Three villagers killed after they defy a forced relocation order in Tenasserim Division

January 16, 2009

HURFOM: The Burmese army has killed two teenagers and the former headman of Amae village after residents defied military orders and returned to the village, from which they had been forced to leave in November.

On November 11th, 60 households were forced to leave Amae village, Tenasserim Division, by soldiers from Infantry Battalion (IB) No. 107. Residents were told to leave immediately, and had to leave behind the majority of their belongings and the building materials in their homes, as well as their farms and plantations.

After IB No. 107 left the area some of the former residents returned to the village to retrieve their belongings, work on their plantations and even sleep in their old homes. In the first week of January, a few days after a group of villagers and the headman had returned to Amae, about thirty soldiers from IB No. 107 lead by Captain Khin Moung Nyein returned to the village.

The soldiers arrested the headman and beat his head and body with their fists and the butts of their rifles, said an eyewitness. They then took him to their battalion headquarters in Tavoy. A week later, his family began holding traditional funeral services, indicating that he had been killed. A HURFOM source that spoke with the family also confirmed that the battalion had admitted its fault, or at least that it had paid the headman’s family 30,000 kyat ($24 USD) to compensate for his death.

According to a man working on his betel nut plantation near Amae, a few days before the headman’s arrest, soldiers killed two young men on their way to retrieve belongings from Amae. “The two young men were walking to Amea village, on the way I could hear them singing a Mon song. After a while, I heard the sound of guns firing four or five times, around noon.” The source, who lives in a village less than 2 kilometers from where the boys were staying, said that the next day he heard that a seventeen year old and a fifteen year old boy had been shot by sentries near Amae.

Former residents of Amae described their difficulties as they struggle to either brave the threat of soldiers and retrieve their belongings, or start new lives entirely from scratch. “I have nothing from my home. I had to leave everything,” said a former resident. “Now I face a very difficult situation. I have no job, and [buying all new] things is expensive. I also have no place to live. I and my family have no idea how to continue our lives in the future.”

Written by HURFOM · Filed Under News