Burma: Trafficking worsens with war's return | Green Left Weekly

Source:  Green Left Weekly

By Lee Yu Kyung

 

Je yang camp, located a 30 minutes drive on often unpaved or rocky road from Laiza, the capital of rebels in Kachin State in northern Burma, accommodates about 8000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

The wild landscape around the camp suggests the scenery would have been far more stunning without the presence of humans.

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https://www.greenleft.org.au/node/56224

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• Burma: Traffickers Target Displaced Kachin On Chinese Border
• Kachin refugee women at risk for trafficking due to conflict, says report - Kachin News Group

Burma's Kachin Face Human Trafficking Threat Along Chinese Border (VIDEO)

Source: The Huffington Post and Berggruen Institute of Governance

By Lusha Chen for the Pulitzer Center

The decades-long conflict between the Burmese government and Kachin Independence Army, members of a minority group, has “created a perfect storm for human trafficking along the China-Burma border,” according to a report released by Kachin Women's Association Thailand.

Read more and see the video here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/27/burma-kachin-human-trafficking_n_4676106.html

Conflict and Bride Trafficking: The Sino-Burmese Border | STAND

http://www.standnow.org/blog/conflict-and-bride-trafficking-sino-burmese-border

Source:  www.standnow.org

This piece is by Laura Hackney, from Stanford STAND

With the end of the ceasefire in 2011 between the KIA (Kachin Independence Army) and the national Burmese army*, fighting in the Kachin State has escalated across the vast province. Though peace talks have taken place recently in the Chinese border town of Ruili, the effects of this violence have destroyed lives and endangered the livelihoods of thousands of Kachin people living in the region. Additionally, the Palaung people in the Northeast Shan State of Burma have also suffered decades of fighting, increased food, education, and healthcare costs, as well as military seizures of land. The vulnerabilities of these minority groups (especially women) have intensified despite the political reforms coming from Naypyidaw.

Due to these various compounding factors, these states along the Sino-Burmese border have become a perfect breeding ground for the trafficking of women and girls into China’s Yunnan Province. Over the past 15 years, migration to China has increased as economic opportunities in towns such as Ruili have exploded.
 Once thought of as the “Wild West” of China, these border towns were the centers for the sex industry, drug trafficking, gambling, and a lucrative jade market. The local government has swiftly cracked down on these illicit activities (especially in Ruili) in the recent decade. However, there has emerged another lucrative market in the region, namely—women trafficked to become brides for Chinese men.

As with several other rapidly developing nations, China has experienced extraordinary demographic changes in the past three decades. In addition to an aging population, there exists in China an aggregate gender imbalance. This imbalance exists in various regional contexts, and has had its most extreme manifestations in rural areas. Due to land reform, the One Child Policy, the proliferation of ultra-sounds, and the overwhelming dependence on son to carry on the family name, the sex ratio at birth in some regions is greatly skewed (in some areas the imbalance is as high as 130 males per every 100 females). Traditional means of securing a bride is no longer available for some men, particularly those living in poor villages. Ruili’s location on the border between Yunnan and Burma acts as a gateway for women to be trafficked into Yunnan and then out to different provinces across the country.

Two Burmese NGOs, the Palaung Women’s Association and the Kachin Women’s Association, have been working in Thailand to document these cases of human trafficking. As with a large number of trafficking cases, traffickers are able to take advantage of the relative poverty of those victims who they wish to sell. Many young women living in the Palaung and Kachin areas of Burma are told that they will be able to find good jobs in prosperous China and send money home to their families. These women enter China, often without documentation, and are sold to Chinese families who need a wife and heir. Once in China, these women do not have access to many public services, can suffer abuse at the hands of their new husbands, or be forced to work without wages in various industries.

Both the Burmese and Chinese governments have established National Plans of Action against Trafficking of Women and Children; however, the root causes of this problem, especially in Burma, have yet to be addressed. The causes of trafficking can be complex, incorporating gender relations, conflict environments, economic resource allocation, globalization, proliferation of crime networks, and poverty--to name a few. In this light, human trafficking is an intolerable symptomatic of various forms of oppression. As a starting point, there must be awareness that a main factor pushing these women in the hands of traffickers is the lack of opportunities in their home cities or villages. An end to the fighting in the Kachin State and a focus on more equitable economic investment by foreign, private, and government entities should be the priority for those working for positive change in Burma.

*Note: “Burmese” here does not explicitly mean the Burmese ethnic group.

Myanmar's trafficked brides fill China's shortage of women - TrustLaw

http://www.trust.org/trustlaw/news/myanmars-trafficked-brides-fill-chinas-women-shortage/- 

Tue, 4 Dec 2012 08:30 GMT

Source: Trustlaw // TrustLaw

A 52-year-old widow from central Myanmar who once used herself as bait to apprehend a broker who was taking young single girls to China. Circumstances forced her to abandon the plan but she hasn’t given up the idea of using herself as a bait again. Taken on Oct 12, 2012 by Minzayar Oo.

YANGON (TrustLaw) - Thazin*, a 17-year-old Burmese from a poor family, thought she was going to work in a textile shop in China, earning wages she daren’t dream of as a market vendor in a suburb of Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city.

Another woman thought she’d married a Burmese man who’d rescue her from an abusive father in central Myanmar. A third from Kachin State bordering China followed a neighbour’s sister who offered a well-paid job so her family could buy rice.

On arriving in China, all three were forced to marry men they’d never set eyes on before: farmers, construction workers and labourers, typical of many who, after decades of a Chinese one-child policy and a cultural preference for male offspring, are unable to find a Chinese bride, let alone pay her dowry.

