Non-ILO Reports on forced labour, including forced portering, in Burma and the region

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Websites/Multiple Documents

Description: General publications page, with several on Burma
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
Date of entry/update: 2003-08-11
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Description: An AP investigation helps free slaves in the 21st century... "Over the course of 18 months, Associated Press journalists located men held in cages, tracked ships and stalked refrigerated trucks to expose the abusive practices of the fishing industry in Southeast Asia. The reporters? dogged effort led to the release of more than 2,000 slaves and traced the seafood they caught to supermarkets and pet food providers across the U.S. For this investigation, AP has won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. The articles are presented here in their entirety..."
Creator/author: Esther Htusan, Margie Mason, Robin McDowell and Martha Mendoza
Source/publisher: Associated Press (AP)
Date of entry/update: 2016-04-20
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Language: English
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Individual Documents

Sub-title: The move marks the first major labour strike since last year’s coup, with garment factory workers reporting exploitation regarding their pay and hours
Description: "Around 2,000 workers from a garment factory in Yangon’s Zaykabar Industrial Park in Mingaladon Township went on strike on Thursday morning, declaring that violations of their basic rights had grown unbearable. The workers are employees of JW factory, which is owned by Great Glowing Investment and operated by another factory in the industrial park: ADK, or “A Dream of Kind.” They are both managed by the same Canadian nationals, according to Myanmar’s Directorate of Investment and Company Administration. The factories reportedly manufacture clothing for international sportswear brands including Crivit and employ nearly 7,000 people. Around 20 junta soldiers and police also arrived in the industrial park at around 11am to speak with the factory management, according to the striking workers. The outcome of the discussion was not known at the time of reporting. “Representatives from the workers’ affairs department [within the military council] came to negotiate, but that department is filled with people on [the employer’s] side,” a 22-year-old woman participating in the walkout said. The woman, who is also enrolled in her final year in Dagon University’s distance learning program, started working at the site in 2020, during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. She was hired at a pay rate of 4,800 kyat (US$2.50) per day, and 1,200 kyat ($0.65) per hour for overtime shifts—Myanmar’s minimum wage. She told Myanmar Now she was required to work 12-hour shifts six days per week, and that her employer had been pushing workers to complete more than 60 garments hourly—a quota that they could not meet. “We can barely make 45 pieces an hour but now they’re asking us to finish 62 pieces an hour,” she told Myanmar Now. “Injustice is widespread here. The workers are not able to practise any of the rights we are entitled to.” In order to meet the performance expectations set by factory management, she added that it had become difficult to take a 30-minute break for lunch, or to use the toilet during their shifts. Another 21-year-old woman from Bago participating in the strike said that she had only been paid a monthly salary of 270,000 kyat ($145) and had been required to work more than 100 overtime hours. “They keep cutting our salaries [for not meeting their requirements]. In this system, there are more punishments for us than rewards,” she said. Many of Yangon’s factories are located in townships where the military has declared martial law, including Hlaing Tharyar, North and South Dagon, Dagon Seikkan, North Okkalapa and Shwepyitha. Widespread factory closures following the February 2021 coup contributed to the loss of jobs of some 1.6m workers nationwide, according to the International Labour Organisation. Workers from Yangon’s factories were among the first members of the public to protest the coup. Some 16 labour organisations were subsequently outlawed by the junta, and members and leaders of unions charged with incitement. Ye Naing Win, the secretary general of one of the banned groups—the Coordination Committee of Trade Unions—recently described to Myanmar Now how labour rights had further deteriorated since the coup, with factory workers being inadequately compensated and unfairly fired, and complaint mechanisms under the junta typically favouring employers..."
Source/publisher: "Myanmar Now" (Myanmar)
2022-07-07
Date of entry/update: 2022-07-07
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
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Description: Hpapun (Mutraw) District "This Situation Update describes events occurring in Dwe Lo Township, Hpapun District between August and October 2015, including forced labour, land confiscation, and livelihood issues. - Soldiers from Tatmadaw Infantry Battalion (IB) #96 in Dwe Lo Township, forced villagers in A--- valley to transport their supplies and the only compensation the villagers were given was petrol. - The Karen National Union (KNU) organised for land confiscation victims in Meh Thoo and Meh Way village tracts to receive two million kyat (US $1,547.80) per acre as compensation. - Since the signing of the 2012 preliminary ceasefire agreement, displaced persons in Dwe Lo Township have been able to return to their old villages...."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
2016-03-09
Date of entry/update: 2016-04-09
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 458.57 KB
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Source/publisher: International Trade Union Confederation
2013-00-00
Date of entry/update: 2013-07-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 108.95 KB
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Description: "...From January 2011 to date, CHRO has documented 20 separate incidents of forced labour, some involving orders to multiple villages. 50 percent of the incidents involved orders from the Burma Army (typically portering), and the other half were orders from the local authorities (typically road construction, planting jatropha, and other forms of manual labour). In May 2011, the International Labour Organization (ILO) held an official awareness-raising workshop in Hakha, the capital of Chin State, involving more than 160 officials, including administrators, judges, police and Burma Army personnel. This was the first official workshop of its kind held in Chin State and an important step towards tackling the issue of forced labour in the area. At the time of writing CHRO has documented 12 separate incidents of forced labour since the workshop took place, 50 percent portering exacted by Burma Army soldiers and the other half by civilian authorities, including the Chief Minister of Chin State..."
