The Rapist Burmese Army

By Kanbawza Win

A seven year old girl raped by the Burmese army ‘Tatmadaw’ soldier was no news for the tyrannical Burmese army. They have been doing this for more than half a century, which is why the people call them ‘Mudane Tatmadaw’ (မုဒိမ္းတပ္မေတာ္). When the rapist army comes all the females have to hide; the soldiers will not differentiate whether it is a child or a 90 year old woman.

Burmese soldiers want to rape in order to give the Burmese genes to the Non-Burmese ethnic nationalities. This is the unwritten and undeclared policy of the Burma nationalist government spearheaded by the Tatmadaw since 1962. So it is no wonder that one of the Burmanization policies of the Tatmadaw is the systematic raping of ethnic nationality women. Eyewitness accounts of civilians fleeing territories under attack reveal a grim picture of the Tatmadaw, an army that targets unarmed women and children in a ‘widespread and systematic way,’ as stated by various human rights and humanitarian groups.

According to Benjamin Zawacki, Southeast Asia researcher for Amnesty International: “Burmese troops are overtly targeting civilians; they are actively avoiding KNU military installations. That is why we are describing the attacks as ‘crimes against humanity’”.

The widespread and systematic nature of Burmese army rape tactics has been a well-documented phenomenon for well over a decade. In 2002, The License to Rape report published by Shan Women’s Action Network and Shan Human Rights Foundationinspired a high level of interest and outrage on the part of the international community against the Burmese army¹.

Several NGOs and independent organizations have examined the structures, policies, and practices of the Tatmadaw, concluding that many of these contribute to Burmese soldiers raping women from Burma`s ethnic nationalities. Burmese generals, on the other hand, have denounced the reports and stated that such reports were fabricated. Private independent research tells a different story, and leads to the inescapable conclusion that the Tatmadaw uses rape on a widespread basis against women from many of Burma`s ethnic nationalities. These rapes are not an aberration committed by renegade soldiers; they are part of a pattern of brutal abuse designed to control, terrorize, and harm ethnic nationality populations through targeting their women. Rape is not confined to Shan State. It is widespread throughout the ethnic states².

Rape by Tatmadaw soldiers is systematic. Its targeting of ethnic women constitutes the kind of preconceived plan or policy necessary to characterize the rape as systematic. Rape and increased militarization go hand-in-hand. When more soldiers are deployed, typically more rape occurs. Rape also occurs on Tatmadaw property especially in Tatmadaw bases, in Tatmadaw barracks, and inTatmadaw jails. This is an authenticated proof that rape is used as a weapon³.

Soldiers of Tatmadaw are raping ethnic women and girls with impunity and women and girls from the Shan, Kachin, Chin, Karen, Mon, Karenni and Arakan states have long suffered under these state-sanctioned sex crimes. Rape incidents in ethnic areas are higher than anywhere else in Burma because they are part of the regime’s strategy both to punish the armed resistance groups and to use a tool to repress various peoples in the larger agenda of ethnic cleansing. More often than not the rapes are carried out with extreme brutality, often resulting in death. But mostly, rapes are part of the Burmanization program.

More than half of the rapes documented in the Licence to Rape report were gang rapes, showing that there is a collective understanding among the troops that they can rape without consequences. Furthermore, according to the women interviewed, 83% of the rapes were committed by officers, usually in front of their own troops, sending a clear message to the troops that rape is acceptable and even encouraged. None of these rapists have been prosecuted. In some cases, those survivors who were courageous enough to report the cases were threatened while others were detained, fined, tortured, or even killed.

Before 1988, a secret order had been issued stating that any Burmese soldier who is able to marry an ethnic woman is rewarded a handsome amount of money. This, however, happens to be a difficult and slow process, so when the Tatmadaw took over the administration, it started to encourage raping ethnic women. This unwritten message was clearly understood by the lieutenants and captains, these ranks subsequently becoming the ones committing most of the rapes.

The regime’s thinking was that in the long run, if only there would be only one race (Burmese), one religion (Theravada Buddhism) and one country, Burma would be able to govern and stand tall in the international community. This is the basic philosophy of all the various military juntas⁴.

Rape often occurs in conjunction with other human rights abuses, such as forced labour, forced relocation, forced portering, torture, and extrajudicial executions. There is also a direct connection between rape and flight. Many women flee Burma either because they have been raped, or because they fear being raped. In addition, rape sometimes occurs while women are in flight.

Widespread rape is committed with impunity, both by officers and lower ranking soldiers. The culture of impunity contributes to the Tatmadaw atmosphere in which rape is permissible. It also leads to the conclusion that the system for protecting civilians is faulty, which may serve as proof that the rape is systematic. Due to the well-known impunity for rape, survivors and families are extremely reluctant to complain about rape. In the rare cases where victims do complain, the military often responds with violence.

On November 19, 2002, the United Nations General Assembly adopted by consensus a resolution on the human rights situation in Burma, expressing a grave concern for rapes and other forms of sexual violence carried out by members of the Burmese army against its own ethnic citizens and resulting in the severe suffering of ethnic women and children.

More recently, after decades of systematic rape by the Mudane Tatmadaw, at last the UN Security Council Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in April 2014 called on the Burmese government to conduct full investigations into allegations of rape and sexual assault committed by the Tatmadaw.

“I call on the Government of Myanmar to fully investigate and respond to current and historical human rights violations and abuses, including crimes of sexual violence. I urge the Government, with the support of the United Nations and it partners, to work to develop a comprehensive protection and service response for survivors,” Mr Ban Ki-moon said in a report presented to the UN Security Council⁵.

The Women’s League of Burma, however, was quick to point out that “previous government-led investigations into military rape have not only failed to deliver justice, but have led to further humiliation and intimidation of rape survivors and their communities.” ⁶

Now, not only the people of Burma but also the world has accepted the fact that the Burmese Army Tatmadaw is a rapist army, in Burmese called Mudane Tatmadaw (မုဒိမ္းတပ္မေတာ္).

Nevertheless, as recently as in January 2014, the presidential spokesman Ye Htut denied that the Burmese military uses rape as a weapon.