Burma Link | June 20, 2016

Mon IDP (Internally Displaced Person) settlements in southeast Burma were established over 20 years ago when scores of civilians were fleeing armed conflict and conflict-related abuse as well as widespread land confiscations at the hands of the Burma Army. Thousands of these IDPs were initially refugees in Thailand, before being forced back to Burma’s side of the border where they were attacked a few months later. On July 21, 1994, Baleh Done Phaik Mon IDP site came under attack by over 100 Burma Army troops who occupied the site, arrested some IDPs, used others as human shields, and engaged in an armed battle with the Mon National Liberation Army (MNLA) before burning almost the entire site to the ground. One Mon IDP from Baleh Done Phaik who was taken as a hostage and used as a human shield by the Burma Army troops, described the attack with remarkable detail. This is his testimony.*

[/fusion_fontawesome]In the early morning, around 6 am, Nai Nyunt
[former village headman] ran from Baleh Done Phaik to Halockhani to inform the Mon soldiers and he also told me that there were [Burma Army] soldiers, so we just tried to get some materials and to run away, but at that time the soldiers were already around my house.

It was the Full Moon day eve, so on the full moon day the young people, the youth, we made some food and the next day, on Full Moon day would donate it to the monasteries. That’s why so many people were in one building, we used it as a youth center, so the Burmese could arrest us in that same place.

And then the soldiers kept us [men] in the sun, from 6 to 12 noon. And after 15 minutes, I heard a walkie-talkie that said, “Go to Halockhani and burn the MRDC [Mon Relief and Development Committee] office and the hospital”, from the walkie-talkie I heard.

They used handcuffs, for every two villagers one pair of handcuffs, and then two villagers went in the front and one soldier went behind and we started walking to Halockhani. On the way one man from Halockhani was walking to Baleh Done Phaik and when he saw the soldiers he just sat down beside the road. “There are so many Mon soldiers, you will all die”, that man said to me.

And then I just asked the [Burma Army] officer, “the road is too small for two people to go together so please release us and we will go one after one. If we run away just shoot us,” I said to the officer. And he released all the villagers from handcuffs.

I wanted to smoke, so I asked for a cigar from the soldiers. One of the soldiers gave me a cigar and I tried to light the cigar when I saw Mon soldiers over there, a Mon soldiers I know. And the Mon soldiers showed me “Get down, get down,” just with his hands “Get down, get down.” At that time, I didn’t light the cigar and I said to the soldier, “Take the cigar, I want to pee”. So I went beside the road and I stayed like underneath the ground so that the ground was my cover.

I just stayed there and pretended like I was going to pee. At that time the Mon soldiers shot at the Burma Army soldiers. When the Mon soldiers shot at them, 7 villagers including me, ran in front of the soldiers and some soldiers yelled to their officer, “They are running, they are running!”, so the officer shouted, “Shoot them, shoot them, why don’t you shoot them!” At that time, we were a little bit far so they couldn’t shoot us.

At that time, because of running quickly, one old man got tired and couldn’t breathe, so I dragged the old man into a small hole, and we stayed in that small hole for a while. After two minutes we tried to get into the Mon soldier area. We just ran and listened to the sound of artilleries and mortars. If we heard “tak” we would get down and then the mortar would explode. And we ran until we arrived at the Mon soldiers’ area.

The fighting took place for only about 20 minutes and when the Burma Army soldiers went back to Baleh Done Phaik they burnt all houses. After a while when we went back again to that fighting place, the Mon soldiers told us, “Don’t stay here, run away, run far away from the fighting!” And at that time I saw the smoke, the smoke of the burning houses. The Burma Army soldiers left after they had burnt them.

They took 11 men. They tied their hands and necks and took all 11 men. And then the BBC [news] announced, “These 11 men are not soldiers, they are refugees, they live in a Mon IDP camp,” so that’s why the big army from Moulmein commanded the soldiers to release these 11 men, and they didn’t kill them. My brother was one of those 11 men.

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More than 20 years since the attack, after having fled back to Thailand and once again being forced to repatriate to Burma, this Mon IDP (as well as countless of others) is yet to have found a proper solution in securing his livelihood and still depends on international assistance for his daily needs.

* The testimony is an edited version of the original. Note that this is a testimony of one person only and the numbers and other details may differ from information found in other sources.

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