CHRO

Legal-Analysis_final (1)

Legal Analysis Related to Sanction Designations on Members of Northwestern Command of the State Administrative Council (SAC)

Introduction

This briefing outlines the key legal arguments pertaining to crimes against humanity and war crimes carried out by the State Administrative Council (SAC) in the context of the ongoing non-international armed conflict (NIAC) in Chin State and Western Burma. Select cases, compiled as part of the CHRO’s ongoing documentation activities, are used as reference points from across geographical locations which the CHRO has been closely monitoring and gathering first-hand information. Where required, information from credible secondary sources has been used. Within it are details of grave human rights violations having taken place in Matupi, Mindat and Thantlang townships of Chin State, and Magway and Sagaing Regions of Western Burma.

The objective of this briefer is to outline, and, where possible name the key decision-makers ordering the crimes outlined within this document. The CHRO has mapped the Tatmadaw hierarchy and command structure operating in Chin State and Western Burma for contextual reference for the initiation of appropriate individual and targeted sanction designations. The data has been compiled through access to leaked documents and interviews with defectors and eyewitnesses conducted by CHRO’s team of field workers. The primary objective of this briefer is to highlight why senior individuals within the below command structures and the specific battalions – that have designed and carried out attacks against the civilian population by targeting homes, livelihoods and lives – need to be considered for sanctions. It is also hoped that ongoing advocacy toward sanctioning regimes, such as those pertaining to aviation fuel and arms embargos will be supported by the following information within the report.

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MAE SOT, Thailand—A few times each month, Saw Khu wakes before dawn and sets out on a dangerous mission to deliver sacks full of Western aid money to conflict-torn areas deep inside Myanmar.

After sneaking across the border from Thailand in a wooden canoe, he is driven through a mountain range strewn with soldiers from Myanmar’s military, which seized power in a coup last year. Arriving at a rendezvous point, he divvies up the cash among colleagues who either hand it over to families in need or use it to buy rice, instant noodles, tarps, mosquito nets, soap and other essentials for them.

“I’m not afraid,” said Mr. Khu, a 47-year-old Myanmar national whose nonprofit has around 200 members across southeast Myanmar and a handful in Thailand. “It’s something that has to be done.”

Mr. Khu’s missions are illegal in both countries. They are one of the few precarious avenues being used to get aid to Myanmar’s most vulnerable populations since the 2021 coup ended a nascent transition to democracy and aggravated conflict between the army and its opponents, according to interviews with more than a dozen representatives of local and international aid organizations, human-rights advocates and officials from the U.S. and Thailand.

Aid arriving for people who settled temporarily by the Moei River to escape fighting between the Myanmar army and insurgent groups.PHOTO: ATHIT PERAWONGMETHA/REUTERS

While the U.S. Agency for International Development and United Nations agencies continue to operate inside Myanmar, their reach is limited because the junta controls where they can go and to a large degree what they can do. Getting permission to move around involved complex processes even before the coup, but representatives of three aid organizations said there is now an intentional regime tactic of denying them access to large populations to cut off resources to areas where opposition to military rule is strongest. They cited the regime’s denial of travel authorizations and arbitrary delays in issuing staff visas as obstacles.

 

To reach vulnerable communities, Western governments often take the cross-border route—but it is convoluted. Myanmar-focused groups like Mr. Khu’s aren’t eligible for legal status in Thailand, which means most foreign governments can’t send funds directly to them. Instead, the governments contribute to larger, registered organizations that, while primarily focused on Thailand, channel some of the funds to the dozens of smaller groups operating inside Myanmar.

Donors have little visibility on how the aid is ultimately distributed but say that the smaller groups that are capable of navigating Myanmar’s tough conditions are their best hope of reaching at least some hard-hit locations. Aid workers like Mr. Khu operate with the help of armed rebel groups in Myanmar that are fighting the junta, traveling through their territories and under their protection.

Displaced people from Myanmar living in makeshift tents on the Thai side of the Moei River, in Mae Sot, Thailand.PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS

A U.S. State Department spokesperson said Myanmar’s regime continues to deny humanitarian access to many populations in need and urged all countries to press them for more. “At the same time, we and others in the international community are identifying alternate means of providing lifesaving assistance that is not dependent upon access permission,” the spokesperson said.

