When Will the Burmese Stop Raping the Kachin Women?

Military guilty of rape Human rights activists are reporting an increased incidence of rape against Kachin women in areas of recent military attacks by government forces in northern Burma. In Kachin State alone, at least 18 cases of rape – sometimes aggravated with murder – were documented over an eight-day period in June by the [...]

Burmese Girls Forced to Marry Chinese Men

Most cross-border human trafficking in Burma involves women tricked into travelling to China to get work, only to find a groom waiting for them on the other side. Thazin* was trafficked to China from Yangon and forced into marriage in 2008. Now 29 and back in Yangon, she said that one day she drank a [...]

Benazir was No Suu Kyi

Over the last few months, even steadfast supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi were questioning her decision to keep her party, the NLD from participating in Burma’s first elections in 20 years. However flawed the vote, the argument went, it offered a tiny window of opportunity for democratic-minded parties to get a foothold in Burma’s [...]

Three Million Burmese Ve Migrated

When Kyi Kyi Thein* and her teenage daughter took up an offer for work in neighbouring Thailand, they did not expect to be smuggled by sea and locked up in a shrimp factory. Fortunately, they and 64 others were rescued by police in 2006. They stayed in Thailand for two more years during court proceedings [...]

Malaysians Raping Burmese Girls in Sarawak

Indigenous tribal girls have been sexually abused by loggers in remote jungles on Borneo island, a Malaysian government report said, in the first official verification of rape accusations involving timber companies. The report recently made public bolsters claims by the Penan tribal community of mistreatment by the timber industry, which activists say has encroached on [...]

Aung San Suu Kyi’s House Arrest Condemned

 ALAIWAH condemns the extension of Aung San Suu Kyi’s house arrest by Burma’s military junta, the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). It also calls on the SPDC to take immediate steps to release Aung San Suu Kyi and all political detainees in Burma. Aung San Suu Kyi, the country’s foremost democracy leader and head [...]