Source/publisher: Chin Human Rights Organization
2012-08-27
Date of entry/update: 2012-09-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "This report includes translated copies of 207 order documents issued by military and civilian officials of Burma?s central government, as well as non-state armed groups now formally subordinate to the state army as ?Border Guard? battalions, to village heads in eastern Burma between March 2008 and July 2011. Of these documents, at least 176 were issued from January 2010 onwards. These documents serve as primary evidence of ongoing exploitative local governance in rural Burma. This report thus supports the continuing testimonies of villagers regarding the regular demands for labour, money, food and other supplies to which their communities are subject by local civilian and military authorities. The order documents collected here include demands for attendance at meetings; the provision of money and food; the production and delivery of thatch, bamboo and other materials; forced recruitment into armed ceasefire groups; forced labour as messengers and porters for the military; forced labour on bridge construction and repair; the provision of information on individuals, households and non-state armed groups; and the imposition of movement restrictions. In almost all cases, demands were uncompensated and backed by implicit or explicit threats of violence or other punishments for non-compliance. Almost all demands articulated in the orders presented in this report involved some element of forced labour in their implementation."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
2011-10-05
Date of entry/update: 2012-01-31
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "This report includes a situation update submitted to KHRG in November 2011 by a villager describing events occurring in Nyaunglebin District, during the period between September and October 2011. It details an incident that occurred in October 2011, in which a villager was shot and injured while working in his betelnut field; the villager who wrote this report noted that some villagers living in these areas respond to the threat of violence by fleeing approaching Tatmadaw patrols. Following the shooting, Tatmadaw troops imposed movement restrictions that prevented villagers from traveling to or staying in their agricultural workplaces in the area where the shooting occurred. This report includes additional information about the use of villagers to provide forced labour at Tatmadaw camps, specifically to perform sentry duty along roads, and also raises villagers? concerns about food security after unseasonable rain prevented villagers in some areas from burning brush on their hill fields preparatory to planting and paddy crops in other areas were destroyed by insects and by flooding during the monsoon."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
2012-01-17
Date of entry/update: 2012-01-18
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...For decades the Burmese army has forced civilians to risk life and limb serving as porters in barbaric conditions during military operations against rebel armed groups. Among those taken to do this often deadly work, for indefinite periods and without compensation, are common criminals serving time in Burma?s prisons and labor camps. Escaped convict porters described to us how the authorities selected them in a seemingly random fashion from prison and transferred them to army units fighting on the front lines. They are forced to carry huge loads of supplies and munitions in mountainous terrain, and given inadequate food and no medical care. Often they are used as ?human shields,? put in front of columns of troops facing ambush or sent first down mined roads or trails, the latter practice known as "atrocity demining.? The wounded are left to die; those who try to escape are frequently executed. Burma?s military government promised that the November 2010 elections, the country?s first elections in more than 20 years, would bring about human rights improvements. But soon after election day the Burmese army, the Tatmadaw, launched military operations that have been accompanied by a new round of abuses. In January 2011, the Tatmadaw, in collusion with the Corrections Department and the Burmese police, gathered an estimated 700 prisoners from approximately 12 prisons and labor camps throughout Burma to serve as porters for an ongoing offensive in southern Karen State, in the east of the country. The same month, another 500 prisoners were taken for use as porters during another separate military operation in northern Karen State and eastern Pegu Region, augmenting 500 porters used in the same area in an earlier stage of the operation in the preceding year. The men were a mix of serious and petty offenders, but their crimes or willingness to serve were not taken into consideration: only their ability to carry heavy loads of ammunition, food, and supplies for more than 17 Tatmadaw battalions engaged in operations against ethnic Karen armed groups. Karen civilians living in the combat zone, who would normally be forced to porter for the military under similarly horrendous conditions, had already fled by the thousands to the Thai border. The prisoners selected as porters described witnessing or enduring summary executions, torture and beatings, being used as ?human shields? to trip landmines or shield soldiers from fire, and being denied medical attention and adequate food and shelter. One convict porter, Ko Kyaw Htun (all prisoner names used in this report are pseudonyms), told how Burmese soldiers forced him to walk ahead when they suspected landmines were on the trails: ?They followed behind us. In their minds, if the mine explodes, the mine will hit us first.? Another porter, Tun Mok, described how soldiers recaptured him after trying to escape, and how they kicked and punched him, and then rolled a thick bamboo pole painfully up and down his shins. This report, based on Human Rights Watch and Karen Human Rights Group interviews with 58 convict porters who escaped to Thailand between 2010 and 2011, details the abuses. The porters we spoke with ranged in age from 20 to 57 years, and included serious offenders such as murderers and drug dealers, as well as individuals convicted of brawling and fraud— even illegal lottery sellers. Their sentences ranged from just one year to more than 20 years? imprisonment, and they were taken from different facilities, including labor camps, maximum security prisons, such as Insein prison in Rangoon, and local prisons for less serious offenders. The accounts shared by porters about the abuses they experienced in 2011 are horrific, but sadly not unusual. The use of convict porters is not an isolated, local, or rogue practice employed by some units or commanders, but has been credibly documented since as early as 1992. This report focuses on recent use of convict porters in Karen State, but the use of convict porters has also been reported in the past in Mon, Karenni, and Shan States. The International Labour Organization (ILO) has raised the issue of convict porters with the Burmese government since 1998, yet the problem persists, particularly during major offensive military operations. Burma?s forcible recruitment and mistreatment of convicts as uncompensated porters in conflict areas are grave violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law. Abuses include murder, torture, and the use of porters as human shields. Those responsible for ordering or participating in such mistreatment should be prosecuted for war crimes. Authorities in Burma have previously admitted the practice occurs, but have claimed that prisoners are not exposed to hostilities. The information gathered for this report, consistent with the evidence gathered over the past two decades, demonstrates that this simply is not true. The practice is ongoing, systematic, and is facilitated by several branches of government, suggesting decision-making at the highest levels of the Burmese military and political establishment. Officials and commanders who knew or should have known of such abuses but took no measures to stop it or punish those responsible should be held accountable as a matter of command responsibility. The use of convict porters on the front line is only one facet of the brutal counterinsurgency practices Burmese officials have used against ethnic minority populations since independence in 1948. These include deliberate attacks on civilian villages and towns, large-scale forced relocation, torture, extrajudicial executions, rape and other sexual violence against women and girls, and the use of child soldiers. Rebel armed groups have also been involved in abuses such as indiscriminate use of landmines, using civilians as forced labor, and recruitment of child soldiers. These abuses have led to growing calls for the establishment of a United Nations commission of inquiry into longstanding allegations of violations of international humanitarian and human rights law in Burma. As the experiences contained in this report make clear, serious abuses that amount to war crimes are being committed with the involvement or knowledge of high-level civilian and military officials. Officers and soldiers commit atrocities with impunity. Credible and impartial investigations are needed into serious abuses committed by all parties to Burma?s internal armed conflicts. The international community?s failure to exert more effective pressure on the Burmese military to end the use of convict porters on the battlefield will condemn more men to take their place..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Watch (HRW), Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
