PERSECUTION AND MURDER OF THE CHIN PEOPLE CONTINUES
"How and why the Burmese Army murder our Chin Christians"
ON THE BURMA-INDIA BORDER (ANS) -- A Burma Army battalion Kha-lah-yah Unit 89, commanded by Lt.Col. Thurah Sein Win was stationed in Phailen, a border village at the Burma-India border, in the Homalin district. In July 1993, a soldier from the Army unit disappeared with four rifles, leaving behind a letter saying that he was leaving because he was unhappy with life in the Burmese Army.
Subsequently, the Army unit accused the Christian community of Phailen of buying the arms from the soldier with church funds, to help the anti-Burmese State Law and Order Restoration Council SLORC resistance movement, the Kuki National Army. The Kuki are Chin, who live in the Indo-Burma border areas (in the Kale -Kabaw Valley extending to Tamu (Sagaing Division).
The army unit arrested several leaders of the community and kept them in the army camp lock-up. On August 2,1993 they interrogated one of the prisoners, Pastor Zang Kho Let. When the Pastor’s answers did not pleased the interrogators, the army personnel beat him with rifle butts or sticks that eventually broke almost all of his bones after two days of interrogation. They cut open his mouth to the neck and told him "We cut open your mouth so that you will no longer preach."
In the two days that they tortured him, Pastor Zang Kho Let never admitted to using the church fund to help the resistance movement or that he was involved in helping the armed resistance. The soldiers, Non Commissioner Officer NCO’s, and officers tortured the pastor with the intent to kill but he was still alive after two days of their inhuman brutality. When the torturers reported to their commanding officer, Colonel Thura Sein Win, on the condition of the pastor, the colonel ordered them to tighten a plastic bag over his head. (Thura is the name of an award given to army officers for bravery, like the torture of the preacher).
After Pastor Zang Kho Let died, they dragged his lifeless body out of the school building and shot him. With a bullet wound in his body, the Burmese army unit claimed that they shot the pastor because he was trying to escape. The soldiers brought the dead body of Pastor Zang Kho Let back in the school building and placed together with the leaders of the village community, who were arrested to witness the gruesome state of the body. They were told to feel the bones, which were all broken. They were told, “If you do not tell us the truth and if you do not admit that you helped the KNA, you will face the same fate.”
The headman of the village, Zang Kho Ngam, farmers Ngam Khai, and Thawng Kho Lun admitted to helping the resistance movement in order to escape torture and death. Nonetheless, they were tortured. It took seven days for the three of them to die; they died a slow death. The soldiers cut and burned their skin. They poured salt directly into their open sores. The soldiers zealously repeated the torture that they had just meted out to Pastor Zang Kho Let. [more]
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