U.S.-based advocacy group Refugees International estimates some $10 million worth of aid has entered Myanmar through Thailand since the coup via these informal channels. It is a fraction of overall aid to the country, which is in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Large parts of Myanmar remain inaccessible, such as central-northwest Myanmar’s Sagaing region where more than half of those displaced since the coup are located.

The U.N. says the number of people who need aid ballooned from one million before the coup to 14.4 million in its aftermath—more than a quarter of the entire population. Before the coup, roughly 350,000 people were internally displaced by earlier conflicts, forced to flee their homes but staying inside Myanmar. That number has now surpassed 1.2 million. Half of the country’s school-age children have had no access to education for two years.

Nationwide protests broke out last year after Myanmar’s military seized power in a coup, which ended a nascent transition to democracy.PHOTO: EPA/SHUTTERSTOCK

Many live in warzones that have no clear front lines. The coup sparked nationwide protests that were met with lethal force by the military, hardening the resolve of the army’s opponents, some of whom turned to guerrilla-style armed resistance. The military responded by bombing and burning villages suspected of harboring insurgents. Conflict is concentrated near the country’s northwest and southeast borders, and increasingly its central plains.

The Myanmar military didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Conditions for the displaced are desperate. Eh Htoo Say, a 30-year-old teacher from Myanmar’s southeast Karen state, fled in December with her 5-year-old son when the Myanmar military bombed and occupied their village, Au Kree Hta. Sometimes they stay under a tarp propped up by bamboo on the bank of a river that separates Myanmar from Thailand. At other times, they hide in a rickety wooden barn just across the river, in Thailand.

She can’t cook after dark because fire would betray her location. She and her son bathe in the open, either in the river or a flooded rice field. She uses banana leaves to collect rainwater to drink and survives on rice and canned fish brought by local charities—part of the patchwork of organizations like Mr. Khu’s.

“I can keep living as long as I have aid,” she said. “But if I don’t get more I’ll really be in trouble.”

Eh Htoo Say, a displaced villager from southeast Myanmar, stands in Thailand looking across the border to Myanmar.PHOTO: FELIZ SOLOMON/WALL STREET JOURNAL

Thailand Foreign Ministry spokesman Tanee Sangrat said that cross-border aid is allowed through legally registered groups like the Thai Red Cross Society. But human-rights advocates and aid workers say delivering aid to populations deep inside Myanmar requires familiarity with the country’s languages, terrain and conflict dynamics.

The Myanmar nationals who do that work described living in constant fear of being caught crossing the border. They can’t use Myanmar’s banks or mobile transfer apps, which they believe are monitored by the military.

In early July, an aid worker who was using aid money to buy rice for displaced people in southeast Myanmar’s Bago region was abducted by the Myanmar military and killed, the worker’s organization said. Nearly all of the aid workers interviewed requested anonymity due to fear of arrest, deportation or further restrictions on access.

“We’re just trying to help people, but to do that we have to be tricky, creative, and risk our lives,” said Mr. Khu’s supervisor. “There’s no guarantee—if we die, we die.”

Write to Feliz Solomon at [email protected]

The Dangerous Mission to Sneak Sacks of Cash in Western Aid Into Myanmar – WSJ

Burned churches: Myanmar’s junta accused of abuses against the Christian minority (france24.com)

Burned churches: Myanmar’s junta accused of abuses against the Christian minority

St Matthew's Church, southwest of Demoso, in flames, on 15 June 2022. The township has been the scene of numerous clashes between the Myanmar army and the Karenni resistance.
St Matthew’s Church, southwest of Demoso, in flames, on 15 June 2022. The township has been the scene of numerous clashes between the Myanmar army and the Karenni resistance. © FBR

Since coming to power in a 2021 coup, the Mynamar military junta has been accused of abuses against the Christian minority, which represents 6% of the country’s population. Local NGOs have condemned the destruction of Christian places of worship.

