(Amnesty International has said it has‘credible information that Myanmar's military deployed land mines in KayahState)

Deutsche Welle

July 20, 2022 11:41 PM

Myanmar's military is committing war crimes by layinglandmines "on a massive scale" around villages, human rights groupAmnesty International said yesterday.

Fighting has ramped up in recent months after armedforces overthrew the democratically-elected government in February 2021 —returning leadership to a military junta.

Amnesty investigators travelled to Kayah State(formerly known as Karenni State) near the border with Thailand, where theyinterviewed 43 people including landmine survivors, medical workers who hadtreated them, and others involved in clearing operations.

The team said they had "credibleinformation" that the military placed landmines in at least 20 villages, includingnear rice fields and around a church, which resulted in civilian injuries anddeaths.

The researchers claimed that in at least one case,soldiers booby-trapped the stairwell of a home using a tripwire.

"The military's depraved use of landmines inhomes and villages will continue to have devastating effects on civilians inKayah State for years to come," said Rawya Rageh, a senior crisis advisorat Amnesty International.

One 52-year-old mother shared an anecdote with theresearchers about the time her teenage daughter was maimed by a landmine.

"I heard the explosion, then I looked and saw alot of smoke," Rosie recalled. "I heard my daughter yelling, 'Mama,Mama,' and I went to look and saw her lying on the ground."

"I noticed that my daughter had no leg anymore… Iwent searching for [her leg], but the man who [was passing by and stopped] tohelp us said, 'Stop! There will be another landmine. The most important thingis to stop the bleeding.'"

Myanmar's military uses several kinds oflocally-manufactured landmines that Amnesty says are "inherentlyindiscriminate."

The military is currently waging a civil war onmultiple fronts — not only in the eastern Kayah State, but also to the west inRakhine State.

There, the treatment of the Muslim Rohingya populationhas been condemned as genocide by governments including the United States,France and Turkey, as well as by NGOs like Amnesty itself.

More than 160 countries have joined the 1997 OttawaConvention that bans the manufacture, stockpiling and transfer ofanti-personnel mines.

Myanmar is one of a few countries not to have signedthe treaty, along with superpowers the United States, Russia and China. ButAmnesty International also claims landmines are nevertheless prohibited under"customary international humanitarian law."

Matt Wells, Amnesty International's crisis responsedeputy director, said the world must respond "urgently" to Myanmar's"cruel and abhorrent" use of landmines.