Thread: Burma : The Story of a Child Soldier

The Story of a Child Soldier
SAW YAN NAING
Friday, August 21, 2009

PAPUN, Karen State—Sixteen-year-old Htun Htun Oo, looked relieved and happy when he learned he would be leaving the conflict zone controlled by the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) soldiers on the Burmese bank of the Salween River, opposite Thailand’s Mae Hong Son province.

The prospect of going to study instead of facing more military duties gave him new hope.

Told he could leave, Htun Htun Oo quickly packed his clothes in a sling bag, put on a watch, applied some Thanaka (Burmese traditional makeup) to his cheeks and said goodbye to the Karen soldiers who had temporarily taken care of him.


A young soldier with the Burmese army (Not Htun Htun Oo)Speaking quietly against a background of birdsong and eddying water in the fast flowing Salween River, he told us his story before he left.

Htun Htun Oo escaped from the Burmese Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) 341 in Papun District in northern Karen State in July, making his way through the forest eastwards, even though he was not sure whether he would be killed when he reached KNLA-controlled territory.

Before he escaped, senior officers had regularly warned the troops that they would be tortured and killed if they surrendered to Karen rebels.

“Whether I lived or died didn’t matter anymore,” Htun Htun Oo said, “All I wanted to do was escape. I was ready for anything so long as I didn’t have to stay another day in that battalion.”

He said that he had to sleep rough in the jungle for three days before he reached the KNLA area.

“When I arrived on the Burmese side of the Salween River, I started to swim across,” he said, pointing to the waters swollen with monsoon rain streaming by.

“The water was too fast and I was drifting downstream, trying to swim,” he said, “Luckily a boat came along and picked me up.

“The Burmese officers would continually punish us and order us to do additional duties—we were no better than slaves,” he said.

“They didn’t give us enough food, and when we were too exhausted to follow orders, they liked to beat us. I was beaten three times for falling asleep when I was on guard duty at night.

“Every morning we had to get up at five and do military exercises,” Htun Htun Oo said. “Around three in the afternoon we would be ordered into the jungle to cut bamboo and collect leaves to make temporary shelters.

“We didn’t get enough time to sleep as we had guard duty at night. I couldn’t take it any more and decided to run away,” he said.

Htun Htun Oo earned 21,000 kyat [US $19] a month, but said he only got about 7,000 kyat [$6.40] after senior officers made deductions.

Htun Htun Oo said he saw child soldiers in other Burmese battalions, and he knew of eight other child soldiers in LIB 341 alone.

During military training, he said he spoke with a younger comrade called Ye Thew, who told him he had been sexually abused by higher ranking officers on several occasions.

Htun Htun Oo was seized by the Burmese army at a railway station in June 2007 while he was on his way to visit his uncle, who was a policeman in Rangoon,.

“A Burmese soldier asked me for my ID card, but I didn’t have one because I hadn’t applied for one by then. So they took me away,” he said.

Htun Htun Oo’s case is not untypical. The recruitment of child soldiers in Burma is still widely practiced by the Burmese army, according to Aye Myint, a leader of Guiding Star, a Burma-based social and labor rights group.

In the last three months, more than 20 children who say they were forced by Burmese officials to serve as soldiers were helped by Aye Myint’s group and the International Labour Organization to return to their families.

Commenting in early August on reports that the Burmese government had released some children from the military, the UN’s special representative for children and armed conflict, Radhika Coomaraswamy, was quoted by Reuters as saying: “We still are not sure how comprehensive that is and the extent of it. And so I am dispatching a team [to Burma] at the end of this month.” The team would hold talks with the Burmese regime and rebel groups, said Coomaraswamy.

In a report in June, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon accused the Burmese military government and “ethnic rebel militias” of recruiting children to serve as fighters, saying that there had been “grave violations” against children in Burma.

According to a 2002 report by the Washington-based Human Rights Watch, there is no precise figure of the number of child soldiers serving in the Burmese army, but it was estimated that 35-45 percent of new recruits were children, some as young as 11, who were forcibly conscripted and brutally treated during training.

The report estimated that as many as 70,000 recruits were under the age of 18.

Htun Htun Oo said, “I have only one message for the youth of Burma—don’t even think about joining the Burmese army. It is like being in a living hell. You will go so far from home that you will forget it even exists.”

Asked about the Burmese regime’s announcement that the military did not recruit child soldiers, he said, “They are lying.”

irrawaddy.org

Junta Conscripts More Child Soldiers
By LAWI WENG
Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Burmese regime forces have conscripted 112 underage youths in the last seven months, according to child labor activists in Burma.

Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Monday, Aye Myint, a leading labor activist in Pegu Division, said 112 school-age youths have been recruited by the junta army between May and November.

Their families have lodged letters of complaint with the International Labour Organization (ILO) in Rangoon, he said.

Two families of conscripted youths lodged letters of complaint with the ILO on Monday. The first youth is Kyaw Min Oo, 16, from Thanatpin Township in Pegu Division and the second is Ye Noung Hein, 15, from Shwe Phy Thar Township in Rangoon Division.