>> Read on The Observers: How rebel fighters are using 3D-printed arms to fight the Myanmar junta

Images circulating on social networks show churches with smoke-blackened or destroyed walls, debris on the ground, and damaged bibles and other religious symbols.

Photos of Churches with Damaged Walls in Kayah State, June 2021
Photos taken at the United Pentecostal Church in Tlangzar village, Falam township, on 5 May. According to the Chin Human Rights Organization, the NGO that sent us the photos, Burmese junta soldiers burned the church's pastor's quarters and has vandalized the Baptist church three since the coup.
Photos taken at the United Pentecostal Church in Tlangzar village, Falam township, on 5 May. According to the Chin Human Rights Organization, the NGO that sent us the photos, Burmese junta soldiers burned the church’s pastor’s quarters and has vandalized the Baptist church three since the coup. © CHRO

Geolocation here

St Matthew's Church, southwest of Demoso, in flames, 15 June 2022. The town has experienced numerous clashes between the Myanmar army and the Karenni resistance.
St Matthew’s Church, southwest of Demoso, in flames, 15 June 2022. The town has experienced numerous clashes between the Myanmar army and the Karenni resistance. © FBR

The church was in perfect condition in 2018, as this geolocation on google maps shows.

Near the town of Demoso, in Kayah State, all that remains of St Matthew’s Church is a burned-out facade, after the Myanmar army raided it on 15 June 2022. David Eubank, a former Texas soldier and fervent Christian who founded the humanitarian aid association “Free Burma Rangers“, was in Demoso when the clashes between the army and resistance fighters broke out. He told us: “The army was shooting at us, it was hard to see anything. I heard several ‘booms’ and then the church caught fire. Before they left, they [the military] left several anti-personnel mines around the church. A 16-year-old Burmese boy stepped on them, luckily we were able to save him.”

L’église de Saint-Matthieu , le 15 juin 2022. On peut voir les rebelles karenni en tenue militaire .

The St Matthew’s churchgoers live in the jungle, like many Karenni villagers (ethnic group in Kayah State), and pray every Sunday in a makeshift church-school made of leaves and plastic.

>> Read on The Observers:

>> À LIRE SUR LES OBSERVATEURS: Residents of Myanmar’s Kayah State flee to jungle to escape military junta

Several churches have been destroyed in Kayah State villages, where the army has been conducting regular air strikes and ground operations in an attempt to quell resistance from Karenni rebels. David Eubanks told us about several attacks on Christian churches that he and his teams have witnessed.

Impact left after an air strike near Sungdula Church, Demoso Township, Kayah State in March 2022, according to Free Burma Rangers. Photo taken on 27 June by Free Burma Rangers
Impact left after an air strike near Sungdula Church, Demoso Township, Kayah State in March 2022, according to Free Burma Rangers. Photo taken on 27 June by Free Burma Rangers © FBR

David Eubanks filme l’intérieur d’une église dans le village de Sung dula, commune de Demoso (État de Kayah), détruite selon lui par des frappes aériennes de la junte militaire le 8 mars 2022. Selon lui et la presse locale (pro résistance), l’attaque serait survenue alors qu’il n’y avait pas de combats. Une information que nous n’avons pas été en mesure de confirmer de source indépendante.
David Eubanks filme l’intérieur d’une église dans le village de Sung dula, commune de Demoso (État de Kayah), détruite selon lui par des frappes aériennes de la junte militaire le 8 mars 2022. Selon lui et la presse locale (pro résistance), l’attaque serait survenue alors qu’il n’y avait pas de combats. Une information que nous n’avons pas été en mesure de confirmer de source indépendante. © FBR

The state of Chin, located on the Indian border in the west of the country, has also been the scene of clashes between the army and resistance movements. More than 80 percent of the state is Christian.

“The church I went to as a child has been destroyed”

Salai Za Uk Ling is Deputy Executive Director the Chin State Human Rights Organisation (CHRO). He is a Baptist Christian m and along with his team, Salai Za Uk Ling documents abuses committed by the country’s army. They have counted more than 50 church attacks since February 2021 in Chin State, which range from aerial bombardments to ransacking by ground troops.

