CHO CHIN WOMAN RAPED BY BURMESE SOLDIER

(Photo: Chinland Guardian)

A 23-year-old Chin woman was raped by Burma Army soldier in Kyauktaw, Rakhine State on 28 July 2012.

Three soldiers were said to have stopped the Chin woman while she was looking for her husband who was thought to be recently recruited by Burma Army battalion based in the Rakhine town.

The victim, from Mindat Township, Chin State, was quoted as saying that three soldiers grabbed her but only one soldier committed the sexual abuse in the early afternoon.

A Chin Christian pastor from Rakhine State said the victim was rescued last Sunday and taken to Mindat town via Mrauk-U in Rakhine State.

The soldier gave a total amount of 500,000 Kyats in compensation to the Chin victim and the case was settled, according to the pastor.

Detailed information about the parpetrator remains unknown up to date.

There are 10 Infantry Battalions of the 9th Military Operations Command (MOC-9) based in Kyauktaw alone.

Malaysia’s RELA Raids Refugee Neighborhood, Arrests Dozens

 

RELA broke this door and forced -enter the house

01 December 2010: Over 100 ‘illegal’ migrants, including about 30 Chins were arrested in one of the biggest raids yet on a refugee neighborhood by Malaysia’s RELA since the beginning of the year.

At around 1:00 a.m. last night, an army of RELA personnel rounded up the Jalan Imbi neighborhood of Kuala Lumpur, breaking locked doors and forced-entering people’s houses.

“We were having a Sweet December gathering when we heard that RELA was rounding up the entire neighborhood,” said a 17 year-old UNHCR-recognized Chin refugee girl who said she was initially taken away before being released about an hour later.

All but one in her house was later released after the RELA found them to have possessed UNHCR cards.

“We immediately turned off the lights and stayed quietly in the rooms. But they broke the backdoor open and forced their way inside the house anyway,” she explained. She said that there were over 20 people gathering in the house for a mid-night Sweet December celebration when the RELA stormed in.

According to a representative of the Chin Refugee Committee (CRC), which runs a center in the same neighborhood, the raid last night was the biggest of its kinds since the beginning of 2010. “We had some smaller-scale raids every now and then, but they were mostly conducted in late afternoon or early evenings,” he said, adding that last night raid was “very unusual” for this year.

Many of the arrested refugees are being detained at an immigration processing center at Daman Sarah in Kuala Lumpur, where they remain as of late this afternoon.

Among the detainee are some UNHCR-recognized refugees who did not carry their UNHCR cards at the time of their arrest, as well as, those refugees who carried only certified copies of UNHCR card after they lost their original documents.

Other nationals rounded up in the raid included migrant workers from Indonesia and Bangladesh.

http://www.chinlandguardian.com/news-2009/1132-rela-raids-refugee-neighborhood-arrests-dozens.html

Home is Where the Heartbreak Is

Each year on November 11th we take a moment to reflect on the people who took part in both World Wars, and how their sacrifices made our current freedom possible. We also use that day to remember the atrocities that mankind has inflicted upon each other and strive to ensure it never happens again. The shocking thing is these atrocities are still happening on a daily basis in places that most of the world turns a blind eye to.

Armed with nothing more than a camera, and a desire to bring the plights of the Burmese people to the global conscious, director Desiree Lim went to Malaysia to document what was going on with the refugee situation over there. What she uncovers in her documentary, Home, is a horrific account of violence and corruption that has infested every single aspect of Malaysian society.

Home examines how Burmese refugees flee the violent rule of the military junta for the safer lands of Malaysia and Thailand. Yet once they have reached these places, the Burmese refugees are subject to a whole other level of corruption and violence that they could have never imagined. Immigration agencies such as RELA routinely blackmail the refugees with threats of deportation. They are also unable to obtain the proper paperwork needed to start a new life so many must work illegally. This not only subjects them to police brutality, but physical, mental and sexual abuse as well. Many of the women are either raped by their employers or are sold to human traffickers, while the men are forced to work on fishing boats where their survival rate is slim at best.

What is really disturbing about all of this is how much Malaysia relies on the illegal immigrants for their infrastructure. There are now over three million Burmese refugees working in Malaysia. They keep all the various businesses, especially the food industry, running. Even the Burmese who have landed legally are not exempt from the corruption. The military junta have deals with Malaysia and Thailand which enforces that all Burmese workers in those lands have to pay a 10% tax off their paychecks. The money collected from this tax would go straight back to military junta. This essentially ensures the revolving door of corruption goes on as those who refuse the tax, or are working illegally and cannot pay the blackmail fees, are sent back to Burma.

The film is broken up into two parts, though only one is truly successful. The first half of the film is a drama in which Desiree Lim enlists one of the refugees, Roi Roi, to help reenact some of the stories that came out of Lim’s conversations with the refugees. This section nearly kills the film in my opinion, as the untrained actors do not convey the range needed for this type of tale. To be honest, I was getting ready to write the film off by time the credits rolled on the first segment.

Luckily I stuck with the film because the second half, the documentary section, is what truly makes this film work. All the emotion that was missing from the first segment is on display here. It is both mesmerizing and heartbreaking to hear the refugees, some of which whom cannot show their face on camera, recount the horrors that they have lived through up to this point. Whether it is the pastor living in the jungle, the mother taking care of both bedridden husband and their four kids, the woman degraded and abuse by female soldiers, or the human rights advocate discussing the obstacles she faces, they all have the same devastating impact.

Home does not provide any answers, which is not surprising considering that this is an issue that is much more complex than you could even imagine. Yet Home is a film that more people really need to see and discuss. The world cannot continue to turn a blind eye on this issue.

For more information on this subject please be sure to visit www.projecthomemalaysia.com