Kyaw Min Oo was seized in August while he and his father slept at a train station in Pegu. He was taken to No.4 military training school at Pinlaung in Shan State.

Ye Noung Hein was taken in 2008, but he ran away from his battalion in October and has become a fugitive unable to return home. His father lodged a letter with the ILO asking the Burmese regime’s military to offer his son an amnesty.

ILO representatives were unavailable for comment when The Irrawaddy tried to contact their Rangoon office on Monday.

According to human rights groups, the Burmese military are still conscripting underage youths.

The children are threatened and beaten if they refuse to agree to undergo military training. After training, many are sent to areas where the army is in conflict with ethnic groups.

A lot of underage recruitment happens in Pegu Division, where many routes intersect. School-age children are recruited at train stations, bus depots, tea shops, outside video halls and movie cinemas or even while walking home at night.

Many child recruits taken from different places are brought to Pegu, Aye Myint said.

According to the “Annual Report of the UN Secretary-General to the Security Council on Children and Armed Conflict” in March, the Burmese junta “continues to screen and release underage children found in its armed forces during the training process.”

Sixty-eight children detected in various military training schools were released to their parents or guardians by the Burmese military, the report said.

The report said the ILO, together with the International Committee of the Red Cross, was instrumental in the release of 12 underage recruits, had verified the release of 23 children “mostly from involuntary military enrolment” and was waiting for government responses to a further 14 cases.

In a report released in October, the UN Security Council Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict (SCWG) welcomed progress made by the Burmese regime to release underage recruits from the armed forces but “expressed concern regarding the number of children remaining in armed groups and the reports of new recruitments by armed forces and armed groups.”

The SCWG also expressed a wish for “enhanced cooperation” from the [Burmese] government without further delay.

In a response to the SCWG published on Nov. 9, The Karen Human Rights Group (KHRG) called for “real progress in protecting children affected by armed conflict” in Burma.

“The vast majority of violations against children are committed by the state armed forces and associated armed groups,” the report said.

The KHRG report calls for the SCWG to monitor the situation in Burma more closely and for the government of Burma to demonstrate “measurable and real progress in ending abuses against children.”

Child recruitment in Burma is not a new problem. In 2002, the New York-based Human Rights Watch estimated that as many as 70,000 conscripts in the regime’s army may have been less than 18-years-old.

irrawaddy.org

I would not believe everything I read at irrawaddy, they have an agenda.

Originally Posted by English Noodles

I would not believe everything I read at irrawaddy, they have an agenda.

Yes, they DO have an agenda...it's called freedom. This business of child soldiers is just heartbreaking.

Shocking just at many countries around the world use kids...Lucky him..

Originally Posted by English Noodles

I would not believe everything I read at irrawaddy, they have an agenda.

Ad hominem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

ILO to begin Burma child soldier campaign
Reporting by Nay Htoo

Feb 12, 2010 (DVB)–The International Labour Organisation will begin circulating leaflets on forced labour and child solider recruitment across Burma, but not before it is passed through the regime’s notorious censor board.

Burma is thought to have one of the world’s highest counts of child soldiers, and the UN’s International Labour Organisation (ILO) is the only body officially mandated to tackle the problem in the pariah state.

Steve Marshall, ILO liaison officer in Rangoon, said that a draft of the leaflet had been submitted to the government’s labour ministry for approval.

The campaign, he said, was raised during talks in Burma last month between ILO executive director Kari Tapiola and labour minister Aung Kyi.

The talks also resulted in an extension of the ‘supplementary understanding’ between the government and the ILO, which acts as an agreement that the Burmese junta will not avenge those who complain to the ILO about forced labour and child solider recruitment.

“There will need to be an extensive printing of these [leaflets] in various languages, with a wide distribution,” said Marshall.

Many complaints of forced labour and child solider recruitment come from Burma’s border regions where the army has been fighting decades-long conflicts with various armed ethnic groups.

“The first print run will clearly be in Myanmar [Burmese] language, but it would be silly not to produce it in the major ethnic languages,” he said, but added that the translation would take more time.

The ILO has struggled since the first supplementary understanding was signed in February 2007 to curb the recruitment of child soldiers and use of forced labour, which includes land disputes, by the Burmese government.

It has also expressed “serious concern” about the jailing of labour activists and forced labour complainants.

A landmark Human Rights Watch report in 2002 found that an estimated 70,000 child soldiers made up around 20 percent of the Burmese army.