2011-07-12
Date of entry/update: 2011-07-15
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 1.57 MB
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Description: "...Over the last two decades, KHRG has documented the abuse of convicts taken by the thousands from prisons across Burma and forced to serve as porters for frontline units of Burma?s state army, the Tatmadaw. In the last two years alone, Tatmadaw units have used at least 1,700 convict porters during two distinct, ongoing combat operations in Karen State and eastern Bago Division; this report presents full transcripts and analysis of interviews with 59 who escaped. In interviews with KHRG, every convict porter described being forced to carry unmanageable loads over hazardous terrain with minimal rest, food and water. Most told of being used deliberately as human shields during combat; forced to walk before troops in landmine-contaminated areas; and being refused medical attention when wounded or ill. Many saw porters executed when they were unable to continue marching or when desperation drove them to attempt escape. Abuses consistently described by porters violate Burma?s domestic and international legal obligations. If such abusive practices are to be halted, existing legal provisions must be enforced by measures that ensure accountability for the individuals that violate them. This report is intended to augment "Dead Men Walking: Convict Porters on the Front Lines in Eastern Burma", a joint report released by KHRG and Human Rights Watch in July 2011..."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
2011-07-13
Date of entry/update: 2011-07-15
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 3.23 MB
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Description: 1.1 Background; 1.2 ILO Activities in Burma; 1.3 Forced Labor Resulting from International Joint Ventures; 1.4 Forced Portering - Partial List of Incidents for 2005; 1.5 Forced Labor - Partial List of Incidents for 2005; 1.6 Forced Prison Labor - Partial List of Incidents for 2005; 1.7 Forced Conscription and Forced Military Training - Partial List of Incidents for 2005; 1.8 Interviews and Personal Accounts.
Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit of the NCGUB
2006-07-00
Date of entry/update: 2010-12-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 172.14 KB
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Description: "Even though they have a sign in our village [Ye Pyu Township] that there will be no forced labor or portering in our village, we still have to do forced labor. ...[The army officials] told us that if people ask you about it, don?t tell them that we are forcing you to do it, but that we are just asking you to help do it." (Page 25) "This report was published on the heels of the International Labour Organization?s visit to Burma to investigate the continuing forced labor and the military regimes compliance with its calls to end the practice. The report documents the widespread continuance of forced labor and the regime?s attempts to hide the practice from the ILO?s view. For the report, EarthRights International staff interviewed many Karen, Tavoyan and Shan victims in Shan State and Tenasserim Division over the past year..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2001-10-15
Date of entry/update: 2010-12-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: Japanese
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Description: "In a recent investigation inside Burma, EarthRights International has detailed just how the systematic practice of forced labor operates and continues in the country. Using rare interviews with local village heads, the report, entitled Entrenched, provides an in-depth look into one small rural area, including the involvement of high-ranking military officers in the practice of forced labor. The rare testimonies illustrate how forced labor—a modern form of slavery—remains prevalent in an area of active military conflict in eastern Burma. Entrenched: an Investigative Report on the Systematic Use of Forced Labor in a Rural Area is based on extensive interviews with ten village heads from one small area that took place during the winter of 2002-2003. Recent interviews from the same area confirm the practice continues into May 2003. (See the Supplemental Report that also includes updates on the Yadana and Yetagun pipeline region, prisoner porter interviews, and other forms of forced labor). By providing an in-depth examination, the report documents the highly systematic and violent nature of labor abuse by the Burmese military..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2003-06-13
Date of entry/update: 2010-11-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "Even though they have a sign in our village [Ye Pyu Township] that there will be no forced labor or portering in our village, we still have to do forced labor. ...[The army officials] told us that if people ask you about it, don?t tell them that we are forcing you to do it, but that we are just asking you to help do it." (Page 25) "This report was published on the heels of the International Labour Organization?s visit to Burma to investigate the continuing forced labor and the military regimes compliance with its calls to end the practice. The report documents the widespread continuance of forced labor and the regime?s attempts to hide the practice from the ILO?s view. For the report, EarthRights International staff interviewed many Karen, Tavoyan and Shan victims in Shan State and Tenasserim Division over the past year..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2001-10-15
Date of entry/update: 2010-11-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Far from indicating a shift away from utilizing forced labor, much less a cessation of this practice, ERI?s interviews demonstrate that the authorities? use of forced labor continues through the present. The following statements are all drawn from these interviews: "Just three days before I came to Thailand, I had to fence their [the military?s] camp" (Interview #11); "We had to go to fence the military base once a month" (Interview #32); "Every month we have to go and work for the soldiers more than ten days, and sometimes it was almost the whole month" (Interview #2); "Every five days, two villagers in our village tract had to go by rotation [to accompany soldiers]" (Interview #38). Several interviews suggest, however, that the authorities are attempting to alter in name what they refuse to reform in practice: "Starting in November 2000... the District Peace Development Council has ordered the villagers to call porters ?helpers? and if people still call ?helpers? porters, they will punish them" (Interview #6); "According to the villagers, there is no ?porter[ing]? now, but [the military] calls it by another name. This time they ask for ?A-Ku-A-Nyi,? which means ?helper.? That means a villager has to go with them for give days as a guide, and they ask for it all the time" (Interview #28). The enclosed interviews were conducted by ERI or by people from Burma who received prior training from ERI on how to conduct interviews. Due to security concerns and our own confidentiality policies, identifying information in the interviews has been redacted. We have given the township names to provide the location of incidences of forced labor and other human rights abuses. We have excluded people?s names, but if this information is needed please contact us. In sum, it is clear that use of forced labor, including portering, has not stopped in areas where we have been able to collect information. ERI will continue to monitor the situation and send information as it is received.