In churches, the army destroys everything and takes away valuables, including offerings and collection money. This destruction of churches usually occurs when the army moves in convoy through villages.

I was born and raised in Thantlang and the whole town has been attacked more than 30 times, since September 2021. The church I went to as a child was destroyed. The army maintains a presence there and it is dangerous to go back.

Dans la ville de Thantlang, ouest de l’État de Chin, onze églises ont été prises pour cible par la junte selon la Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO).

In September 2021, the pastor of a Baptist church in Thantlang was shot by the army while trying to save his burning church after a bombing. His phone book was cut off and his wedding ring stolen, according to the Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO).

L’armée birmane aurait mis le feu à une église baptiste de la ville de Thantlang, dans l’après-midi du 9 juin 2022, selon la Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO)
L’armée birmane aurait mis le feu à une église baptiste de la ville de Thantlang, dans l’après-midi du 9 juin 2022, selon la Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO) © CHRO

Géolocalisation ici

Salai Za Uk Ling added:

[In Chin State], the junta is targeting churches, hospitals and schools… We know from testimonies of former army personnel that the military is instructed to ‘clear anything that might be in their way’. Much of the fighting between the junta and the resistance is taking place where Christian ethnic groups live (Chin, Karen and Kayah states), so many churches and infrastructures have been affected.

On 24 December 2021, Christmas Eve, the army massacred 35 people in a Christian village in Kayah State.

The junta spokesman said that places of worship were not targeted, except during raids, when it had information that “terrorists” (rebels) were hiding inside. Our observer, as well as many other witnesses, have disputed this statement.

When the military arrives in a village, they use churches as a base, because they know that Christians from the resistance forces will not attack them in the church.

Analysts from Myanmar Witness, a project that documents human rights abuses in the country, told the Observers that it is difficult to know whether the churches are being targeted by the Myanmar military on purpose, or whether they are collateral damage from clashes with resistance movements.

“Anything that is not Buddhist can be considered suspicious”

Salai Za Uk Ling has been documenting human rights abuses in Chin State for 27 years, and according to him, this kind of discrimination is nothing new.

Discrimination on the basis of Christian identity has always been a problem for the Chin [and other Christian ethnicities], as has the destruction of Christian buildings. This is a way for them [the army] to physically destroy Christianity. The junta already removed several large crosses from hilltops in the past (the junta was already in power before Aung San Suu Kyi’s party came to power in democratic elections in 2015: Editor’s note). Several religious buildings were also destroyed under previous regimes.

Anything that is not Buddhist can be viewed as suspicious. The Buddhist majority has always been valued, there is a very nationalistic view of religion.

 

The various ethnic and religious minorities in Myanmar have long been discriminated against by successive Buddhist regimes. Foremost among these is the Rohingya Muslim minority, made stateless by a 1982 law and considered one of the most persecuted minorities in the world. Since the military coup, the army has also been accused of occupying and burning mosques.

In June, Pope Francis and Myanmar’s Christian religious leaders called on the junta to stop attacking religious buildings.

The Myanmar army is predominantly Buddhist, and has pledged to protect Buddhism, which for our Observers may explain why they have no qualms about attacking churches. The army has also been accused of destroying around 100 Buddhist monasteries.

Photos of a Monastery Destroyed by the Army, according to the Karenni Resistance

1,900 civilians have been murdered by junta soldiers since February 2021, according to a statement by UN Human Rights Council High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet, in which she referred to “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” perpetrated by Myanmar’s military.

A Chin pastor who was arrested by LIB 269 on June 27 has been charged under Section 505 (b) of the Penal Code.

Rev. En Khat Muan of Lawibual Baptist Church was arrested together with a local youth leader Lian Sian Mung on accusation that they abetted the resistance group PDF-Zoland in trying to persuade the public to boycott the state-run schools, which were re-opened by the miltiary junta in Tedim in northern Chin State. The pastor was accused of telling his congregation members not to send their children to state-run schools under the military junta.

Lian Sian Mung of the Shalom Youth Committee was released on July 5 after he complied with the order to sign a pledge. However, the Baptist pastor is now being held at Tedim Police lock-up cell where he awaits trial.