Another report last year by the Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict claimed that children as young as nine were serving in the military.

english.dvb.no

Originally Posted by Mid

Sold to Be Soldiers

The Recruitment and Use of Child Soldiers in Burma



Map of Burma

Terminology and Abbreviations


I. Summary


The Government of Burma’s Armed Forces: The Tatmadaw

Government Failure to Address Child Recruitment

Non-state Armed Groups

The Local and International Response



II. Recommendations



III. Methodology



IV. Background



V. The Tatmadaw: The State Military


The Tatmadaw’s Staffing Crisis

Recruitment

The Su Saun Yay Recruit Holding Camps

Training

Deployment and Active Duty

Desertion, Imprisonment, and Re-recruitment

The Future of Tatmadaw Child Recruitment

The Government of Burma’s Response to the Recruitment and Use of Child Soldiers


VI. Child Soldiers in Non-State Armed Groups

United Wa State Army

Karenni Army

Karen National Liberation Army

Shan State Army – South

Kachin Independence Army

Democratic Karen Buddhist Army

Kachin Defense Army

Mon National Liberation Army

Karenni Nationalities People’s Liberation Front

Shan Nationalities People’s Liberation Army

Rebellion Resistance Force

KNU-KNLA Peace Council


VII. The International Response

The United Nations Security Council

United Nations Country Team

UNICEF

ILO

Neighboring country and cross-border initiatives


VIII. Legal Standards

Child Recruitment as a War Crime

International Standards on Demobilization, Reintegration, and Rehabilitation

Acknowledgements

Appendix A: SPDC Plan of Action regarding child soldiers
(pdf file - 4 pages, 949 kb)

Appendix B: Human Rights Watch letter to the UN Mission of Myanmar, August 22, 2007
(pdf file - 2 pages, 104 kb)

Appendix C: Reply from the UN Mission of Myanmar, September 12, 2007
(pdf file - 3 pages, 90 kb)

Appendix D: KNPP Deed of Commitment regarding child soldiers
(pdf file - 4 pages, 252 kb)

Appendix E: KNLA Deed of Commitment regarding child soldiers
(pdf file - 2 pages, 96 kb)

Volume 19, No. 15© October 2007
hrw.org

‘Most serious penalties’ for child solider case
Francis Wade
Feb 24, 2010

Three army officials in Burma have been imprisoned in what the International Labour Organisation hail as an unprecedented reprimand of child soldier recruiters by the ruling junta.

The three men received prison sentences of one year, three months and one month respectively, all with hard labour, for their role in forcibly recruiting a 13-year-old boy into the Burmese army.

Two other low-ranking officials were given a one-year suspension. Steve Marshall, liaison officer for the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Rangoon, said the prosecutions were “significant” and “positive”, and were the first case of imprisonment of child solider recruiters brought to the organisation’s attention.

The ILO is the only international body in Burma with a mandate to tackle the problem.

It said last month that it had received a total of 120 complaints of underage recruitment since it began its programme in February 2007.

Although Burma became a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in 1991 – thereby making underage recruitment illegal under both domestic and international law - human rights groups have said that up to 20 percent of the country’s estimated 500,000 troops could be underage, making it one of the world’s leading child soldier recruiters.

A report last year by the Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict claimed that children as young as nine were serving in the military.

Marshall added that despite the imprisonment of the officials, “the objective of all of the activity is not to necessarily get all of the people arrested and imprisoned, but to stop the practice of recruitment and the use of children [in the army]”.

The ruling junta’s aggressive expansion of its army has been seen as a leading cause for the continuing recruitment of juniors, with senior personnel often forced to fulfill government-directed quotas for troop numbers.

The ILO last month announced that it would begin circulating leaflets around Burma carrying information about child soldier recruitment and forced labour in an attempt to educate the population on the problem.

A number of Burma’s ethnic armies are also believed to recruit child soldiers.

english.dvb.no

Two Underage Youths Recruited for Burmese Army in Arakan
Khaing Khiang Zan

Maungdaw: Two underage youths, one 17 and one 16 years old, were recruited on Thursday in Maungdaw by army officials from Light Infantry Battalion 263 based in Buthidaung, 80 miles north of Arakan State's capital, Sittwe, reported a relative of the boys.

"Two army officers came to our village on Thursday to recruit them without permission from their family. The youths did not want to join the Burmese army at first but later agreed after the army officials promised to give them 100,000 kyats and a bag of rice if they joined," she said.

17-year-old Maung Than Htay is the son of U Sein Maung and Daw U Than Sein, and 16-year-old Maung Ko Lu is the son of U Mra Tun Pru and Daw U Ma Sein. They are both from Aung Bala Village on the outskirts of Maungdaw on the western border.

The army officers who recruited the youth are Lieutenant Myo Zaw and Sergeant Zaw Win from Light Infantry Battalion 263; they brought the youth to Buthidaung after the youths agreed to join the army.

"Their family had no right to disclose their displeasure about their children's recruitment in front of the army officials. So the families had to give up their children even though they did not want them to join the army. If they opposed their children being taken in front of the official, army authorities would have taken action against them," she said.

According to a local source, another two underage youths from Bo Mu Wra in Maungdaw were also recruited by army officials from LIB 263 and were brought to Buthidaung with the officials along with Maung Than Htay and Maung Ko Lu.

Recently, the Burmese army has increased recruitment in Arakan State by promising new recruits rewards like money, rice and cloths.

In some townships in Arakan State, including Min Bya and Pauktaw, the naval force is also recruiting new sailors to serve in the navy by distributing posters with the slogan, "You are required by the Burmese navy to defend Burma's waters." #

narinjara.com

Border Guard Force accepts children from DKBA
Kyaw Kha
Friday, 27 August 2010

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – At least 40 child soldiers have joined the ranks of the Burmese regime’s new border forces, after a number of Democratic Karen Buddhist Army battalions this month came under junta command, a fellow soldier revealed today.


