(This post is direct translation of articles from various Burmese
language blogs.)
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| KIA landmine victim Ma Jar-Sai-Ein (age 13). |
In the
early evening of September 13 a thirteen-years-old Kachin schoolgirl on her way
home from the Pharkant State High School was killed when KIA triggered a
massive explosion of the series of 30 mines they had earlier planted along the
road near the school.
Her
name was Jar-Sai-Ein and she was a year-9 student and the mines killing her
were the handy work of the Sixth Battalion Second Brigade of Kachin
Independence Army well known in Burma as KIA.
According to the KIA the
mines were intended for the Burma army column from the LIB-389 reported to be
travelling along the busy road between Mhaw-wan-ga-lay and Sunt-nghai villages.
But their timing was wrong
and they killed one and wounded many among the school children on their way
home after school from the Pharkant State High School and Mhaw-wan State
Primary School.
The wounded civilians and the
children still receiving treatments in the Pharkant Hospital are
Lu-bu-jar-lu-on (8), Lu-bu-khun-sai (31), Sai-lu-pan (17), Ga-long-khau-pan
(36), Kyaw-Htain-Lin (17), Khau-saung (35), all from Mhawwan, and Soe-Moe (44)
from Sut-yat-nghai.
Series of 30 remote-controlled mines: KIA
Favourite
Ruthless KIA has been using
what the local people (whether Kachins or Shans or Burmese) fearfully called the
Mine-Ba-day-thar (Series of land-mines in Burmese) all over the populated areas
of Kachin State to attack the army columns and also to stop the local civilian
populace from freely moving around doing their own business like farming,
hunting, or just travelling to and from their homes.
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| A wounded soldier. |
The end result is the
indiscriminate killings of innocent men, women, and children like 13 years old
schoolgirl Jar-Sai-Ein from Pharkant. Of course the KIA mines also kill the men
of the Burma army.
On August 29 of this year a column
from Burma army LIB-269 (Light Infantry Battalion) had a devastating loss from KIA
Mine-Ba-day-thar when the column entered a Buddhist village known to be a anti-KIA
village near Pharkant.
KIA had planted many lots of
their Mine Ba-day-thar in the village and blew the whole village up when the
whole army column was in the village. Apart from the large number of Buddhist
villagers killed and wounded 6 army officers and 42 other ranks all total 48
men of LIB-269 under the TOC-21 (Tactical Operations Command) were killed in
the devastating landmine attack.
Kachin countryside strewn with deadly KIA
landmines
As their strategic policy KIA
has been using millions of land mines they had stockpiled last 20 odd years of
peace in case they had to face the Burma army again. And now they are using
these mines all over once-peaceful Kachin State. In the process they
indiscriminately killed and wounded mainly the innocent civilians and some
Burma army men.
Many incompetent KIA men have
even managed to kill themselves with their own mines as a lot of them
minelayers are forced-recruits from the local Kachin and Shan villages with
just few days of training on laying landmines.
The main targets of KIA
landmine campaign are the Mandalay-Myitkyinar rail line and the daily trains,
and all vehicular roads so that the army wouldn’t be able to supply their infantry
battalions all over the Kachin State.
But the sinister targets of
KIA landmine campaign are the farms and villages as KIA has basically wanted to
drive debilitating fear into the minds of local populace.
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| A motorbike-rider killed by KIA's roadside mine. |
Kachins are now the minority
in their own land after waging many decades of brutal civil war against Buddhist
Burma army which is also equally brutal in their response to the Christian KIA.
Shans gradually moving up
from the neighboring Shan State are now more than 60% of total population of
Kachin State while ethnic Burmese now dominates major cities like Myitkyinar
and Bamaw.
Nearly half of the KIA ranks
and files are now ethnic Shan Buddhists but the officer ranks are still
dominated by the ethnic Kachin Christians and the trouble is brewing in KIA
field units as happened between the Wa troops and leading Burmese cadres in
now-completely-disappeared CPB forces during the 1980s.
No longer are the majority of
people their own Kachins the KIA needs deep-seated fear to control the local
populace, and their landmines are the major instrument for planting that
constant fear into people’s mind.
Civilian landmine casualties in Pharkant
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| Mutilated corpse of Daw Lat-Sai (age 51). |
On September 18 this year a
Mhaw-wan resident 51 year-old Kachin woman Daw Lat-Sai was killed stepping on a
KIA landmine planted on the dirt track by the Namaryan Creek, on her way to her
small plot of vegetable land in Pharkant.
The locals brought her to the
Pharkant Hospital but she died on the way. She was a poor widower and left two
young sons and two young daughters destitute and hopeless from the loss of
their mother and the only breadwinner of the family.
Her husband a Kachin was
killed 5 years ago. Out of 4 now-orphaned children the youngest girl Ma
Jar-Lone is a Year-3 student at the Mhaw-wan State Primary School.
The local KIA is now
demanding her young children and relatives to pay back for their
destroyed-landmine as their declared policy is to get back the inflated-cost of
an exploded KIA mine if a person or a farm animal had stepped on it.
“These mines are for the Burma army soldiers to step on,
not the local civilians and their farm animals, and if they step on it and kill
or main themselves that’s their problem not KIA’s, but we must be paid for the
damages done to our valuable landmine,”
KIA proudly declare their policy and strictly enforce it.
Maung Brang, from Waimaw town across the Irrawaddy from Myitkyinar, in above photo was injured and Maung Lwan Ze his friend was killed stepping on a KIA mine planted on the dirt track near their village in Waimaw Township while they were searching for a stray cow. Brang almost lost his right eye and his chest is now pockmarked with shrapnel from the landmine explosion.
Whether Maung Bran's family is being asked by the local KIA to pay back for the substantial damages done to their mine is not confirmed yet at the time of this news report. Maung Bran is now in Myitkyinar hospital.
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| Maung Bran at the Myitkyinar hospital. |
Whether Maung Bran's family is being asked by the local KIA to pay back for the substantial damages done to their mine is not confirmed yet at the time of this news report. Maung Bran is now in Myitkyinar hospital.
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| Assorted landmines captured from KIA (2012). |
And the pathological liar KIA
has been blaming it all on Burma army. They love to use such big words like Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing while they have been doing genocide and ethnic
cleansing of ethnic Burmese and Shans living peacefully for generations on
their so-called ancestral land.
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| Refugees fleeing KIA atrocities in a Refugee camp in Pharkant (2012). |
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| One of many bridges destroyed by KIA (2012). |
KIA ignores ASSK's demand to stop using Landmines
After her visit to Kachin State and extensive consultation with the Kachin people in last February just this year Daw Suu has requested the KIA to stop using their landmines, but KIA has completely ignored Daw Suu's demand and now, believe it or not, they are seriously condemning Daw Suu for being silence on the Kachin issue.
A classic example of the pot calling the kettle black. Daw Suu will start talking about the Kachin issue, I reckon, once KIA start listening to her with respect she well deserved!
Daw Suu in Myitkyinar (February 2012)
A classic example of the pot calling the kettle black. Daw Suu will start talking about the Kachin issue, I reckon, once KIA start listening to her with respect she well deserved!