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2001-06-04
Date of entry/update: 2010-11-01
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...the use of forced labour remains widespread and pervasive throughout the country. The routine disruption of work and life has brought many communities to the brink of humanitarian crisis, with villagers in rural areas struggling to find the time to grow food or earn a wage in between fulfilling the various demands of the junta and its allied ceasefire groups...Reports of forced labour were received from sources across the country during the year 2007 and again in 2008, with particularly high rates of incidence reported in Arakan State, Karen State and Shan State. In some states, military demands for labour, food or money were often expressed in written order documents, although some officers have become aware of the importance of these documents as evidence of human rights abuse and have begun circumventing the problem by issuing their orders verbally at meetings. In August 2008 the Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) published a collection of 59 translated order documents issued by State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) and Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) authorities in Toungoo, Nyaunglebin, Papun and Thaton Districts between October 2007 and March 2008. Some of the orders covered general issues and specified travel permission or restrictions on the sale of meat, but many included demands for food, materials, services and various kinds of labour or attendance at meetings..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Docmentation Unit (HRDU)
2009-11-23
Date of entry/update: 2009-12-05
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 974.09 KB
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Description: "As the principal means of establishing control over the people of Thaton District, the SPDC has supported a more aggressive DKBA role in the area. With the junta?s political, military and financial backing the DKBA has sought to expand its numbers, strengthen its position vis-à-vis the civilian population and eradicate the remaining KNU/KNLA presence in the region. To those ends, the DKBA has used forced labour, looting, extortion, land confiscation and movement restrictions and embarked on a hostile campaign of forced recruitment from amongst the local population. These abuses have eroded village livelihoods, leading to low harvest yields and wholly failed crops; problems which compound over time and progressively deepen poverty and malnourishment. With the onset of the rainy season and the 2007 cultivation period, villagers in Thaton District are faced with depleting provisions. This food insecurity will require that many harvest their 2007 crop as early as October while still unripe. The low yield of an early harvest, lost time spent on forced labour and the harmful fallout of further extortion and other abuses will all combine to ensure once again that villagers in Thaton District confront food shortages and increasing poverty..."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group Field Report (KHRG #2007-F5)
2007-07-09
Date of entry/update: 2009-11-08
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "In Pa?an District of central Karen State, Burmese authorities impose strict controls on the movements and activities of all villagers while also taking their land, money and livestock, using them as forced labour, and forcing them to join state paramilitary organisations. Muslims are being forcibly evicted from their villages into relocation camps to make way for new SPDC army camps. Simultaneously the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) acts on behalf of the SPDC in many areas, extending the regime?s control in return for impunity to exploit and extort from the civilian population. The double burden of forced labour, extortion, restrictions and forced conscription imposed by two sets of authorities takes a heavy toll on the villagers, yet in a cruel irony they are also being forced to give money and unpaid child labour to prepare New Year festivities where the DKBA plays host to foreigners and Rangoon movie stars..."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group Field Report (KHRG #2006-F12)
2006-12-22
Date of entry/update: 2009-11-08
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Trotz des seit Ende Februar 2007 offiziellen Verbots von Zwangsarbeit in Burma (Myanmar), gibt es unaufhörlich Berichte über neue Fälle ? ganz besonders in den Grenzgebieten, zu denen Ausländer keinen Zugang haben und wo Minderheiten wie die Karen verfolgt werden. Burmesische Gewerkschafter legten Anfang Juni einen Bericht vor, in dem 3.400 Vorwürfe der Zwangsarbeit dokumentiert sind. Ein von der ILO (Internationale Arbeitsorganisation) im März eingerichtetes Beschwerdeorgan für Zwangsarbeit in Burma registrierte von März bis Juni nur 23 Fälle. Forced labour in ethnic minority areas
Source/publisher: Gesellschaft für bedrohte Völker
2007-09-07
Date of entry/update: 2008-05-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: German, Deutsch