A child soldier wears the Burmese Army shoulder patch of the 707th Artillery Operations Command, based in Kyaukpadaung, Mandalay Division in central Burma.
At least 40 child soldiers this month joined the ranks of the Burmese regime’s new Border Guard Force, transferred after Democratic Karen Buddhist Army battalions came under junta command, fellow soldiers said.
Photo: Mizzima

“In the past, they [the children] were DKBA soldiers but now they have become BGF soldiers,” a soldier from the Border Guard Force (BGF) central office told Mizzima. “As far as I know, there are about 40 child soldiers in the 999th Brigade and Kalohtoobaw’s battalion alone,” he added.

Some officers and soldiers from the DKBA (which reportedly had more than 7,000 troops) resigned, some retired and some joined the BGF, so it is estimated that about 1,000 DKBA troops have rejected the junta’s proposal to join the force.

A former DKBA soldier from the 7th battalion under the 999th Brigade said: “The force’s priority is to accept the youths. Some are about 16 years old, but they appear older than 20. Some children were forced to join the DKBA and some joined of their own accord.”

The DKBA recruited many child soldiers, Aung Myo Min, director of the Human Rights Education Institute of Burma (HREIB) based in Thailand, said.

“DKBA has become a subordinate of the junta’s army, so handling the child soldiers’ case has become the duty of the State Peace and Development Council [SPDC, Burma’s ruling military junta]. If it really wants to eliminate child-soldier cases, it must not allow this [accepting child soldiers into the BGF] to happen,” Aung Myo Min said.

“The SPDC … should give those children immediate help and send them home. The junta has the duty not to accept the children in the Border Guard Force”, he added.

Burma signed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1992, so if the Burmese Army, or the BGF, used child soldiers, they could be charged with violation of that convention, he said.

The junta formed the committee for the prevention of military recruitment of underage children on January 5, 2004, with the co-operation of UN, but since then observers and some UN reports have said the committee had taken no action and that the Burmese Army was still recruiting child soldiers. The UN labour organisation, the ILO, has reported widespread cases of kidnapping used in such “recruiting”.

mizzima.com

Arrest warrant for ex-child soldier
NAW NOREEN
1 September 2010


The Burmese army has been accused multiple times of using child soldiers (DVB)

A man who was recruited into the Burmese army at the age of 14 and fled the following year is now being hunted by troops under orders to arrest him, his family said.

A letter was sent last week by the army to Htun Htun Aung’s family in Taungdwingyi in Burma’s central Bago division. Although now aged 22, having escaped seven years ago, the army has declared him a deserter.

“He is paranoid because he is wanted for desertion and is not staying at home now,” said his mother, Pyone Kyi. “I worry for him being in a situation like this, waiting for [the army] to come and arrest him.”

Htun Htun Aung and two friends were approached by troops as they played in the grounds of their school in Taungdwingyi in September 2002. The troops promised the boys’ families a bag of rice each and 50,000 kyat (US$50) if they agreed to go, which they did.

They were then sent to a Basic Military Training programme in Yeni, in Bago division. Htun Htun Aung was subsequently posted as a private at a Rangoon-based battalion, before escaping in late 2003.

The story is common in Burma, where battalion commanders regularly send troops out on recruitment drives to fill quotas set by the junta. The ruling generals have been aggressively expanding the Burmese army, which is now thought to number nearly 500,000 troops, one of the world’s largest standing armies relative to population.

The exact number of child soldiers serving is unknown, but a 2002 Human Rights Watch report put the figure at some 70,000, or around a fifth of the total army size at the time. It added that desertion can be punishable by three to five years in prison.

Recruitment of minors is illegal under Burmese law; under international law, boys and girls aged 15 or over had been legally able to volunteer for the army, while only adults over 18 can be forcibly recruited.

But according to an ‘optional protocol’ law established in 1992, states “shall take all feasible measures to ensure that persons below the age of 18 do not take a direct part in hostilities and that they are not compulsorily recruited into their armed forces”.

The ruling junta is not the only guilty party in Burma, with some of the country’s multiple armed ethnic groups, such as the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and United Wa State Army (UWSA), known use child soldiers.

dvb.no

Originally Posted by English Noodles

I would not believe everything I read at irrawaddy, they have an agenda.

....as does every sort of news and info source.

Noodles was just trolling , there are plenty of alternate sources for the same story

Child Soldiers Recruited in Giri Affected Area of Arakan
1/3/2011

Mray Bon: The Burmese army has been easily recruiting soldiers in cyclone-affected areas of Arakan as many families in the area are struggling for the daily survival after Cyclone Giri ravaged the region. Many underage youths have also been recruited into the Burmese army, said local people and relief workers.

A relief worker said, "The worst area for recruitment of child soldiers is Mray Bon Township. Many families in the area are facing hardships getting daily food after the cyclone. Because of this, the Burmese army is very easily able to recruit child soldiers in the area."

