Much has been made in recent times of the continued use in Burma of antiquated and anti-human rights laws from the country's decades of military rule, as well as from the colonial era. While legislators discuss the amendment or revocation of some laws, and the issue is debated in the public domain, much less is said of the superstructure of military-introduced administrative orders that officials around the country continue to employ in their day-to-day activities, invariably in order to circumscribe or deny human rights.

The new wave of land deals is not the new investment in
agriculture that millions had been waiting for. The poorest people
are being hardest hit as competition for land intensifies. Oxfam’s
research has revealed that residents regularly lose out to local
elites and domestic or foreign investors because they lack the
power to claim their rights effectively and to defend and advance
their interests. Companies and governments must take urgent
steps to improve land rights outcomes for people living in poverty.

This report contains the full transcript of an interview conducted during April 2011 in Tantabin Township, Toungoo District by a community member trained by KHRG to monitor human rights conditions. The community member interviewed a 37 year-old township secretary, Saw H---, who described abuses committed by several Tatmadaw battalions, including forced relocation, land confiscation, forced labour, restrictions on freedom of movement, denial of humanitarian access, targeting civilians, and arbitrary taxes and demands.

...Like the other resource concessions, land grabbing for large scale agriculture and military purpose in ethnic areas is a military state-building strategy of Myanmar military led-government. Since 1990s, in Myanmar, a military-run dictatorship has adopted its own version of market economy. While maintaining ownership of all land, the state allocated large land concession to companies, which have strong network with generals or government officials, for logging, mining, and agribusiness purpose.

The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand, Bangkok - Three years after the 2012 preliminary ceasefire negotiations between the Myanmar government and the Karen National Union (KNU), reported instances of land confiscation continue to increase in southeast Myanmar. In its 2015 report, ‘With only our voices, what can we do?’, KHRG highlights four main land use types which lead to land confiscation: infrastructure projects, natural resource extraction, commercial agriculture projects, and military activities.

Land confiscation is narrowly defined by KHRG as incidents in which villagers’ access to or use of land is forcibly supplanted by another actor without their consent. Land confiscation often occurs at proposed development, natural resource extraction, or private business sites, including hydro-electric dams, mining and logging projects, and plantation agriculture. Increased militarisation at these sites perpetuates a cycle of land confiscation in areas adjacent to the sites for the development of military camps, roads, or other infrastructure to support the project.

Commentary: Land Grabbing and Related Issues and Abuses Continue...
Contents: Themes & Places of Violations reported in this issue...
Acronyms:
MAP...
Land abandoned under force seized and original owners required to buy them back, in Lai-Kha...
Burmese military let people’s militia groups grow crops on lands long cultivated by local people, in Nam-Zarng...
Situation of land grabbing and related abuses in areas under the influence of a ceasefire group “UWSA”, in Murng-Ton...

Contents:
1. Introduction
1.1 Purpose of Discussion Paper
2. Background History
2.1 Ethnic Politics and Military Interference
3. Land tenure legislation (1948-62)
3.1 Earlier a brief period of Democracy (1948-1962)
3.2 Under BSBP rule (1962 - 1988)
3.3 Under Military ruling (1988 - Up to now)
4. Socio-Economic Poverty and Land Ownership
5. Summary of Findings
6. Analysis of Findings
7. Militarization and land confiscation
8. No rights to a fair Market price and food sovereignty

Outline of a Pilot Approach towards Cadastral Registration of Customary
Communal Land Tenure in Myanmar....."...The objectives of the study were to identify legal ways using the Farmland Law 2012 and
Association Law 2014 to protect through land registration the untitled agricultural uplands,
including the fallows of upland shifting cultivation that are possessed by ethnic nationalities
that manage their lands under customary communal tenure. The risk of possible alienation of

WITH SUBSTANTIAL SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS, INCLUDING A PHOTO ESSAY...Selected Land and Livelihood Impacts Along the Shwe Natural Gas and China-Myanmar Oil Transport Pipeline from Rakhine State to Mandalay Division..."Yesterday, we published a photo essay and companion report highlighting the severe impacts of the Shwe natural gas and Myanmar-China oil transport pipelines on the lives and livelihoods of local communities living around these mega-projects.

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The international community, whose Western representatives so readily flock to Myanmar in both good will and selfish interest, is often an unwitting contributor to the country's persistent instability. This will likely lead not to intended peace but to more unwanted war until certain facts are fully faced...

Myanmar may soon face a land conflict epidemic as a result of the growing influx of investments and
the consequent demand for land, unless laws and policies that adequately address land rights issues
are urgently adopted and implemented.
The Myotha Industrial Park typifies Myanmar’s current economic development model, which seeks
to incentivize investment in areas designated as “least developed.” The Myotha Industrial Park,
developed by the Burmese company Mandalay Myotha Industrial Development (MMID) in Ngazun