"With a population of over 50 million people, Burma is comprised of eight major ethnic nationalities: Burman, Shan, Karen, Karenni, Mon, Chin, Kachin and Arakan. Burma?s ethnic groups demand equality, autonomy and self-determination, but are systematically denied their rights by the regime. Instead, they are met with human rights violations: forced labor, forced relocation, religious persecution, arbitrary arrest and detention, destruction of thousands of ethnic villages, the driving out of hundreds of thousands of ethnic civilians to neighboring countries, and the forced internal displacement of an estimated one million people. Worse yet is that Burmese military soldiers are raping the ethnic women and girls with impunity. Women and girls from the Shan, Kachin, Chin, Karen, Mon, Karenni and Arakan states have long suffered under these state-sanctioned sex crimes. Rape incidents in ethnic areas are higher than anywhere else in Burma because they are part of the regime?s strategy to punish the armed resistance groups or used as a tool to repress various peoples in the larger agenda of ethnic cleansing. Although rape has been used by the regime to control the population for decades, it took years and the courage of many women to document these crimes. In recent years, the different women?s groups operating in Burma started documenting the systematic sexual violence against ethnic women by the State army soldiers. The total number of rape victims documented in these reports from Chin, Shan, Karen, Mon and Kachin states totals 1,859 girls and women, with some accounts going back as far as 1995. As a result of these reports, the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma has repeatedly raised concerns about the widespread use of sexual violence by the regime?s troops. However, the military regime and the ?new?, nominally civilian government of Burma, has continued to deny this atrocity and the sexual violence continues. This report will look into the meaning of ?rape as a weapon of war?, the way it is used by the Burmese military and the response that the Burmese government and the international community could provide to stop such practice..."