On 16 December, 2010, 17-year-old Khin Maung Zaw, son of U Hla Maung from Yet Chaung Village in Kha Yu Chaung Village Tract in Mray Bon Township, was recruited into the Burmese army. Khin Maung Zaw's family disagreed with the recruitment, but were unable to stop it. Khin Maung Zaw was later sent to the No. 9 western command training school.

16-year-old Min Naing, son of U Wai Kyan Aung from Awar Kyaunt Su Village in Mray Bon Township, was also recruited by the Burmese army despite his family's opposition because he has not become a novitiate in accordance with tradition.

Another 16-year-old youth from the monastery school in Wa Khoke Chaung Village in Mray Bon was also recently recruited by the Burmese army. 16-year-old Maung Soe Soe Ko, son of U Kyaw Thein Chay from Pa Thone Village in Mray Bon Township was recruited by Sergeant Soe Hla and brought to Ann to attend training.

"We heard that the Burmese army recruited around 30 soldiers, mostly children, in the area recently and they were brought to the No. 9 training school for basic training. But some sources told me that the child soldiers were brought to the western command headquarters in Ann Town from the No. 9 training school in Mray Bon in army vehicles," the relief worker said.

The army recruiting team is led by Captain Aung Thu Nyein from Sakhaka 5, the Military Operation Planning Bureau, and the team is now roaming the cyclone affected area village by village to recruit soldiers.

Many youths in the area are now joining with the Burmese army after the youths have faced many difficulties with their daily survival after Cyclone Giri, said a monk from the area, who added, "The army authority is taking the opportunity to recruit soldiers in our area. The soldiers in our village have been luring youths to join the Burmese army by shooting guns into the air."

Many middle and high school level students in Giri-affected areas had to drop out of school due to the crisis their families' were facing after the cyclone. The army authority has used the opportunity to recruit them into the Burmese army.

narinjara.com

Interviews on child soldiers
Ko Wild
Monday, 07 February 2011

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The SPDC regime formed a Committee for the Prevention of Recruiting Child Soldiers on January 5, 2004, and it frequently claims progress in preventing the recruitment of child soldiers. The committee is led by Lt. Gen. Thura Myint Aung of the Defense Ministry (the former adjutant general).

The International Labor Organization (ILO) has campaigned for the elimination of the recruitment of child soldiers and has urged people to report cases to the ILO office in Rangoon.

The junta representative to the Universal Periodic Review conference of UN Human Rights Council recently reported that the authorities had sent 440 child soldiers back home to their families since 2002. However, the Burmese junta still prohibits inspection of military camps by outside groups. Some international human rights organizations claim the Burmese army has up to 60,000 child soldiers in the armed forces.

Mizzima recently interviewed the father and a mother of two children who were forcibly conscripted into the army.

Interview I

Interview with the father of Maung Moe Mya, 17, who was conscripted as a child soldier and stationed with Light Infantry Battalion (LIB) No. 343 in Ye Township in Mon State

Education: Grade-3

Name of father: U Ramikhatmi

Residence: Dagon South Township, Rangoon Division.

Q: How did you get in contact with your child and when were you reunited?

A: He called me from Ye Township and told me that he was in an army unit. He was sent to a military operation on the Thai-Burma border in December 2009.. He reportedly was in a skirmish with Karen soldiers while patrolling the road. He returned home with permission after the operation, but he didn't report back to the unit. He was pronounced a deserter from his unit. Later, I filed his case with the ILO.

Q: How did your son end up in the army?

A: He was recruited in 2009 when he was 15 years old. He was arrested in Tha-ton in Mon State while he was visiting his aunt's house. He was arrested near a railway station, and he was thrown in with new military trainees when they arrived at the train station.

Q: Was he a student when he was arrested? Who did you inform prior to getting help from the ILO office?

A: His education was interrupted at Grade-3. I didn't complain or inform anybody. I filed the case after he returned from the military on leave. I thought he was somewhere in Tha-ton. He left for Tha-ton to visit his aunt's house. That is why we didn't complain to anyone.

Q: Where was he during his time in the army?

A: He was first sent to Ye and after a month there, he was sent for training around July and he received training at Tha-ton, Basic Military Training School No. 9. The training was for about 4 and half months.

Q: In some cases, deserters are arrested and sent back to the army by ward officials who inform the authorities. Did that happen in this case?

A: No. When I got to the army base, the officers told me that they could file his case under ‘deserting from an army unit’, but they did nothing. He remained at the base. I filed the case with the ILO in May 2010, and the ILO issued a document. I took it back to the unit as proof to bring my son back home. I later informed the ILO, along with the copy of his release orders. He was officially released from the army and the order was signed by an officer in the battalion.

Q: When you got to Light Infantry Battalion No. 343, who did you meet with?

A: The captain of the battalion.

Interview II

Interview with Phoe Lone (aka) Maung Tun Tun Win, 15, who was conscripted as a child and stationed with Artillery Battalion No. 331 in Pin Laung Township.

Education: Grade-2

Residence: Dawpon Township, Rangoon Division.


Q: How were you recruited into the military?

A: A sergeant and a lieutenant forcedly kidnapped me off a street corner and took me to a passenger bus. They gagged my mouth.

Q: Nobody on the bus said anything to them?

