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DAWN NEWS BULLETIN (r)



Forced Relocation in Karenni area
	About 2500 Karenni refugees from Karenni refugee camps 1 and 2, 
most of them 
women and children, were forcibly relocated to a new site which is just 
one hour's walk 
from the Slorc outpost in Karenni area. 
	The 537 households are living under a cloud of fear after being 
forced to move 
from their camps to the new location by the local Thai authorities on 19 
March 1996. 
	About 12 Thai border police equipped with M16 and HK arrived at 
Char Le camp 
(Refugee Camp 2) in the morning of  March 19.  They demanded the refugees 
pack all 
their belongings and ordered them into waiting trucks.  The soldiers 
threatened if the 
refugees did not obey their orders, they would burn down the camp and 
kill the camp 
leaders.  
	" We did not dare to disobey their order. They were so tough -- 
just like Slorc 
soldiers in Burma!  We just had to follow their demands even though we 
did not know 
where we would be going." said Pha Daw, a Karenni refugee from the camp. 
Another 
refugee said, "The Thai soldiers shouted at us and called us 'stray 
dogs'. I feel bad because 
I understand Thai. They used really bad words in Thai, shouting their 
orders at us to obey 
and be forcibly relocated." 
	After negotiations with the camp leaders, the deadline extension 
of four day was 
agreed upon, but about 40 refugees were loaded into the trucks 
immediately anyway. The 
next day, the same soldiers arrived in the morning and  took the refugees 
away in 4 trucks.  
Some refugees fled at night because they were in great fear for their 
safety.  
	Aye Maung , a ward leader of the Char le refugee camp, said Thai 
security officials 
came to the camp and ordered them out. "They ordered us not to try to 
escape from the 
camp, to pack and get ready to leave. The next morning they trucked us 
from the camp 
and dropped us at the new place."  
	The new site is just dense forest. Upon their arrival, the  
refugees had to build 
rough temporary shelters of plastic sheets and bamboo.  A single mountain 
range, which 
marks the border, is the only barrier between the refugees and Slorc 
forces. 
	"I am very scared to live here because it is so close to the 
Slorc troops. They can  
come and kill us at any time," said  Naw Esther in her crude bamboo hut. 
	In an interview with Aike Ku, a 30-year-old Karenni from Shardaw 
township, he  
expressed the great fear for his safety; if he were sent back to Burma he 
would surely be 
arrested by Burmese troops. He had been conscripted for forced labor at 
military bases 
and for porterage several times when in Burma.  In 1987, he was arrested 
and charged 
with supporting KNPP forces in 1987. During his interrogation, he had 
been beaten and 
tortured. He was released only after his village headmaster bailed him 
out with some 
amount of money. As soon as he was released he fled to the Karenni 
refugee camp.  He 
first came to the Nang Aung Karenni refugee in 1988 and six months ago he 
moved to 
Cher Le camp.  "Most of the refugees in this camp are in the same 
situation as me. We all 
would be in great danger if we were sent back to Burma and rearrested by 
the Burmese 
troops." said Aike Ku.   
	Most of the refugees fled to Thailand several years due to the 
wide ranges of 
human rights abuses by the Slorc troops in their native territory. Some 
of them fled 
recently because of the latest round of fighting between Slorc and 
Karenni forces. 
	No reason for the forcible relocation by the Thai authorities was 
clear, but a KNPP 
commander, General Aung Myat, said he believed the refugees were driven 
out of their 
old camp in response to demands by Burmese authorities. "The Burmese 
soldiers accused 
Thailand of sheltering guerrillas in the old camp and they threaten to 
fire at it with artillery 
if the Thai authorities did not allow them to search it." Their old 
camps  were about seven 
kilometer (four miles) inside Thailand while the new  location is just on 
the Thai side of
the frontier.  
	A Thai border security official said all of the estimated 6,000 
Karenni refugees in a 
string of camps inside Thailand would be relocated to the border line. 
ABSDF family 
member camp in the Karenni area also faced the similar fate of 
relocation. ABSDF camp 
members were evacuated into Thailand to escape an intensive attack by the 
Burmese 
army.  They were immediately forced to move to the same place as the 
Karenni refugees.