The avarice of the generals of the Burmese military junta and their cronies are above human, environmental and ecological concerns. Encroachment and rampant land grabbing is creating a serious ecological disbalance where the fragile eco system of the world's largest tiger reserve in Hukawng Valley in Kachin State, Burma is in grave peril. The pro-junta Yuzana Company has grabbed over 200,000 acres of land in the valley around the tiger reserve with the help of Burma's ruling junta since last year. The US-based Wildlife Conservation Society dubbed the Hukawng Valley the world's largest tiger reserve in 2004.
So perturbed are residents living around Hukawng Valley over the rapid destruction of the ecology of the valley following the encroachment and frenetic gold mining activities, that they have made a fervent appeal to senior General Than Shwe to intervene lest the tiger reserve be reduced to a commercial entity. The appeal has been met by stony silence.
With the active connivance of the Burmese Army the Rangoon- based Yuzana Company owned by U Htay Myint, has been on a land grabbing spree in the lush and verdant valley. The company has employed over 500 workers and since the end of 2006 started seizing agricultural tracts to grow sugar cane and cassava plants in the occupied land.
The blitzkrieg mounted on the Hukawng Valley by the Yuzana Company has seen farmers losing acres and acres of paddy field, orchards and grazing land for cattle. The company equipped with modern farm machinery imported from abroad descended on the quite environs of the valley, where people tilled land and tended to their orchards and plantations in an ambience of serenity and in coexistence with nature. Money and muscle power silenced both efforts to stop the company. Dissent has been effectively muffled.
In an inexplicable move which had villagers bewildered and angry, Yuzana Company employees went about systematically spraying an unknown chemical agent leading to wanton killing of domestic and wild animals. Carcasses of buffaloes, cows and wild pigs littered the fields even as vultures hovered overhead.
Rampant felling of trees and bamboo, needed for locally styled home construction is now in short supply given the depredation in the woods and forests by company employees. The onslaught on the forests and farmlands by a company's management, whose greed is boundless, is rapidly destroying the natural habitat of birds and wild animals, including the tiger for which the Hukawng Valley is famous.
Both the fragile eco-system and the economy of the area have come under the axe leading to a serious social conflict between the local people and the company's workers. The firm's workers are from lower Burma and this has only increased hostilities with the ethnic population. Quarrels have led to fights and killings. Quite a few villagers have gone missing. After the company arrived hapless people around the valley have had their lives turned upside down by the commercial activities afoot with the blessings of the junta. While the junta backed Yuzana Company's intrusion into the valley began last year, attempts to wrest control of Kachin state from the Kachin Independent Organization (KIO) dates back to 1994 after the rebel armed group was manipulated into a ceasefire agreement by the shrewd generals of the ruling dictatorship. The KIO was lulled into believing that a political dialogue would be initiated. But after the ceasefire no plea for a dialogue was entertained by the junta. The relations between the junta and the KIO began to sour from 2005.
The military has sought to occupy Kachin state with all the powers at its resource. The junta has used military and economic clout at its disposal to make inroads in a state which apart from its flora and fauna and agricultural resources, boasts the only jade mines in the country in Phakant. The state also has a lot of gold mines, the biggest being in Hukawng Valley along Mali River and N'mai River together with mines in Putao.
It was but obvious that the junta would systematically try to usurp Kachin resources --- mainly its mineral wealth. Laced with the desire to fleece the state of its resources, was the political aim of wresting control of a region in northern Burma, which has been fighting for self determination and autonomy. In the parlance of the ethnic nationalities, what the generals have been out to achieve over the years is the total Burmanization of the country. This is being sought to be achieved by mass internal migration especially of Burmans from lower Burma to the Hukawng Valley regions and other areas of Kachin state, akin to the ethnic cleansing methods adopted in Arakan state where people from central Burma are being settled in newly built model villages on land confiscated from the Rohingya community.
In conclusion, the attitude of the Burmese military junta is reminiscent of invaders down history. The agenda -- loot at any cost.
Feedback:
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
About the author: The author is a veteran journalist from India and has been in major newspapers as a Reporter, Deputy Chief of Bureau, News Coordinator, Op-ed and Edit writer.