A: They gagged my mouth. Nobody from the bus said anything because they were in uniform. We slept a night at the Kili Market jetty, and I was then sent along with a sergeant from Moulmein. It happened on June 20, 2009.

Q: Where did you go from Moulmein? Where did you get training?

A: I got to Lamai village in Mon State, where LIB No. 588 is stationed. I received military training at Basic Military Training School No. 9. I was in the same batch with Moe Mya, and we were trained for four and a half months. I also got training at the Meik-Hti-La artillery unit.

Q: Was the training hard?

A: Yes. It is very hard. We were trained in small arms and other areas.

Q: After training in Meik-Hti-La, where were you sent?

A: I was assigned to Pin Laung, to Artillery Battalion No. 331. I was there for almost eight months.

Q: How did you get out of the army?

A: My mother came and took me out. My father died four years ago. When I had an opportunity, I called home. There was a phone at my neighbor's house, and I still remembered the number.

Q: What was in like in the army?

A: The situation was so bad. I couldn’t save anything from my salary because they took out for everything. The workload nearly killed me. We were on duty from 5 a.m. to 8 p.m. We had to find our own food. Later, we were fed daily with some eggs.

Q: What did you have to do during these hours?

A: We carried cement bags. We worked on the construction of the battalion commander’s house (Lieutenant Colonel Myo Myint, B. C. No. 18022). We were supposed to be paid 3,000 kyat a day, but we didn't get any money. He took all the money. We were then asked to process pine wood oil (turpentine). We had to cut pine trees. His wife also ordered us to do things. I worked for them during those eight months. I was not sent to the frontline.

Q: Have you met with any problems now from the military or with ward officials?

A: None from the army. The ward officials said to behave in the community and suggested I make copies of the military release order and keep it safe.

Q: Did you get your release order from the Pin Laung military unit without any problems?

A: We talked about three hours at the unit with the help of an ILO officer.

Q: Were there other child soldiers in the Pin Laung military unit?

A: There are many child soldiers in the Pin Laung unit. I think about 15 to 20. They are around my age. They still remain there. They talked to me about it when they knew I was leaving the unit. I promised them that I would try to work for their release.

mizzima.com

Runaway Child Soldiers Jailed for Deserting
ZARNI MANN
Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Burmese child soldiers who run away from their army bases back home to their parents are regularly rearrested and imprisoned as punishment for deserting.


A child soldier in Burmese army uniform
(PHOTO: Yuzo/ The Irrawaddy)

Htet Htet Aung,17, escaped from his training base in Taunggyi, Shan State, but was caught a few days later. He was sentenced to one year in prison.“We heard that he had been sentenced on Jan. 25,” said his uncle. “He ran home without attending the training. No. 3 Military Police came to arrest him and sent him back to Base 531 in Pa Ru Soe. He is now suffering from malaria and is locked up in Loikaw Prison.”

According to his family, he has cerebral malaria and was being treated before his army conscription. His family have informed the ILO. They said Htet Htet Aung's case was accepted by ILO as child soldier case number 236.

“ILO said our child will be freed, but that it will take time,” said his uncle. “We have no idea how long. We are worried about his health.”

Another case is that of Zin Aung, 14, from Taungsoon village, War Township, in Pegu Division. He was arrested and sentenced to three and a half years in prison last December for desertion from the Burmese army.

There is also Kyaw Ye Aung, 15, a child soldier in the Burmese army from Myin Mu village, Amarapura township, Mandalay. He ran away from his base but was rearrested as a deserter. He was put in stocks at Palake police station for two days before he was transferred to Htee Taw Moe Recruitment Base No. 2 at Madaya, Mandalay Division. His parents were notified on Jan. 27 that they could take him home because he was underage. But they were forced to sign a declaration that they would not report the case or file a complaint with the authorities or any organization.

“We've taken photos and video while we were talking with the authorities [at Maday],” said his grandfather. “We said we were going to report this to ILO. They warned us not to. They would not comment on what action would be taken against those who recruited my grandson. He is completely terrified of them, and will not say a word in front of them.”

Although the Burmese junta formed a committee to investigate child soldier issues in 2004, it has since denied using child soldiers in the army.

irrawaddy.org

A former child soldier who spent a year in the Burmese army before getting out with the help of the International Labor Organization (ILO) says abusive treatment of low-ranking troops and recruitment of underage soldiers are still common practices in the army, despite calls for reform.

The former soldier, Min Swe Oo, said that he was forcibly recruited at the end of 2009 by an unidentified sergeant in Taungoo, Pegu Division. At the time, he was just 14 years old.


Forcible Recruitment Still Common: Former Child Soldier

Burmese soldiers in Putau (Putao), northern Kachin State, deceived two high school students by giving them alcohol while convincing them to join the army, said a local source.

The 14 and 15 year-old students, in grades 9 and 10 from Sar Hkum Dam Village, in Putau district, were lured into joining the army by soldiers who made them drunk last week, said the sources close to the two students.

“They are crying now and they want to go back home but the Burmese Army won’t allow them. Their parents cannot do anything,” said the source.