Instead they pay brokers to find them a wife from impoverished Myanmar, where at least a quarter of the population lives on $1 a day.

Thazin told TrustLaw she cried and begged the brokers to let her go when she found out what was happening to her - but she couldn't escape from the stranger who had paid to marry her.
“I didn’t know where to run and I was scared they'd kill me if I got caught,” she said.

She lived in a village in China's southwest Yunnan province for nearly five years and gave birth to two children before escaping. She said there were many forced brides from Myanmar in other villages in the area.

Seven out of every 10 trafficking cases in Myanmar in 2011 “were committed solely with the intention of forcing girls and women into marriages with Chinese men,” said the Myanmar government’s annual progress report on anti-trafficking efforts.

Myanmar and China signed a memorandum of understanding in 2009 to tackle trafficking, but a plan of action has yet to be finalised. Aid workers and activists say Beijing’s reluctance to work with civil society is a problem.

There are concerns too that the prolonged displacement of an estimated 75,000 people in Myanmar's Kachin State due to clashes between government troops and Kachin rebels could increase the risk of trafficking of women and girls.

POVERTY MEETS WOMEN SHORTAGE

Chinese government figures released in June 2012 say the country of 1.3 billion people has 117.78 men for every 100 women as a result of its long-standing single-child policy. By 2020, there could be between 24 million and 30 million single Chinese men.

The scarcity of jobs in Myanmar means poor, vulnerable Burmese girls and women are falling victim to traffickers - many of them women  - who bring them to China under false pretences as brides for Chinese bachelors.

The Myanmar government recorded a total of 315 forced marriages in the past three years. Most are believed to have occurred in China. The United Nations says the main destinations are the southern provinces of Yunnan, Fujian, Henan, Sichuan and Anhui.

Figures from the U.N.anti- trafficking agency UNIAP show that 103 women were trafficked to China in the first eight months of 2012. The real number could be higher as many victims may be unable to run away, unwilling to speak out or unaware that help is available.

"Sometimes the victims are not aware they’re being exploited and can file complaints,” said Khin Myo Thant, manager of the anti-trafficking programme at aid agency World Vision, which is helping Thazin. “They think it’s their karma, because of something they’ve done in the previous life."

The Myanmar government may be winning praise for its democratic reforms but it has not adequately addressed social protection and livelihood needs, David Brickey Bloomer, Save the Children’s child protection officer for Asia, told TrustLaw. A perception that girls are an economic burden on the household leads to their being encouraged to migrate in search of opportunities when times are hard.

“If there was a choice between a boy and a girl in one household, who would they first encourage to go? It would almost overwhelmingly be the girl; or a girl may be asked to drop out of school before a boy would be,” he said. “That’s not just in Myanmar but quite common through Southeast Asia.”

TACKLING DEMAND

Exiled ethnic groups also say problems in Myanmar such as land seizures, forced labour and religious discrimination, as well as armed clashes in border areas, can force women to search for greener pastures.

The Kachin Women's Association Thailand (KWAT), which operates a crisis centre at the Myanmar-China border and helps 60 to 80 trafficking victims a year, has been overwhelmed by the need to care for women displaced by the fighting in Kachin state which began in June 2011, according to Julia Marip, coordinator of the KWAT anti-trafficking programme.

“When the period of displacement increases and the amount of aid reduces, it is inevitable they would start looking at ways of earning a living,” she told TrustLaw.

Efforts to stop forced marriages must focus on both ends of the trafficking chain, aid workers say. "We need to tackle the demand issue if we want to tackle (this),” said World Vision’s Khin Myo Thant.

“But in China, they don’t consider this forced marriage,” said Thant. “For them it’s looking for a bride and not a big issue. But from the perspective of Myanmar culture and women, it shouldn’t happen.”

CHALLENGES
Myanmar has taken steps to combat trafficking, including enacting a law against human trafficking in 2005, and has been recognised for its efforts.

In June, the U.S. State Department upgraded the country to Tier 2 status in its latest Trafficking in Persons Report, from Tier 3 - the lowest ranking – where it had languished since the report was introduced in 2000.

Still, there are concerns that the pace of change means the authorities are struggling to ensure that the plans they draw up are implemented effectively. Critics say the government is good at raising awareness, using posters and billboards, but poor at measuring the impact of its projects, and weak on coordination between key agencies - the Home Affairs Ministry and the Social Welfare Department.

Corruption remains a major issue, too, with authorities turning a blind eye to traffickers, especially in border areas. This makes victims reluctant to come forward, hampering prosecutions.

“Sometimes when we receive calls, we tell (the victims) to go to the anti-trafficking police who could help them, but they daren’t go,” said Ohnmar Ei Ei Chaw, UNIAP’s national project coordinator in Myanmar.“The fear and distrust of authorities is still present so they’re scared to file a complaint or ask for help.”

Even when victims manage to escape, their ordeal may not be over. Helping to rehabilitate and reintegrate them is “the biggest challenge” and many who came back have difficulties finding stable jobs with decent wages, she said.

“In terms of procedures and policies, all are in place, but to really help them recover and reintegrate, we need the human resources, the expertise, funding and a coordinated mechanism between different departments. All of these are still quite weak,” she said.

Thazin, who made the long journey home only to find that her widowed father had died and her brothers had been separated, would like the traffickers to be arrested if they could be found.

“I don’t want anyone to go through what I did,” she said.

* Names have been changed to protect the identity of the victims.

 This article is part of a Thomson Reuters Foundation special report ontrafficking and modern day slavery.

Trafficking and modern day slavery will be high on the agenda at the Trust Women conference, Dec 4-5