Persecuted minority in Myanmar sees Canada as model

Rev. Hkalam Samson got a good laugh out of his native friends the first time he visited their reserve near Winnipeg, awed by the low speed limits he interpreted as deep respect for Canada's aboriginals.

But Samson was in for a sobering reshaping of his understanding upon learning the signs were intended to prevent drunk-driving deaths. Suicides by three peers at their Manitoba seminary college during his two years of studies there also gave him pause.

Yet on comparing his own experiences as a minority, persecuted for decades under Myanmar's brutal military regime, Samson asserts the human and political rights afforded to Canada's natives are "more than enough."

That's why the church and community leader of 20 years is advocating for the recently-reformed government of his southeast Asian country also known as Burma to usher forward its emerging democracy by remaking his homeland in Canada's image.

"In Canada, you practice federalism. Each provincial government runs its own region. They tax, police their own territory," he said.

"If we have this kind of government, no problem. We are very happy. We can resist hardship." Samson was born in northern Myanmar's mountainous Kachin State, a member of a two millionstrong minority that has waged a decades-long battle for autonomy against successive military-dominated governments denounced last year by Canada for instigating "atrocious and unacceptable human suffering." It's a struggle with no end in sight, despite the country testing the waters of democracy.

While Samson readily draws parallels between Kachin customs and physical appearance and those of aboriginal Canadians, the Kachins' ultimate goal is instead tantamount to transforming Kachin State into Quebec. They want Myanmar morphed into a federal union, demarcated along ethnic lines, instead of the current system beholden to a central government they argue pays lip service to international concerns about widespread human rights abuses.

"Whenever we talk about (gaining a) federal democracy, we talk about Canada, Switzerland, Sweden. Those are the model countries," said Dumsa Dau Hka, an adviser to the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), the rebel group that styles itself the white knight of the Kachin people.

"That is what we Kachin want."

Canadian parliamentarians investigated violations against the Kachin in spring 2012, convening an all-party subcommittee that condemned the Myanmar military for an ethnic and religious-based "program of persecution" they compared at the time to Syria.

Samson was there too, returning to Canada for the first time in nearly 15 years to testify in Ottawa. He praised Canadian-style governance and requested international pressure be brought to bear on his country's government towards solving the worsening humanitarian crisis.

But just over a year later, a journey to Samson's ramshackle hometown of Myitkyina - the capital of Kachin State and a short flight from the Himalayas - reveals his people are still languishing, distant as ever from the pulse of change in the heartland.

"The military intelligence came into my camp. Took me and put me in a room. Started to question me," said Brang Shawng, a hollow-eyed 25-year-old released in late June from imprisonment for allegedly blowing up city buildings. "I resisted many times. But they beat and tortured me. I finally (falsely) confessed. ... I was scared, I did not want to die."

The father of three is living once again in an internally displaced persons' camp on the city's outskirts, one of 129 total camps throughout the state.

He explained through a translator that the military pinned the crimes on him because he shares the same name as a rebel army captain.

A March 2012 report by Human Rights Watch accused the military of "serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law, including deliberate or indiscriminate attacks on civilians, unlawful killings, torture and illtreatment, the use of child soldiers and the use of abusive forced labour in conflict zones."

The report also chastised the KIA for conscripting child soldiers and its ongoing use of landmines.

http://www.information.myanmaronlinecentre.com/persecuted-minority-in-myanmar-sees-canada-as-model/