Burmese soldiers use alcohol to lure two boys to join army

Originally Posted by Jools

Originally Posted by English Noodles

I would not believe everything I read at irrawaddy, they have an agenda.

Yes, they DO have an agenda...it's called freedom. This business of child soldiers is just heartbreaking.

maybe a silly question. why heartbreaking. personally i can see more poss than neg in it.

^ that you Gibbs ?

Great article Mid, many people are oblivious as to what goes on in the world. If these kids can make to adulthood maybe they can overthrow the regime.

Exploited, in More Ways Than One
LINN THANT
Wednesday, April 6, 2011


Child soldiers who desert from the Burmese army to escape mistreatment often end up as sex slaves in the country's prisons such as notorious Insein prison.

The recruitment of child soldiers in Burma is nothing new to those who know about the country's deplorable human rights record, but there is one facet of this issue that has yet to receive much attention: the abuse that child soldiers jailed for desertion face inside Burma's prisons.

Of the estimated 400,000 soldiers in Burma's army, not one is female, and so there have been no reported incidents of young girls being conscripted. But during my two decades in prison as a political prisoner until 2009, it was not unusual to hear someone talking about making someone into a “girl soldier.”

Late one evening while in prison, I heard the wailing cry of a young man, aged around 16, coming from a punishment cell adjacent to my own cell. The boy later told me that his name was Thaw Zin, and that he was a former child soldier from the Burmese army.

He was one of several child soldiers I had met during my time in jail, serving one- to three-year prison sentences for fleeing from the army. In tears, he said that he had been in jail for just five weeks when he was taken to the punishment cell for breaking a prison rule.

At first, he was reluctant to discuss his “crime,” but when I asked him what had happened to him, he continued crying for a while and then finally told me his heart-wrenching story.

Thaw Zin said that he had been sentenced to a year in prison for breaking Section 65 of the Criminal Code—army desertion. Having been out of contact with his parents since he was recruited as a solider when he was young, he could not hope to receive any visits from his family.

During his first week in prison, he was forced to wash the toilet bowls of prisoners with his bare hands. He said he detested every moment of that work and while he was trying to break free from that ordeal, a hardcore criminal prisoner named Kyaw Gyi approached him, calling him “son.”

“Kyaw Gyi gave me a bath like I was his son. I never had a good bath before I met him. He also bought me medicines for my skin diseases. I thought my own parents were not as kind as he was to me,” Thaw Zin said.

Within a matter of days, Kyaw Gyi, a notorious criminal, became a great benefactor to Thaw Zin and arranged for the latter to be able to come and live with him in the same prison ward. Also through Kyaw Gyi's prison network, Thaw Zin was liberated from his job of washing toilet bowls.

One night, Thaw Zin said Kyaw Gyi asked him for sex. He said that at first he tried to brush off Kyaw Gyi's sexual advances, thinking he had once been a soldier. But when he thought about his first weeks in prison before meeting Kyaw Gyi—doing toilet-bowl duty, and not having enough food or proper clothing or a chance to take a proper bath—he said he was finally compelled to submit to Kyaw Gyi's will.

For several nights, he appeased Kyaw Gyi's desires, but at around ten o' clock on the night before he was taken to the cell next to mine, some other prisoners became aware of what was going on. After that, he was beaten by both guards and prisoners, who started calling him a “girl soldier.”

He was then shackled and taken to the punishment cell. He said he was crying because he feared that his parents and other family members would somehow learn of his “affair” in prison.

In fact, Thaw Zin was just one of many child soldiers and young prisoners who were sexually molested by hardcore criminals who bribed prison authorities so that they could get away with their dirty acts.

According to Human Rights Watch, the vast majority of new recruits in Burma are forcibly conscripted, and there may be as many as 70,000 soldiers—including some from armed opposition groups—under the age of 18, with some as young as just 11 years of age.

In Thaw Zin's case, he said he was deceived by a broker and conscripted into the army at the age of 14. According to his account, he came from a village in Pyawbwe Township and was a student at a state high school at the time he was recruited. But because his parents were very poor peasants working on a plantation, he often missed classes so he could help them with their work.

One day, on his way back home from school, he was approached by a middle-aged man who gave him some snacks and some pocket money. A few days later, together with another boy from the village younger than him, he went along with the man to an army unit in the town.

He said that when he received his military training, he met many other boys as young as 10 and 11, and some boys were even shorter than the guns they were trained to shoot. Besides weapons training, Thaw Zin said he and other fellow child soldiers had to do various chores—ranging from doing laundry to firewood-cutting to fetching water—at the homes of military officers and others of senior rank.

Sometimes they also had to pave roads, grow trees, herd cattle owned by the army and do other hard labor. After four months of military training, during which he received no pay except pocket money, Thaw Zin became an infantry soldier and had to go to border areas in Mon and Shan states. After a few months, he ran away from the army to escape the hardships he experienced, and but was later caught and jailed.

It is certain that there are many other child soldiers in the army who would like to get out but have not yet been able to. Among those who have escaped are many who are arrested and sexually abused in jail. But some of the child soldiers I spoke to in prison told me that they were sexually abused while they were still in the army.