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Description: 1.1 Introduction: Forced Portering; Forced Labour; Forced Convict Labour; Forced Military Conscription...1.2 ILO Activities in Burma: Construction of the New Capital [box]... 1.3 Forced Labour Resulting from International Joint Ventures: The Settlement of the Total Lawsuit; Potential Use of Forced Labour on Internationally Sponsored Projects; Salween Dams; Shwe Gas Development; Road and Rail Projects...1.4 Forced Portering ? Partial List of Incidents for 2006: Arakan State - Buthidaung Township; Chin State - Matupi Township; Karen State - Dooplaya District, Mergui/Tavoy District, Nyaunglebin District, Thaton District, Toungoo District; Mon State - Ye Township; Shan State - Kae-See Township, Murng Kerng Township, Murng-Nai Township, Namkhan Township, Nam-Zarng Township...1.5 Forced Labour ? Partial List of Incidents for 2006: Arakan State - Buthidaung Township, Kyaukpru Township, Maungdaw Township, Palawa Township, Ponna Kyunt Township, Rathidaung Township; Chin State - Falam Township, Hakha Township, Matupi Township, Paletwa Township, Tedim Township, Thantlang Township; Kachin State - Hopin Township, Sinbo Township; Karen State - Dooplaya District, Nyaunglebin District, Pa?an District, Papun District, Thaton District, Toungoo District; Karenni State; Mon State - Khaw Zar Sub-Township, Mudon Township, Thanbyuzayat Township, Ye Township; Pegu Division; Sagaing Division; Shan State - Kae-See Township, Kun Hing Township, Lai-Kha Township, Lashio Township, Muse Town, Murng-Ton Township, Tachilek Township; Tenasserim Division…1.6 Forced Prison Labour ? Partial List of Incidents for 2006: Arakan State; Chin State; Karen State - Papun District, Thaton District, Toungoo District; Mandalay Division…1.7 Forced Conscription and Forced Military Training ? Partial List of Incidents for 2006: Arakan State - Manaung Township, Maungdaw Township, Ponna Kyunt Township, Yathetaung Township; Chin State - Paletwa Township, Matupi Township; Kachin State; Karen State - Nyaunglebin District, Pa?an District; Mon State; Tenasserim Division…1.8 Interviews and Personal Accounts [20 interviews].
Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit of the NCGUB
2007-06-25
Date of entry/update: 2007-07-13
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 784.65 KB
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Description: "Burma?s State Peace and Development Council?s Order No. 1/99 (March 1999), along with the Supplementary Order to Order No. 1/99 (October 2000),1 outlawed forced labor throughout the country. Despite these orders, forced labor continues. The villagers of Shan State, Karenni State, Karen State, Pegu Division, Mandalay Division, and Tenasserim Division tell of their experiences in the 77 accounts that follow. Life under military rule still means a life where the rule of law is absent. Without legal recourse and continued international pressure for change, these people have no choice but to flee..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International (ERI)
2002-06-00
Date of entry/update: 2007-03-15
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "To support its military attacks on hill villages throughout northern Karen State since November 2005, Burma?s State Peace & Development Council (SPDC) military junta has brought several thousand convicts from prisons across Burma to carry ammunition and supplies and to act as human minesweepers. Many of these men are innocent of any crime, but were imprisoned because they were too poor to bribe police and judges who use their positions to extort money. The corruption continues with their jailers, who send them to the Army as porters if they are unable to pay. The SPDC relies increasingly on convict porters for its major military operations, both as a large-scale and accessible workforce to augment the forced labour of villagers and to legitimise its use of forced labour in the eyes of the international community. However, the use of convict porters in frontline operations is anything but legitimate: treated as property of the soldiers, worked to the point of exhaustion or death, beaten, tortured or murdered whenever they can no longer carry loads, underfed and given no treatment when sick or wounded, their treatment flagrantly violates Burma?s obligations under the Geneva Conventions and the ILO Forced Labour Convention. Right now SPDC troops in northern Karen State are leaving a trail of porters? bodies behind them, while hundreds are attempting escape. This report is based on KHRG?s interviews with some of those who have escaped, whose stories reveal a system of endemic corruption and horrific brutality. Yet despite the presence of thousands of convict porters SPDC forces continue to recruit villagers for forced labour whenever possible, indicating that Burma?s ever-expanding Army is using convict labour as a supplement rather than an alternative to the forced labour of villagers..."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG #2006-03)
2006-08-22
Date of entry/update: 2006-10-06
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Mit Zwangsarbeit, ethnischen Umsiedlungen und ausländischen Investitions-Dollars sichert die Militärjunta ihre Machtstrukturen in Myanmar. Forced labour, internal displacement, foreign investments, power structures.
Source/publisher: politikerscreen
2005-04-29
Date of entry/update: 2005-06-10
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: Deutsch, German
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Description: What are the consequences of investment in or trade with Burma? How does it work? Who profits? Who suffers from it?... Contents: 1. Introduction; 2. Who owns the economy? (When you do business with Burma, who do you need to deal with? Can a company have independent business links in Burma?) 3. Levels of FDI and trade; 4. How much of this money is going to the junta? Another source of income: all kinds of taxes; A possible third source of income: the exchange of foreign currency; 5. What do the generals do with this money? 6. On corruption, transparency and drugs; 7. Is there a link between FDI and politics? 8. Are there direct links between FDI and abuse of workers? 9. What is the effect of sanctions on ordinary citizens?
