Police in western Myanmar\u2019s volatile Rakhine state investigating the rape of an ethnic Rakhine woman during military operations in her village last week have summoned witnesses to provide their accounts of the alleged assault, a township administrator said Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The 36-year-old mother of four children told RFA on July 2 that she had been sexually assaulted by four uniformed Myanmar soldiers in rural Rathedaung township on June 30 when they found her and some relatives hiding in a bomb shelter in their home during an army sweep of U Gar village to clear the area of rebel Arakan Army (AA) troops.<\/p>\n
Sheltering with the woman in the bomb shelter during a military campaign that displaced 20,000 people were her daughter, infant granddaughter, mother, aunt, and mother-in-law, said the woman, who declined to be named for safety reasons. Her husband, who has worked in neighboring Thailand for the past six years, was absent.<\/p>\n
Soldiers who entered the house discovered the women when the baby cried out, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey told me I had to give them either my life or my body,\u201d she told RFA. \u201cI refused them, and they threatened me by pointing their guns at me, saying they would kill me if I ran. I tried, but they stopped me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I hadn\u2019t let them do what they wanted, my life would have been in danger, and my family members could have been killed, too,\u201d she said. \u201cThen they raped me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Afterwards, the soldiers instructed the women not to tell anyone what they had done and handed her 20,000 kyats (U.S. $14).<\/p>\n
They soldiers intended to rape the victim\u2019s daughter, but her mother-in-law begged them not to because the younger woman had given birth six days earlier, she added.<\/p>\n
Myanmar military spokesman Brigadier General Zaw Min Tun denied that soldiers raped the woman and suggested that she made up the story<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter the military received the report, we investigated the claims and released a statement saying that we found it not to be true,\u201d he told RFA.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome cases are made up,\u201d he added. \u201cPeople may have filed complaints. Whether the crime really occurred or not, the victim side can file a report if they believe that they have been hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n
Questioned in Sittwe<\/strong><\/p>\n On Tuesday, Rathedaung township administrator Aung Myint Thein told RFA that Colonel Min Than, Rakhine\u2019s security and border affairs minister, ordered him to bring the woman and the witnesses to the state capital Sittwe for questioning.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Rakhine state border and security affairs minister asked me to summon them,\u201d he said, adding that state police took the U Gar village head, his clerk, and three women who were with the victim in the bomb shelter and questioned them in Sittwe for about 12 hours.<\/p>\n \u201cI was there with them,\u201d he said. \u201cI just got back home, but the three women are still there for questioning. I was not questioned.\u201d<\/p>\n The alleged victim\u2019s sister-in-law told RFA that the police asked her about the rape and about the soldiers taking the victim\u2019s daughter, intending to sexually assault her.<\/p>\n \u201cI told them everything I know,\u201d she said. \u201cI told them how they entered the house, how they found us because they heard the baby crying, how they took the victim to rape, and how they took the victim\u2019s daughter from the bomb shelter.\u201d<\/p>\n The woman\u2019s aunt also said that she told the police all she had observed because she wants justice for her niece.<\/p>\n \u201cNo woman would degrade herself by coming out as rape victim,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are just worried that we won\u2019t get justice for her. We just want justice.\u201d<\/p>\n RFA has withheld the names of the witnesses, as well as the identity of the alleged victim, to protect their safety and privacy.<\/p>\n When contacted by RFA, Police Lieutenant Colonel Maung Maung Soe of the Rakhine State Police Force said he did not know about the questioning of the women.<\/p>\n \u201cThey can\u2019t be questioned unless they filed a complaint about the rape case, but they didn\u2019t,\u201d he said. \u201cI haven\u2019t heard that the plaintiff has filed a case either, so it is impossible that they have been questioned. The witnesses can testify only after the victim files the case.\u201d<\/p>\n Colonel Min Than, who requested the meeting with three women, told RFA that police had not\u00a0 questioned them, but rather asked for their observations.<\/p>\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t question them,\u201d he said. \u201cWe just asked them if they had something to say or to report and asked them how we could help. They were saying different things.\u201d<\/p>\n UN calls for investigation<\/strong><\/p>\n United Nations officials in Myanmar have urged authorities to fully investigate the case and prosecute the perpetrators.<\/p>\n \u201cThe U.N. is aware of the accusation that three soldiers raped a woman in Rakhine,\u201d a U.N. officer who declined to be named told RFA in an email.<\/p>\n \u201cAuthorities should investigate the accusation as soon as possible,\u201d the person wrote.\u201d If the crime occurred, then the accused should be put on trial and action should be taken against them.\u201d<\/p>\n Aung Myo Min, director of human rights education group Equality Myanmar, called for a thorough independent probe of the case based on evidence and facts, and not just a military investigation.<\/p>\n \u201cAn independent investigation should be carried out for this case that would ensure objectivity in the judicial process,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Reports of Myanmar military \u201cclearance operations\u201d to ferret out AA soldiers in Rathedaung in June prompted about 20,000 civilians to flee the Mu-sae Kan area of southern Rathedaung township where U Gar village is located.<\/p>\n The villagers made their way to Sittwe and other safe places amid fighting between Myanmar and Arakan forces that has raged in northern Rakhine state for the past 18 months.<\/p>\n Locals said a military column entered U Gar Village on June 30 and opened fire, prompting most residents to flee to nearby communities out of fear of being detained and questioned on suspicion of possible connections to the AA.<\/p>\n But the woman who was attacked and her relatives stayed behind and hid because it would have been difficult for them to flee with the newborn, villagers told RFA.<\/p>\n Before the soldiers left U Gar village, they recorded videos of three elderly men, who out of fear said that the troops had not stolen any of the villagers\u2019 jewelry or animals or raped any woman, they said.<\/p>\n Reported by RFA\u2019s Myanmar Service. Translated by Khet Mar. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Source;https:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/myanmar\/army-rape-07072020183157.html<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Police in western Myanmar\u2019s volatile Rakhine state investigating the rape of an ethnic Rakhine woman during military operations in her village last week have summoned witnesses to provide their accounts of the alleged assault, a township administrator said Tuesday. The 36-year-old mother of four children told RFA on July 2 that she had been sexually […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4333,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"class_list":["post-4332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-human-rights-violation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4334,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332\/revisions\/4334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/equalitymyanmar.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}