This may need to be corroborated, but I think the sexual abuse of child soldiers in prison also stems from public hatred of the army. Prison inmates are sometimes used as army porters and human shields in the war zones. Those prisoners who attempted to flee away during fighting were severely flogged and punished. Such stories abound in prison, perhaps prompting some prisoners to exact revenge on child soldiers who became prisoners themselves.

As the number of deserters continues to grow, the Burmese army has launched a special recruitment campaign since 2008, according to army sources, who said that each recruitment unit now has to take in as many as 150 child soldiers every month to meet their quota requirement.

An activist in Shan State working on the issue said that child soldiers have even become victims of human trafficking. In the past, the army paid private brokers who specialized in recruiting child soldiers around 30,000 kyat (US $35) for each new recruit, but now pays around 45,000 to 50,000 kyat ($52-58), he said.

Many of these brokers are relatives of soldiers, reserve members of fire-fighting units and members of the state-sponsored Union Solidarity and Development Association, which last year was transformed into a political party that now dominates Burma's newly formed Parliament.

The recruitment targets include juveniles in poor neighborhoods, orphans and teenage beggars wandering in the streets or hanging around parks, bus stops and train stations.

Army deserters like Thaw Zin told me that bullying is rampant in the army and that there is no system to provide proper education or welfare for soldiers, resulting in a dramatic increase in the numbers of deserters in recent years. Army observers said at least 30 to 35 soldiers desert from 500 army units across the country each month.

irrawaddy.org

Despite Improvements, Child Soldier Recruitment Continues
KO HTWE
Wednesday, May 11, 2011


Protesters urging the Philippines government to support a UN commission of inquiry into human rights violations in Burma rally in front of the Foreign Affairs office in Manila on August 6, 2010.
(photo: Getty Images)

The Burmese military is still recruiting underage children despite its policy against doing so, claim victims and activists.

Aye Myint, a lawyer and workers' rights activist in Pegu, told The Irrawaddy that the recruitment of children into the army is worse than last year.

“I received fifteen complaints from Rangoon, Irrawaddy, Mandalay and Pegu divisions. Three others are now collecting documents. Most of the persons that complained to the International Labor Organization (ILO) will be able to return to their home sooner or later,” said Aye Myint.

In January, 15-year-old Aung Ko and 12-year-old Thein Min Htike went missing on the way from Mawlamyinegyunn Township inthe Irrawaddy Region to Rangoon while going to visit relatives, according to a family member.

The boys' mother, San Aye, said that three months later her sons informed the family that they had been recruited into the army and were receiving basic military training at Training Battalion No. 9 in Thaton Township, Mon State.

“One of my children is so young that he is not novitiate yet. I don’t wish to let them be conscripted into the army. I don’t want to live without them. My husband is now acting crazy and every day I have to shed tears,” said San Aye. “The children rang us and said they are okay and don’t want to come back, but it seems like someone is beside them.”

Pho Phyu, a legal advocate, said that he received three cases of child recruitment recently from the Irrawaddy region.

“The recruitment is still ongoing. We have some difficulties in this case. Although we can contact the child, the army transfers the child to another place and then loses the child. So we contact ILO,” said Pho Phyu.

Burmese child soldiers have been arrested and imprisoned as punishment for deserting when they tried to run away from their army bases.

The Burmese regime formed a committee to investigate child soldier issues in 2004 and it has since denied using child soldiers in the army.

According to the ILO's data, there were 261 underage recruitment complaints and 80 young men discharged or released as a result of the complaints from the beginning of 2010 until now. Of the remaining complaints, approximately 110 are in process, which means that the military is investigating, and 80 are being assessed by the ILO.

Steve Marshall, the ILO liaison officer in Rangoon, said that when the issue of child soldier recruitment was raised back in 2007, the subject was very sensitive, but since that time the military response has been quite positive and there has been considerable improvements over the last few years.

“Every complaint we submit is received and acted on relatively efficiently, and if it is found that a person is under 18 then he is most definitely discharged and the perpetrator prosecuted,” said Marshall.

“It is important that we do not simply respond to complaints, that we are able to become more proactive working together to ensure the correct administrative policies are in place to stop the practice, and we look forward to working with the government to achieve that ideal position,” he added.

Rangoon-based 7 Day News journal, quoting a UNICEF official, reported that the number of underage soldiers recruited is decreasing and 402 child soldiers have been sent home since 2004.

“Children themselves come to the army to join. All of the child soldiers have no document such as identity and birth certificate. And its hard to differentiate who are 17-years old or 18-years old because of the same body structure. Some children want to join the army because they envy the officers they have seen,” Ramesh Shrestha, a UNICEF Representative in Burma, told the 7Day News journal.

irrawaddy.org

see also :

https://teakdoor.com/world-news/81875...-soldiers.html (Child Soldiers)

https://teakdoor.com/thailand-and-asi...d-soldier.html

https://teakdoor.com/thailand-and-asi...desertion.html (Burma : Ex-child soldier jailed for desertion)

Too bad the international community will not take a closer look at this situation. This place has been a hell hole for a long time. I have a feeling with all of the attention in the ME this is being overlooked as a convenience.