Religious minorities bear the brunt of Myanmar’s repression
The sentencing of a Baptist pastor in April has dealt a new blow to the Christian minority in Myanmar, which has historically been persecuted by the army
When the Reverend Dr. Hkalam Samson, former head of the Baptist community in Myanmar, was sentenced to six years in prison early last month, it marked another blow against Christians in the Southeast Asian country, which has been under a repressive military rule since February 2021.
"Ethnic and religious minorities are exposed to persecution, especially their leaders," said Salai Za Uk Ling, a Burmese activist now living in exile.
A "brutal military regime"
The Burmese courts, which are affiliated with the dictatorship of General Min Aung Hlaing, sentenced the pastor on Good Friday. It’s not clear if that was merely a coincidence or a deliberately cynical choice. The 65-year-old pastor from Kachin State in North-East Myanmar is a former leader of the Kachin Baptist Convention. He was arrested last December on charges of terrorism, illegal association and inciting opposition to the junta's power, which has plunged Burma into chaos since the 2021 military coup.
Ten days after Dr. Samson was convicted, the United States denounced "trumped-up" charges by a "brutal military regime" targeting "a religious figure respected for his courageous work" in "defending religious freedom. During a visit to Washington in 2019, the pastor was already denouncing the "oppression" the Burmese military was inflicting on minorities.
In late 2022, Thian Lian Sang, a pastor in the western state of Chin, was similarly sentenced to twenty-three years in prison, said Salai Za Uk Ling, deputy executive director of the Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO).
"In Chin State, four pastors have been murdered. One was brutally murdered. Another was kidnapped," the CHRO director said, citing his organization’s latest figures.
The organization, which has special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council, documents abuses committed by the army in Chin State, which is 90 percent Christian.
The activist said some 83 churches have been destroyed in Myanmar in the more than two years since Aung San Suu Kyi's government was overthrown. "When the soldiers enter a village, they stay in the church, knowing full well that the Chin resistance will not attack them in a sacred place," he said. From one village to another, parishes are burned or vandalized. "Sometimes mines are left behind: pastors have lost their legs,” the CHRO director explained.
"Discriminated against because of our religious identity"
Such abuse has forced a quarter of the population of Chin State to move. Other regions with Christian populations are affected by the violence, such as Kachin (northeast), Kayah (east) and Karen (southeast) states. For example,the army massacred a Christian village in Kachin state last year on Christmas eve, burning alive nearly 40 Karennis, including children and old people.
Although the army's brutality has increased tenfold since February 2021, it is not new, Salai Za Uk Ling insisted.
"Since the 1962 coup d'état, successive military regimes have pursued discriminatory policies against religious minorities, including Christians (about 8%), who are particularly threatened because they represent the country's most visible and identifiable minority," he pointed out.
In Myanmar, where 90% of the 53 million population is Buddhist, there is a correlation between religion and ethnicity: the majority ethnic group, the Bamars, is associated with Buddhism, while ethnic minorities are associated with other faiths. Since Christianity is seen as a Western influence, Christians are historically viewed as disloyal to the government.
"Laws have been passed to promote a state Buddhism," said CHRO's deputy executive director. "Separate schools are being built, boarding schools run by Buddhist monks and designed to indoctrinate: we have always been discriminated against because of our religious identity and ethnicity, including under the presidency of Aung San Suu Kyi."
The drama of the Rohingya
And what about the drama of the Rohingya? Stateless, This ethnic group, of which most members are Muslims, is without a state and has settled in Arakan in western Myanmar. The Rohingya have been victims of genocide according to the United States. They have fled by the hundreds of thousands to neighboring Bangladesh.
Alexandra de Mersan, a lecturer at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (Inalco), said the Christians are just one of many targets: "Any group that resists is in the military's sights."
What is new in comparison to other periods when the junta was in power, the anthropologist said, "is that some Burmese, even those belonging to the majority ethnic group, are resisting and many have taken refuge in areas controlled by the so-called ethnic armies to train there”.
“There is now a mea culpa on the part of the Burmese, recognizing that they did not understand to what extent these minorities, on the margins and long-repressed by the army, had suffered," de Mersan said.