Monk slain

Monk slain, villages dislodged

Human Rights

A Palaung monk was tortured and shot while whole villages were relocated in eastern Shan State last year, said Shan relief workers from the border. 

This is the first time details of what took place in Monghpyak, a township 83 km from the Tachilek, opposite Mae Sai, have emerged. 

On 12 July 2003, about 80 soldiers from Monghpyak-based Light Infantry Battalion 329, led by Maj Aye Ko came to a Palaung village of Nawngkhio, Mongloong Tract. (According to the 1974 government directory, Mongloong is in Monghsat, and not Monghpyak, township.) The troops, finding a small tape recorder among the belongings of the Palaung monk, Tu Inpan, reportedly accused him of being connected to the Shan State Army 'South' of Col Yawdserk. He was unceremoniously disrobed and interrogated. During the interrogation, they chopped off his right leg at the knee with a knife. Then they shot him in the head. 

According to Paw Zan, 53, who recently arrived at the Piangfah IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) village, opposite Chiangrai's Mae Fah Luang district, with 4 members of his family, "The monk's brains were splattered all over the place. There was nothing left of his head." 

The troops also rounded up 20 layman members of the temple committee, tied up with their hands behind their backs and battered them with a stick. "I passed out," Paw Zan recalled, "and when I regained consciousness, I couldn't see properly, and my wife had to take me home." 

All the possessions of the villagers, including rice, livestock, money and "even our pots and pans" were looted and villagers were made to carry them to the nearby village of Ternglong, 3-hour's walk away. 

A month later, Nawngkhio and the surrounding villages were ordered to relocate to Monghpong, Tachilek township, within 3-days. 

The villages included the following: 

Life in Monghpong, where the Shans' most revered monk, Khru Bar Boonzoom resides, was nevertheless very hard for the relocated people, as they had no land and the weather was very hot compared to their previous home in the hills. Some 200 perished through fever and diarrhea. "Besides, we had to do forced labor for the soldiers on their fields seized from local Shans," said Paw Zan. "Each household was required to furnish one of its members to work there 20 days a month. They told us: Don't tell anyone we're using you or we'll beat the hell out of you." 

Relocation of villages has been a standing practice of the Burma Army since Shan State was declared under martial law in 1952. A vivid account is given by the Shan Human Rights Foundation in Dispossessed: Forced relocation and Extrajudicial killings in Shan State, April 1998 http://www.shanland.org. According to Burma Border Consortium, a Thai-based refugee relief program, an estimated 1,000,000 people have been displaced in the border states since 1996.