Source/publisher: International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU)
2005-01-25
Date of entry/update: 2005-02-07
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
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Description: "This report presents the direct translations of 783 order documents and letters, selected from a total of 1,007 such documents. The orders dictate demands for forced labour, money, food and materials, place restrictions on movements and activities of villagers, and make threats to arrest village elders or destroy villages of those who fail to obey. Over 650 of those selected were sent by military units and local authorities of Burma?s ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) junta to village elders in Toungoo, Papun, Nyaunglebin, Thaton, Pa?an and Dooplaya Districts, which together cover most of Karen State and part of eastern Pegu Division and Mon State (see Map 1 showing Burma or Map 2 showing Karen State). The remainder were sent by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) or the Karen Peace Army (KPA), groups allied with the SPDC. All but a few of the orders were issued between January 2002 and February 2003..." Papun, Pa?an, Thaton, Nyaunglebin, Toungoo, & Dooplaya Districts General Forced Labour (Orders #1-150); Forced Labour Supplying Materials (#150-191); Set to a Village I: Village A, Papun District (#192-200); Set to a Village II: Village B, Papun District (#201-226); Set to a Village III: Village C, Thaton District (#227-241); Set to a Village IV: Village D, Dooplaya District (#242-251); Extortion of Money, Food, and Materials (#252-335); Crop Quotas (#336-346); Restrictions on Movement and Activity (#347-354); Demands for Intelligence (#355-426); Education, Health (#427-442); Education (#427-439); Health (#440-442); Summons to ‘Meetings? (#443-652); DKBA & KPA Letters (#653-783); DKBA Recruitment (#653); DKBA General Forced Labour (#654-685); DKBA Demands for Materials and Money (#686-719); DKBA Restrictions (#720-727); DKBA Meetings (#728-771); KPA Letters (#772-783); Appendix A: The Village Act and the Towns Act; Appendix B: SPDC Orders ‘Banning? Forced Labour.
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group ( KHRG #2003-01)
2003-08-22
Date of entry/update: 2003-11-17
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "In 2002, the SPDC continued using forced labor in Burma; particularly forced portering for military operations; forced labor for military bases and income generating projects for the military and building and maintenance of roads. Despite the release of Aung San Suu Kyi in May, little changed for Burma?s ethnic minority groups, particularly the Karen, Karenni and Shan, living in rural areas where forced labor is regularly conscripted for portering, infrastructure projects and military support activities. The use of forced labor in these areas is often perpetrated under the guise of "Government Development Programs." Although the issue of forced labor in Burma has received much recent attention internationally, there has been little corresponding action by SPDC to eradicate it despite an order banning the use of forced labor which was promulgated in 2000 (see below). Two trends that continued in 2002 were the use of prison labor for portering during military operations and the collection of porter fees. Porter fees take on two forms; in one, each household in a village is required to pay a certain amount each month in order to compensate the conscripted porters. In the other, villagers are forced to pay a fee so that they are not conscripted as porters. Porter fees are a burden on villagers that should not be underestimated as its affects their livelihood in almost the same way that portering does. Villagers who cannot afford to take time away from their livelihood to porter also cannot afford to pay money to avoid portering. Both the increase in the use of prisoner portering and porter fees can be attributed to SPDC?s desire to improve its image in the international community. The use of prisoner porters lessens the number of civilian porters that need to be conscripted and when porters are paid with funds forcibly collected from villagers, the Burmese military can claim that the porters are paid laborers..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit, NCGUB
2003-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-11-10
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : htm
Size: 229.56 KB
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Description: "The following nineteen recent interviews with villagers from eastern Burma confirm the continued use of forced labor in their communities during 2003. The interviews show the use of forced labor and portering coordinated by high-ranking military officers in some areas of Burma; some orders originate from battalion commanders and a local strategic commander. The interviews also illustrate that it is ultimately the military that issues these orders for forced labor even if they often use village heads as intermediaries in giving and enforcing the orders. These interviews are redacted and abridged to ensure the security of those interviewed and their families. EarthRights International keeps the interviews in their entirety on file...[This] Supplemental Report...also includes updates on the Yadana and Yetagun pipeline region, prisoner porter interviews, and other forms of forced labor. By providing an in-depth examination, the report documents the highly systematic and violent nature of labor abuse by the Burmese military..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2003-06-04
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-16
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 250.94 KB
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2001-02-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
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Description: " The ICFTU sincerely hoped that, as a combined result of the Resolution on Burma adopted by the 88th Session of the International Labour Conference (Geneva, June 2000) and of the ILO's success in restoring a climate of dialogue with the authorities, the use of forced labour would significantly decrease in intensity and, in time, even be eradicated. In fact, nothing of the sort has happened and, as a result, the ICFTU is compelled to continue to supply up-to-date evidence thereof to the Committee of Experts. It does so with regret, and with increasing frustration at the authorities' lack of sincerity and commitment to eliminating forced labour. In spite of their denials, alleged efforts to suppress the practice, professed good will and spirit of co-operation with the ILO, the military authorities of Burma have continued to resort to forced labour on a massive scale. Senior, middle and low-ranking army officers and rank-and-file soldiers, as well as civilian authorities, have continued to exact forced labour in all areas of activity previously identified by the ILO. In support of its claims, the ICFTU encloses nearly 30 reports and other documents, totalling over one hundred pages. They provide detailed evidence, from the same sources and of the same quality as the hundreds of reports examined over the last 5 years by the ILO and found to be credible and authentic..."
