Fleeing Burmese soldier claims he was press-ganged into the army
Jan 23, 2009 - A Burmese Army private has escaped to Thailand and claimed that he was forced to join the Burmese army. Kyit Ko, a.k.a Than Lyin, aged 23, arrived at a Thai border police station at 10 a.m. on January 23rd, according to a border source.
Kyit Ko told the local source that he had been posted to an army outpost at the border a month ago. The junior soldiers were ordered by their platoon commander to cut bamboo from the forest to fence off the camp, dig trenches and fetch water from the stream. Before moving to this border post he used to receive a salary of 11,000 kyat per month, but he had not being paid since his transfer to the border.
“On the day of his escape he was ordered to cut bamboo in the morning at about 7 a.m., but instead he made his way to a Thai border village that sent him to the Thai police station,” reported the source.
Khit Ko is from a village located in the Mandalay area. According to his account he was ‘recruited’ by a section commander, Than Sein from LIB no. 350, while he was returning from Mandalay train station after helping his father at his workplace. Than Sein asked him to join the army, then beat him with a bamboo slat three times when he refused to do so. He was then forced to accompany Than Sein to the army camp for finger printing and wasthen sent to the Mandalay army recruitment center.
Khit Ko had to attend a four and a half month military training. He says there were about 250 recruits attending the same training and about half of them appeared to be underage.
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