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A woman’s life, displaced on the border

Grass leaves cover the small hut and the floor is laid with bamboo. The poles are only the thickness of a thin man’s wrist. The hut has three rooms and it was built as many months ago. In the bedroom there is one blanket and two pillows; in the kitchen there are two pots and four dishes. A woman named Mi Kyae is sleeping on the floor as two children play on the ground near her. Their situation is not so different from the situation of many displaced people and refugees on the Thai-Burma border.

The New Mon State Party (NMSP) has had a ceasefire with Burma’s State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) government for around 13 years, but the villagers still suffer from war. Conflict is still happening in southern Mon State and Tanessarim Division because Mon and Karen rebels are active in the area. The SPDC calls the region a “black area,” and treats it as a free fire zone. Read more

Broken Communities: Just what the junta wants

I was born in Mon State, but recently traveled to Rangoon. I went to get a passport, but the moment I walked into the immigration office, I became afraid I would not succeed. Hundreds of people were crowded around – so many people it seemed as if a wealthy person was making a rice donation to the people.

The office is small and so crowded I felt as if I could not breath. A government official said that three hundred people apply for a passport every day; every person I talked to said they were trying to leave Burma. Read more

A town for no one

By Lawi weng:

The Three Pagodas Pass crossing on the Thai-Burma border has been officially closed for almost two years, . Many businessmen despair because they cannot trade, and many people despair because they cannot work. The Burmese town, former home to a burgeoning furniture manufacturing industry, offers little employment and many people have to cross into Thailand to earn eighty baht a day at a sewing factory. Read more

Where Is My School, Where Are My Friends?

By WCRP:

A tragic story from one of the Cyclone Nargis hit zones

An 11 year old boy, Maung Thein Naing (not his real name), was surprised to hear his father say he had to leave for school in early June, following orders from the village headmen. Soon after Cyclone Nargis ripped through his village and killed his mother and sister, he forgot he was a student. His school in the north of the village near the rice fields also disappeared in the storms of early May. Read more

Wildlife trade on the Thai-Burma border threatening species

By Taramon and Lawi Weng:

The flourishing black market trade in wild animal products is encouraging hunters to harvest animals on the Thai-Burma border at an unsustainable rate.

Thai authorities on the Thai-Burma border are heavily involved in the black market trade, frequently traveling into both government and rebel-controlled areas to procure wildlife.

Hunting, combined with habitat loss due to logging, the proliferation of rubber plantations and slash and burn agriculture, means that a variety of animals face regional extinction. For example, in the eastern part of Ye Township, or from the upper Bee Ree river to Thailand, rare animals including many species of tigers, deer, beer, many kind of snakes, wild goat, wild cat and some species birds are rare, if they can be found at all. Read more

All Ages Amphetamine Use on the Increase in Mon State

HURFOM:

The origins of the recent influx of amphetamines into Sanghklaburi are unknown and widely debated; the Mon people claim the pills are Karen in derivation while the Karen point the finger at the Mon. A third contender is the Burmese officials, who most people agree have a hand in the illegal trade in some way. Thus the question of amphetamine production is a complex one, and it is not confined to the illegal trade category, with widespread use becoming more commonplace inside Burma. Read more

Legal document a must for Burmese migrant workers

Banyol Kin, IMNA :

With the Thai Immigration Ministry imposing restrictions on migrant workers working in Thailand, the authorities are reissuing documents to workers who had missed updating it in previous years.

On March 21 many NGO’s who represent migrant workers came together and asked government officials to take cognizance of rights of migrant workers. Read more

Is it a crime by ethnics to observe their National Day?

By Joi Htaw

The 61^st anniversary National Day has been celebrated around the world where the Mon people are located. The National Day has been observed not only by Mon people in Mon State but also in western countries, UK, Canada, USA, Australia and by Mon migrant workers in Burma’s neighbouring countries.

The Mon National Day in Thailand was observed in four places in migrant communities and in Malaysia, South Korea and other places where Mon people reside. Most of the migrant workers in Samutsakorn, Thailand got the chance to celebrate National Day even though they do not have any security document.

Although Mon people commemorated the National Day and Mon national flag flew world wide, the villagers in Southern part of Ye Township, were prohibited to unfurl the national flag and was forced to play Burmese songs instead of the national song. Read more

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