Section 505 (b) carries a two-year jail term on conviction and relates to crimes of spreading rumors or false propaganda or inciting the public for violence against the state.

@CHRO|20 July 2022|

Date: July 20, 2022

Testimony_Oral_Presentation

Testimony of Salai Za Uk Ling, Deputy Executive Director of CHRO at the 4th Hearing of International Parliamentary Inquiry on Myanmar

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to appear before you this evening to speak about the situation of Chin people under military junta of Myanmar, which calls itself the State Administrative Council. My name is Salai Za Uk Ling and I represent the Chin Human Rights Organization, a group that has been documenting the human rights situation of Chin people for the last 27 years with a UN ECOSOC Special Consultative Status since 2018.

I am here to speak about the humanitarian consequences of the attempted coup with specific regards to the situation in Chin State, where I come from. I am doing so with the view of reminding all of us to stay laser-focused on who is responsible for the horrors of the past year and a half, and the urgent need for accountability and justice for the crimes committed, thus far with complete impunity. Let us be very clear that as we speak here today, the chief criminal mastermind who presided over the killings and mass atrocities against the people of Myanmar, General Min Aung Hlaing, is freely travelling internationally and visiting Russia, and the arm of international justice system is yet to reach him for the crimes he has committed. But I hope that this hearing will be the beginning of laying an important groundwork and providing impetus for advancing accountability and justice process in Myanmar.

That said, for the past year and half, Chin State with a Christian majority and a population of just below half a million, or one percent of the country’s population, has not escaped the kinds of atrocities and terrors at the hands of the Myanmar Army. In fact, the state has been one of the primary targets of military’s campaign of annihilation. I am using the word annihilation here because this is the exact word used by the junta’s spokesperson right before the start of their brutal military campaign around April last year. This should be emphasized because it was a public expression of criminal intent for what the army would do in the ensuing months. Our organization has closely monitored and documented incidents and patterns of the gross violations by the military over the period, and this is what we have found as of this month.

  • The unlawful deaths or extrajudicial killings of over 250 Chin civilians
  • Unlawful arrests and arbitrary detention of over 1100 people
  • The deliberate and intentional destruction of livelihood and civilian properties, including the burning of over 1800 houses across Chin State, the vast majority of which took place in my hometown Thantlang over the course of more than 30 separate attacks
  • The destruction of 65 religious buildings, including over 50 churches or places of worship
  • The forced displacement of an estimated 120,000 people, which constitute 20 percent of the entire population of Chin State

As you can see, despite being only 1 percent of the entire population, Chin State has suffered from disproportionate share of serious rights violations and related humanitarian crisis. The Tatmadaw is currently sending in two large military columns into Chin State, and there has been intense fighting in the north over the past three weeks. Soldiers from LID 22 have burned down three villages in Falam and Hakha Townships and summarily executed two civilians during this latest expedition. Fighting is also flaring up in the south as the reinforcement convoy is traveling from Pakhoku as we speak. The SAC troops are blocking all access routes to Chin State and preventing commercial traffics and basic commodities from entering to the area, including international humanitarian aid. This is all part of a strategy aimed at collective punishment under the four cuts practice. The objective is to establish strategic military dominance in the region by depopulating the entire region or pushing people into starvation, and eventually forcing them into submission under the military’s control. There is no end in sight for these gross violations being committed with impunity. The international community must act swiftly and decisively to tackle the culture of impunity and address the humanitarian needs of the people in the region. Everyday that action is delayed is another day that more people are dying and suffering. Something consequential needs to be urgently done to address the unfolding humanitarian disaster.

CHRO recommends the following course of action for the international community:

  • To take all measures to reject the legitimacy of SAC and deny their participation at any regional, multilateral or international spaces, including all the ASEAN platforms. We applaud countries that have boycotted the security summit in Russia this week, including New Zealand, Australia and the United States, and possibly South Korea and Japan
  • Adopt a more proactive, coordinated and direct approach towards Myanmar by stopping the usual approach of deferring everything to ASEAN, which has failed miserably
  • Directly engage with, and urgently make flexible funding and resources available for local CBOs and CSO networks who are providing humanitarian assistance to IDPs and refugee communities, especially via cross-border operations
  • Enable or increase funding for monitoring and human rights documentation work towards accountability and justice for international crimes committed by the military junta
  • Designate the civil servants across the country who continue to boldly defy the junta through the Civil Disobedience Movement as Frontline Human Rights Defenders to enable them to access channels for direct financial support for their brave human rights work.

