Burmese army using rape to terrorise villagers, says report
By Randeep Ramesh Monday

April 2, 2007 – (Guardian Unlimited) Sharon, a Chin woman who escaped to India after being raped by Burmese soldiers.

Rape is being used as a "weapon" to terrorise villagers in Burma leading to a refugee influx in neighbouring India, a new report claims.

More than 100,000 people – more than 15% of the population - have fled Burma's Chin state, a lush thin strip of land the size of Belgium, into north-eastern India in recent years.

Campaigners say that a push by the Burmese military rulers to crush a 20-year-old "Chin" insurgency combined with a recent state-policy to "Burmanise" the local population has seen soldiers run amok in the state.

"Women are the most vulnerable group and the soldiers rape them to terrorise the local populace. The state encourages this because it wants to abolish other ethnic identities and thinks forced mixing is one way of achieving this," said Cheery Zahau, author of the report Unsafe State, which chronicles dozens of rape cases.

The Chins are an ethnically distinct people who are mostly Christian. Burma – now officially named Myanmar by the junta – is a predominately Buddhist country.

"The army used to have just two battalions in Chin state. Now they have eight and another five in surrounding areas. [The soldiers] perpetuate systematic sexual violence."

Ms Zahau says girls as young as 12 are being raped in their homes and then often conscripted to work as porters in the army. There has not been any prosecution of Burmese soldiers although in rare cases some perpetrators have paid small sums, amounting to a few pounds, to victims' families.

In a poor corner of western Delhi lives Sharon, a Chin woman who escaped to India in 2004. She had been raped twice after being forced to carry provisions and ammunition for Burmese soldiers through the jungles.

"The soldiers came to my house asking for food. They raped me in front of my mother. Then they took me to work for them. I was raped again and ran away. I did not stop running until I reached India," she told the Guardian.

Once in India's Mizoram state, Sharon discovered she was pregnant. "I did not know what had happened. The soldiers' had done this to me. I could not keep the baby and gave him away to an Indian family who wanted children."

The 40-year-old now lives with her two teenage daughters in a single tiny room above an open drain in a dusty lane. Awarded refugee status by the UN, Sharon is allowed to work. She manages to survive on her monthly wage of 1,500 rupees and a refugee subsidy of 600 rupees – less than a pound a day.

"I cannot speak the language here and there is a lot of discrimination against us because we are not Indian. But it is better here than in Burma," said Sharon.

Having got refugee status, Sharon is one of the luckier escapees from Burma. Most live in fear of deportation unless they can make the 1,600-mile journey to Delhi from the border. India now forcibly repatriates high-profile Burmese asylum-seekers. Last year Delhi extradited 11 Burmese army defectors.

Despite openly supporting the pro-democracy movement after the 1988 uprisings, India has moved silently to supporting the military in Burma in a bid to counter rising Chinese influence. This week Burma's naval chief was visiting New Delhi to bolster bilateral ties.

From: http://www.guardian.co.uk/burma/story/0,,2048433,00.html