Source/publisher: ICFTU
2001-11-29
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit of the NCGUB
1995-09-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : htm
Size: 122.54 KB
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Description: "Throughout the year 2000, the military junta continued its blatant use of unpaid civilian forced labor in virtually all their undertakings, including economic activities, military operations, building and maintaining infrastructures such as roads, bridges and military facilities, cultivating crops for the military, and, in many cases, even in their daily personal matters. Carts, mini-tractors, trucks, cars and other vehicles of the people were frequently forced to serve the military without compensation or responsibility for any damage done to the vehicles. Civilians in rural and ethnic areas in Burma were called for ?wontan? (?servants?), which usually means porters or military camp labor, or ?loh ah pay? (translated here as ?voluntary labor?); SPDC?s term for forced labor..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit, NCGUB
2001-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : htm htm
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Description: "...The SPDC in 2001 continues using forced labor in Burma; particularly forced portering for military operations; forced labor for military bases and income generating projects for the military and building and maintenance of roads. Despite ongoing talks between Aung San Suu Kyi and SPDC, little has changed for Burma?s ethnic minority groups, particularly the Karen, Karenni and Shan, living in rural areas where forced labor is regularly conscripted for portering, infrastructure projects and military support activities. Although the issue of forced labor in Burma has received much recent attention internationally, there has been little corresponding action by SPDC to eradicate its use..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Documentation Unit of the NCGUB
2002-09-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : htm
Size: 273.96 KB
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Description: The Brutal Abuse of Prisoners on Burma?s Frontlines. Based on KHRG interviews with prison convicts from all over Burma who have escaped forced labour for SPDC troops, this report tells the story of their arrest, sentencing, life in the prisons and the increasing use of convicts as porters by Burma?s military junta. Documents the arbitrary arrest and sentencing of people to long jail terms for petty offences, the brutal and inhuman conditions in the prisons, and the even more brutal abuse and killings of convicts who are forced to go into combat situations with the military - in many cases after their sentences should have expired. This report also includes an Annex of Interviews.
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group Regional & Thematic Reports (KHRG #2000-060)
2000-12-20
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "EarthRights International (ERI) has collected credible reports regarding the use of forced labor to construct a new hydroelectric dam on the Shwe Gin River, near Kyaut Nagar in Eastern Burma. This predominantly Karen area, north of Shwe Gin Township, is home to thousands of "internally displaced people? who have been repeatedly forced out of their homes by the military junta?s activities. The dam project, which will eventually dislocate them once again, is currently pushing the local people further into poverty by stealing their labor. Villagers interviewed by an ERI fact-finding team said that in May 2002, soldiers routinely force them to work on the construction project. According to one local man, ?We can only come back after we finished the work in the camp. In the camp, they don?t have water and food for the workers. The military orders the villagers to do what they want. The soldiers don?t have any sympathy for the workers.? Official information regarding the project, which is located on the edge of the armed conflict, is extremely difficult to obtain. The project is overseen by the state-owned Myanmar Electrical Power Enterprise (MEPE). In early 2001, a survey was conducted by four Japanese technicians working for an undisclosed company. Construction began shortly after and is to be completed in 2005. No social or environmental impact assessment was carried out prior to beginning construction. Reconnaissance of the area also reveals the construction of roads, military barracks, a helicopter pad, as well as surveillance posts on the western side of the river. The area surrounding the dam site is now heavily militarized."
Creator/author: Ken MacLean, Mahn Nay Myo
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2002-09-13
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 178.36 KB
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Description: In a recent statement, Burma?s ruling military council rejected the conclusions of a report on forced labor in Burma released by the New York-based rights group, Human Rights Watch. The statement attacked the report?s "negative attitude, irresponsible actions and unrealistic expectations," but gave no indication of what it would consider to constitute a more "realistic" assessment of the prospects for change. Moreover, by referring to "unrealistic expectations", the junta?s spokesman seemed to be conceding that forced labor still exists to some extent inside Burma. Indeed, although the military government has officially banned forced labor, it has evidently allowed some room for officials to continue with this practice in rural and remote areas. So while the junta accuses Human Rights Watch of not being "aware of the developments taking place and the cooperation the government of Myanmar has extended to the ILO (International Labor Organization)," it appears that the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) is itself unaware that it is trapped in a system of its own creation-namely, the existing authoritarian political system, which is underpinned by military rule. For nearly forty years now, Burma has been in the grips of a system that has been incapable of a realistic assessment of its own role in perpetuating the country?s many problems.
Creator/author: By Tin-Maung Than
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" (Commentary)
2004-04-09
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...According to reliable sources, military authorities in Karen State have been turning to local Buddhist abbots to recruit villagers for road-building and other construction projects. The sources added that sizeable donations were being offered to the senior monks in exchange for their cooperation..."
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy", Vol. 8. No. 10 (Intelligence section)
2000-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Information on a new flow of refugees from northeastern Pa?an District into Thailand. The villagers say that they fled their village in mid-January 2001 because SPDC troops are using them as porters, forced labour on an access road, and Army camp labour in order to strengthen the regime?s control over this contested area. Worst of all, the villagers say they are being ordered to clear landmines in front of the SPDC Army?s road-building bulldozer, and to make way for new Army camps.
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG Information Update #2001-U1)
2001-02-20
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Roads, Relocations, and the Campaign for Control in Toungoo District. Based on interviews and field reports from KHRG field researchers in this northern Karen district, looks at the phenomenon of ?Peace Villages? under SPDC control and ?Hiding Villages? in the hills; while the ?Hiding Villages? are being systematically destroyed and their villagers hunted and captured, the ?Peace Villages? face so many demands for forced labour and extortion that many ofthem are fleeing to the hills. Looks at forced labour road construction and its relation to increasing SPDC militarisation of the area, and also at the new tourism development project at Than Daung Gyi which involves large-scale land confiscation and forced labour. Keywords: Karen; KNU; KNLA; SPDC deserters; Sa Thon Lon activities; human minesweepers; human shields; reprisals against villagers; abuse of village heads; SPDC army units; military situation; forced relocation; strategic hamletting; relocation sites; internal displacement; IDPs; cross-border assistance; forced labour; torture; killings; extortion, economic oppression; looting; pillaging; burning of villages; destruction of crops and food stocks; forced labour on road projects; road building; restrictions on movment; lack of education and health services; tourism project; confiscation of land and forced labour for tourism project;landmines; malnutrition; starvation; SPDC Orders. ... ADDITIONAL KEYWORDS: forced resettlement, forced relocation, forced movement, forced displacement, forced migration, forced to move, displaced
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group Regional & Thematic Reports (KHRG #2000-05)
2000-10-15
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Transcript of part of a recorded conversation, southern Burma, mid-94. Insight into attitudes regarding villagers, NGOs, forced labour etc.
