Torture in Myanmar: New Reports

[ASEAN NOW Content Team]

 

"They suffocated me by putting a plastic bag over my head."
They repeated the process three times....
They staged a mock execution....
They aimed a weapon at me and repeatedly pressed the trigger."

This is how a Myanmar inmate recounted to Human Rights Watch some of the torture tactics employed by Myanmar soldiers during an interrogation session in a military facility after being arrested for anti-junta rallies earlier this year.
Even before the interrogation, the subject had been beaten severely.
The former inmate stated, "My back felt broken."
"They kept kicking my head when I was on my knees...
There was a lot of blood.
I honestly didn't think I'd make it out alive."

 

Torture by Myanmar's notoriously harsh security personnel is becoming more widely publicised.
The Associated Press published an exposé on October 28 that includes credible and consistent claims of torture from 28 detainees who were released in recent months, as well as information from victims, medical forensic analysts, and military defectors who observed the abuse.

On October 18, Myanmar's junta issued a partial amnesty for detainees.
According to the announcement, 1,316 persons will be pardoned and charges against 4,320 people who "participated in protests" would be withdrawn.
However, many of these individuals have yet to be released, and those who have been released have detailed descriptions of their mistreatment.

 

Several women who had been released told Myanmar media about the brutality they had received in a Yangon interrogation centre, including mock executions and sexual assault.
Since the February 1 military coup that ousted the democratically elected government, Human Rights Watch has recorded similar accounts at the same facility and elsewhere.

Human Rights Watch has concluded that violations since the February coup amount to crimes against humanity, based on consistent accusations of torture of junta critics, as well as widespread and systematic executions and other atrocities by Myanmar's security forces.