 

Thank you

Chin State Food Running Out as Myanmar Junta Blocks Roads (irrawaddy.com)

By THE IRRAWADDY 13 July 2022

Residents in Matupi and Mindat townships in southern Chin State are running out of food as Myanmar’s regime has blocked supplies.

The regime has blocked the Paletwa-Matupi, Matupi-Mindat, and Mindat-Kyaukhtu roads which supply the townships.

A Matupi volunteer said communities have almost run out of rice.

“The prices of oil and salt have increased. Three eggs cost 1,000 kyats [compared to around 150 kyats per egg in Yangon] and they are scarce. Most people can’t afford them,” she said.

The roads are blocked by the regime although there is no fighting with the Chinland Defense Force (CDF). A 61-liter rice sack was around 4,000 kyats before the coup in Matupi and they are now 66,000-70,000 kyats, when they are available, according to residents.

Residents are buying broken rice for around 45,000 kyats per sack. The regime is beginning to allow some residents to leave the town in private vehicles, said a Matupi resident.

“Patients who need hospital treatment can leave. Neighbors ask them to bring back food. They bring back eggs and dried fish but no rice and oil,” she said.

Mindat has been isolated and surrounding villages are often shelled, despite the lack of fighting, residents said.

“We have left our villages and farms. We are struggling to survive and concerned for our safety and food,” a villager told The Irrawaddy.

The Mindat CDF said junta helicopters and Light Infantry Battalion 274 based in Mindat are bombing villages.

More than 60 Mindat residents are reportedly in Pakokku Prison and around 30 are being held at Battalion 274 in Mindat.

It called for international charities to help displaced Mindat civilians.

Mindat residents said junta soldiers detained a man and woman in Kyawttaw village on July 6. Some villagers were reportedly injured when two helicopters dropped bombs on two villages on July 2. A school, church and some houses were damaged.

The regime shells villagers because it only controls Mindat town and adjacent villages, said the CDF.

This report details human rights abuses that took place in Mindat Township, Chin State from the period of April to December 2021. In May 2021, Martial Law was imposed on Mindat Town, pre-empting a large-scale assault by air and on the ground in order to engage with the Chin Defense Force – Mindat (CDF-M) and establish military control of the town. During a three-day siege, indiscriminate bombing of civilian infrastructure took place, hospital premises were stormed, and widespread instances of war crimes committed by Tatmadaw forces were reported. Download 

 

(UCA News) — At least 49 buildings including a church have been set ablaze in the deserted town of Thantlang in Myanmar’s western Chin state due to shelling by the military.

Thantlang Centenary Baptist Church — where the slain pastor Cung Biak Hum served as a minister — was burned to cinders on Nov. 25, according to the Chin Human Rights Organization.

More than 160 buildings, including two churches, were set ablaze in the town in late October and soldiers were accused of torching houses at random.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) reviewed thermal anomaly data over the town indicating that the city is once again ablaze. The data captured by VIIRS shows active fires in the early hours of Nov. 25, according to Richard Weir, a researcher from HRW.

At least 22 churches have been burned or destroyed by the military along with more than 350 civilian homes in Chin state between August and November, according to local rights groups and Church sources.

The latest military assault on churches and residential buildings came amid growing calls by rights groups and civil society organizations for the UN to take action to stop the military’s violence against the people of Myanmar.

Predominantly Christian Chin state has been at the forefront of some of the strongest resistance to the junta and has witnessed fierce attacks by the military including air strikes, heavy artillery and indiscriminate attacks on civilians while hundreds have been arbitrarily detained and dozens killed.

Prior to the most recent attack, more than 10,000 residents of Thantlang had already fled their homes as the military indiscriminately shot into houses and set off fires by shelling in September.

