As thousands of displaced Karen fill temporary shelters along the Salween River in Burma, their plight has yet to mobilize the international community...

"A large boat churns through the coffee-colored waters of the Salween River that separates Burma from Thailand. Sitting among plastic wrapped bundles of mosquito nets, tins of sardines, boxes of iron nails, plastic buckets, hammers and floor mats, a small chunky man stares at the fast-gathering rain clouds smothering the hot sun.

Despite a number of peace talks having been conducted between the central government and Kachin Independence Army (KIA), there is no sign of the war ceasing in Kachin state. The ongoing armed conflict has been driving thousands of civilians out of their villages. Many IDPs are now living in church supported camps along with relief from international humanitarian agencies. IDPs living in crowded camps with limited support face various obstacles as they cannot practice their livelihood anymore.

#039;"Welcome to our new Kachin townships," the camp administrator said sarcastically as he guided us down the muddy path leading to one of the dozens of refugee camps scattered through Kachin, the thin sliver of land which forms Burma's northernmost region. Makeshift shelters constructed from canvas and bamboo are now home for thousands of internally displaced people.

The United Nations refugee agency say there are more than 50,000 displaced people here, the Kachin put the figure much higher...

Karen Internally Displaced Persons wonder when they will be able to go home...

"Sitting in his new bamboo hut in Ler Per Her camp for Internally Displaced Persons, located on the bank of Thailand’s Moei River near the border with Burma, Phar The Tai—a skinny, tough-looking man of 60 who used to hide in the jungles and mountains of Burma’s eastern Karen State—waits for the time when he can return home.

Highly recommended. Well-organised site. In "list of sources used" are most of the main reports from 1995 bearing on IDPs (though the reports from 1995 to 1997 are missing - temporarily, one hopes) and more Burma pages updated June 2001. Go to the home page for links on IDPs, including the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement.

Finding Food in Fear/Living in Fear
Introduction for ‘one family’....

In February 2010, Burma Issues conducted a field trip inside Karen State to raise internally displaced persons’ (IDPs) awareness of the upcoming elections. While they were watching a video, the township where the IDPs were staying was attacked by the Burmese army. They had to flee into the jungle and our cameraman decided to follow.

The most controversial aspect of the census recently held in Burma has been the denial of the large Muslim population in Arakan to identify themselves as Rohingya, the term of their choice. The government ban means as many as one million people remain uncounted in Arakan. That is scarcely surprising, as the Burmese government, Rakhine ultra-nationalists and seemingly a majority of the Burmese population have denied for years the existence of the Rohingya identity.

Mass Displacement by the Burmese Army's forced relocation program in Tenasserim division first rose to awareness when multi-national companies started to build the Yadana gas pipeline. What followed was a Burmese Army offensive in 1997 to KNU controlled areas to secure more of the area for their business interests. After the arrival of foreign companies and the Yadana gas pipeline the Kamoethway area became a refuge for those fleeing from the gas pipeline area. Later Kamoethway area itself became another target for Burmese troops trying to gain better access to the gas pipeline.

Burma has a population of 50 million people, recent estimates place 2 million of those people as Internally Displaced
Persons (IDP). They live precarious and transient lives in the jungles of Burma’s ethnic border areas and in the more urban
central plains. They are denied the stability of having a home and a livelihood and are forced into a constant state of
movement: never having the opportunity to maintain a home, their farms, access to education and medical facilities and
peace of mind...

Historically underdeveloped and divided, Burma today is politically isolated, increasingly militarised, economically mismanaged by its own authorities, and socially and culturally divided along ethnic, religious, and language lines. Following independence from Britain in 1948, parties representing the ethnic minority population have been struggling for greater autonomy from the central Burmese regime.

Some docs on IDPs in Burma

Refugees International Advocate Veronika Martin and human rights lawyer Betsy Apple recently completed an assessment mission to the Thai-Burmese border.