must take immediate action to stop these most
grave atrocities."
Source/publisher:
The Karen Women
Date of Publication:
2007-02-00
Date of entry:
2007-02-13
Grouping:
- Individual Documents
Category:
Language:
English
Local URL:
Format:
pdf
Size:
673.45 KB