In recent weeks, the military began sending fresh reinforcements to launch a major offensive against the resistance groups in the region. The UN human rights office has warned that the deployment of troops and heavy weapons by the military may lead to an imminent attack in these areas.

Myanmar’s military has long been accused of committing atrocities, especially in ethnic regions, by resorting to rape, abductions, arbitrary arrests and killings besides vandalizing places of worship and civilian properties.

More than 23,600 people have been displaced in several townships in Chin state since May while 5,200 people were newly displaced as of Nov. 10 and more than 15,000 have already crossed the border with India, according to UN reports.

Catholic and Baptist churches in Chin state, an impoverished region, were targeted by the military in July and August as soldiers camped in the churches and destroyed church property.

Various denominations have condemned the disrespectful acts of the soldiers, including the consumption of alcohol inside places of worship, and called it a violation of the Geneva Convention.

Nearly 1,300 people have been killed by the junta since it seized power and toppled the elected civilian government of Aung San Suu Kyi on Feb. 1.

 

The New York Times

For decades, armed conflict, political repression and targeted campaigns against minorities have forced hundreds of thousands of people to leave the country. Now many more are expected to follow.

By Sui-Lee Wee

Terrified farmers and families with children in Myanmar are fleeing into India as the military junta that seized power in a February coup continues to seek out and eliminate resistance along the country’s border.

The Tatmadaw, as the Myanmar military is known, has targeted areas that are home to thousands of armed civilians who call themselves the People’s Defense Force. Soldiers have fired rocket launchers into residential neighborhoods, burned down homes, cut off internet access and food supplies, and even shot at fleeing civilians, according to residents.

For more than seven decades, armed conflict, political repression and targeted campaigns against minorities like the Rohingya have forced hundreds of thousands of people from Myanmar to seek refuge in other countries. Many more are now expected to follow.

Aid groups say they are preparing for a flood of refugees, but are concerned that countries surrounding Myanmar such as Thailand may push them back. In Chin State in the northwest of Myanmar, an entire town of roughly 12,000 people has nearly emptied out in the past month. Residents have reported a large buildup of troops in recent weeks, signaling a potential wider crackdown by the Tatmadaw and leaving many people desperate to escape.

After troops burned down his home on Sept. 18 with rocket-propelled grenades, Ral That Chung decided he had no choice but to leave Thantlang, his town in Chin State.

“I love Myanmar, but I will return only if there is peace,” said Mr. Ral That Chung, who walked for eight days with 10 members of his family to reach India. “It’s better to suffer here than to live in fear in my own country.”

In the eight months since the army seized control, roughly 15,000 people in Myanmar have fled for India, according to the United Nations. Catherine Stubberfield, a spokeswoman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ Asia and Pacific bureau, said the agency has observed some 5,000 people who successfully entered India from Myanmar after recent clashes.

“The brutality in which entire villages are attacked indiscriminately has created a horrific situation in which people are absolutely desperate,” said Tom Andrews, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar. “And things are getting worse.”

The refugees say they sleep in forests for days, some of them going without food as they make their way toward India. Once they reach the Tiau River crossing separating the two countries, they take a bamboo raft or boat across to reach safety.

In the tiny village of Ramthlo, Crosby Cung said all 1,000 people who live there were preparing to leave. The villagers, he said, have selected two to three places where roughly 500 people can hide out in the forest until they are ready to head for the Indian border. Last week, soldiers set a neighboring village on fire.

 

“It is really sad to see,” Mr. Cung said. “Leaving your village and fleeing into the jungle is not what we want to do. I want to protect my village so they do not loot and burn down the village. But we, the civilians, can’t do anything. We have no choice but to flee.”

The recent exodus has been most pronounced in Chin State, a stronghold of the People’s Defense Force where civilians have often suffered the brunt of the Tatmadaw’s cruelty. In August and September, 28 out of the 45 people killed in the rural border region were civilians, according to the Chin Human Rights Organization.