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) Regional & Thematic Reports
1994-09-25
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: Papun, Pa?an, Thaton, Nyaunglebin, Toungoo, & Dooplaya Districts.This report presents direct translations of over 500 order documents and letters sent to villages by SPDC military units and authorities from late 1999 through January 2001. Over 300 of them contain demands for forced labour, negating the SPDC?s claims to have put a stop to the practice. Others were used to restrict the movements and activities of villagers, demand crop quotas, extortion money, food and building materials without payment, and order villagers to cooperate with SPDC occupation troops in several different ways. Many of them threaten to arrest and detain village elders, shell villages with mortar fire, shoot villagers, or pillage, burn or relocate villages if they fail to comply. This report, our longest in almost 10 years of human rights documentation, is part of KHRG?s ongoing project to translate and publish these orders as evidence(previous sets can be seen in "SPDC & DKBA Orders to Villages: Set 2000-B" and other earlier reports); even as it went to print, we had already obtained over 300 newer order documents which we are currently processing for upcoming release.
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group Orders Reports (KHRG #2001-02)
2001-05-18
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "...This report demonstrates that civilians continue to be conscripted for forced labor by military units providing security to two natural gas pipelines in southern Burma, the Yadana and Yetagun pipelines. The multinational oil companies that operate these pipelines, including TotalFinaElf (formerly Total) of France, Premier Oil of the United Kingdom, and Unocal of the United States, continue to be morally complicit and legally responsible for the forced labor occurring in the pipeline region..."
Source/publisher: EarthRights International
2002-02-07
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "SLORC?s campaign of forced relocations and forced-labour road building in the Palauk-Palaw, Mergui and Tenasserim regions, which began in September 1996, is now being accelerated ... Almost every village between the Tavoy-Mergui-Kawthaung car road in the west and the Tenasserim River in the east, from Palauk in the north to Tenasserim town in the south has been ordered to move one or more times between September 1996 and January 1997..." ADDITIONAL KEYWORDS: forced resettlement, forced relocation, forced movement, forced displacement, forced migration, forced to move, displaced
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
1997-02-09
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : html
Size: 10.18 KB
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Description: "These men all arrived at a Karen Army camp on February 13, 1992, after each spending over 2 months as porters for # 14 LIB of SLORC?s 66 Division. On arrival, the Karen soldiers noted that they were extremely emaciated and shaking from hunger and terror, both of their immediate past and their immediate future. This was clear when, despite their state of starvation, they were at first afraid to eat the rice given to them. By February 21, when this interview was conducted, they had already relaxed and recovered a great deal, but were still quite weak..."
Source/publisher: Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG)
1992-02-26
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
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Description: "?Total Denial? catalogues the systematic human rights abuses and environmental degradation perpetrated by SLORC as the regime seeks to consolidate its power base in the gas pipeline region. Further, the report shows that investment in projects such as the Yadana pipeline not only gives tacit approval and support to the repressive SLORC junta but also exacerbates the grave human rights and environmental problems in Burma.... The research indicates that gross human rights violations, including summary executions, torture, forced labor and forced relocations, have occurred as a result of natural gas development projects funded by European and North American corporations. In addition to condemning transnational corporate complicity with the SLORC regime, the report also presents the perspectives of those most directly impacted by the foreign investment who for too long have silently endured the abuses meted out by SLORC for the benefit of its foreign corporate partners." ...Additional keywords: environment, human rights violations.
Source/publisher: EarthRights International (ERI) and Southeast Asian Information Network (SAIN)
1996-07-10
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 310.45 KB
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Description: "Three Western oil companies -- Total, Premier and Unocal -- bent on exploiting natural gas , entered partnerships with the brutal Burmese military regime. Since the early 1990?s, a terrible drama has been unfolding in Burma. Three western oil companies -- Total, Premier, and Unocal -- entered into partnerships with the brutal Burmese miltary regime to build the Yadana and Yetagun natural gas pipelines. The regime created a highly militarized pipelinecorridor in what had previously been a relatively peaceful area, resulting in violent suppression of dissent, environmental destruction, forced labor and portering, forced relocations, torture, rape, and summary executions. EarthRights International co-founder Ka Hsaw Wa and a team of field staff traveled on both sides of the Thai-Burmese border in the Tenasserim region to document the conditions in the pipeline corridor. In the nearly four years since the release of "Total Denial" (1996), the violence and forced labor in the pipeline region have continued unabated. This report builds on the evidence in "Total Denial" and brings to light several new facets of the tragedy in the Tenasserim region. Keywords:, human rights, environment, forced relocation, internal displacement, foreign investment. ADDITIONAL KEYWORDS: forced resettlement, forced relocation, forced movement, forced displacement, forced migration, forced to move, displaced
Source/publisher: Earthrights International
2000-05-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 5.98 MB
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Description: forced labour, ILO, human rights, international economic relations. Bericht über Zwangsarbeit in Burma. Der Artikel von Tom Kramer beleuchtet auch den Aspekt von Auslandsinvestitionen und wie auslaendische Unternehmen von der Zwangsarbeit profitieren.
Creator/author: Tom Kramer, Deutsch von Gudrun Witte
Source/publisher: Südostasien Jg. 17, Nr. 2 / Asienhaus
2001-06-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: Deutsch
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