Chin State borders the Indian state of Mizoram and is predominantly Christian. Many of the locals in Mizoram are also ethnic Chin and have close ties to the Chin people in Myanmar, but their patience has been tested by a recent Covid outbreak that Mizoram officials have blamed on refugees.

A district official in Mizoram who declined to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the news media, said even though the Indian government’s policy is to keep the borders closed to refugees, the locals are unofficially helping those fleeing Myanmar. If the locals did not provide assistance, the official said, the refugees would die.

Phil Robertson, the deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, warned that the situation facing the refugees would become more difficult over time. “Resources will become increasingly scarce, and there may be pressure to send them back,” he said.

In India, the refugees live in shacks with tinned roofs or plastic tarps overhead. Van Certh Luai, a refugee who arrived in Mizoram after walking for three days, said her family of six gets only three gallons of water a day for drinking, washing and bathing. Mosquitoes feast on their skin. But the family says they are staying put.

“I do not want my three children to grow up in fear,” Ms. Van Certh Luai, 38, said.

The fighting in Chin State started in August, when 150 soldiers arrived in the town and started firing mortar rounds, injuring people and damaging houses. On Sept. 6, the Chinland Defense Force — the Chin arm of the People’s Defense Force — said it killed 15 soldiers.

Rights activists say the junta has targeted Chin State because it is home to the Chin National Front, the first ethnic armed group to throw its support behind the so-called National Unity Government, the organization founded by Myanmar’s ousted elected leaders. The rebel group has also been training thousands of anti-coup protesters who have taken up arms against the military.

Cer Sung said she heard gunshots and bombs falling at around 4 p.m. on Aug. 15 while she was boiling popcorn at home in Thantlang, in Chin State. In a state of panic, she looked for her 10-year-old son, who was watching his favorite Hindi cartoon on television, remote control in his left hand. As she entered the house, fragments of artillery shells started falling between her and her son.

Ms. Cer Sung, 44, recalled seeing the left side of her son’s body go up in flames. His left index finger, the one on the remote control, was blown off. He died on the spot.

“I am angry with the Myanmar army for brutally killing my only son,” Ms. Cer Sung said, sobbing.

She and her family have decided to remain in Myanmar for now, frightened to stay but also scared to find out what life would be like if they were to leave. Other families have scrambled to leave so quickly that they did not have much time to prepare.

Sui Tha Par said she found her husband, Cung Biak Hum, lying on the side of a road with two gunshot wounds to his back and chest after he rushed to extinguish a fire caused by Tatmadaw troops in Thantlang on Sept. 18. His ring finger had been cut off and his gold wedding band was missing, according to family members.

“They shot my husband to death,” Ms. Sui Tha Par said in tears. She is pregnant and expects to give birth next month, she said. After burying her husband, she and her two sons, 11 and 7 years old, decided to leave for Mizoram.

Thousands Flee Myanmar for India Amid Fears of a Growing Refugee Crisis – The New York Times (nytimes.com)

The Protection and Humanitarian Affairs Division has been created within CHRO to lead the organization’s efforts to respond to unfolding humanitarian crisis in Chin State, which is now literally a disaster in waiting.

The Division aims to address the emerging humanitarian and protection needs of the already vulnerable population of western Myanmar, particularly, Chin State, where new armed conflicts and worsening COVID-19 spread have brought new levels of humanitarian crisis and human insecurity to the region since the February 1 coup in Myanmar. The new Division seeks to bridge the widening gaps in the humanitarian response measures towards the rapidly deteriorating conflict situation and the fast-spreading deadly Coronavirus in the region, by working together with new and existing local partners to try and coordinate intervention strategies and provide synergy to the work of various humanitarian actors operating in the region. The Division also aims to assist with protection issues arising from the ongoing political crackdown, as well as those confronting internally displaced population and refugees, including special protection for women in armed conflict situation. Under the purview of the new Division will be advocacy work associated with protection issues faced by refugee communities in India and Malaysia.

Programmatically, this new division will operate under the management and supervision of the Peace, Development and Democratization Program (PDDP) of CHRO. The Division oversees two operation units, tasked with specific mandates and functions: Protection Unit and Humanitarian Affairs Unit.

To protect and promote human rights and democratic principles