Tag: Shan

Myanmar: More Bible students escape, but 20 women still held

December 3, 2018 Myanmar Baptists, China, Churches, Education, Myanmar, Shan

Ethnic Wa, Palaung and Shan people watch in 2013 a religious ceremony by the ethnic United Wa State Army who have been fighting Myanmar's government troops in northern Shan state for decades. (Photo: Getty Images)

Four of the 41 Bible students forcibly recruited by an ethnic minority army in Myanmar’s northern Shan state in September have escaped, according to Catholic news site UCAN. Last month an initial group of 17 students escaped from a United Wa State Army (UWSA) base in the Wa hills near the . . . Read More

Myanmar: Bible students ‘suffering health and psychological problems’ after escaping armed group

November 15, 2018 Myanmar China, Churches, Education, Kachin, Myanmar, Shan

Members of the ethnic army group UWSA stand guard north of Kyaing Tong town, in eastern Shan state, in 2006. (Photo: Getty Pictures)

Seventeen of the 41 Bible students forcibly recruited by an ethnic minority army in Myanmar’s northern Shan state in September have escaped, according to Catholic news site UCAN. The students arrived in groups of two or three at the Lahu Baptist Church in Kyaing Tong town, eastern Shan state, in the . . . Read More

Burmese Christians detained, ordered not to pray in churches

October 17, 2018 Myanmar Chin, Kachin, Myanmar, Shan, UN

A military group in Myanmar has detained ethnic minority Wa and Lahu Christians and ordered them to pledge that they will not pray in churches but only in their homes, Catholic news agency UCAN reports. One hundred Wa Christians, who signed a statement giving a guarantee, have since been released, . . . Read More

Myanmar: Ethnic army detains 92 pastors, orders others to leave

October 1, 2018 Myanmar China, Churches, Education, Missionaries, Myanmar, Shan, UN, USA

UWSA ethnic army has forced Bible students to join its ranks while closing and destroying churches in Wa region, northern Shan state. Photo: Getty Images

An ethnic armed group has recently detained almost 100 pastors and forced Bible students to join its ranks of fighters in northern Myanmar’s Shan state, reports Radio Free Asia. Witnesses who fled the state’s northern Wa region, which borders China, reported that 92 pastors were held by the armed group, . . . Read More

Churches destroyed, priests questioned in Myanmar’s Shan state

September 20, 2018 Myanmar China, Churches, Communism, Kachin, Missionaries, Myanmar, Shan, Tatmadaw, UN, USA

The United Wa State Army has ordered that churches built in Wa territory in Shan state after 1989 have to be destroyed. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

An ethnic armed group in Myanmar’s Shan state is destroying churches and holding clergymen for questioning, reports Radio Free Asia. The United Wa State Army (UWSA), the military wing of the United Wa State Party (UWSP), reportedly issued a statement on Facebook on 6 September, declaring that all churches built . . . Read More

US imposes sanctions on Myanmar for ‘widespread human rights abuses’

August 20, 2018 Myanmar Churches, Human rights, Kachin, Ma Ba Tha, Minorities, Myanmar, Rakhine, Rohingya, Sanctions, Shan, USA

Since fighting flared up in Kachin state in April thousands of people have fled their homes and, like these women, found refuge in temporary shelters at church compounds in Kachin's capital Myitkyina.(Photo: YE AUNG THU/AFP/Getty Images)

The US government announced on Friday that it had imposed sanctions on Myanmar for “widespread human rights abuses” against Christians, Rohingya Muslims and other ethnic minorities, reports The New York Times. According to the Treasury Department the abuses against Rohingya Muslims in southwestern Rakhine state, forcing more than 700,000 to seek . . . Read More

Myanmar’s ‘forgotten Christians’

August 16, 2018 Myanmar IDPs, Kachin, Karen, Minorities, Myanmar, Refugees, Shan, Youth

An internally displaced woman with a child stands near a temporary shelter in a church compound in Kachin's capital Myitkyina. (Photo: YE AUNG THU/AFP/Getty Images)

While the world is focusing on the plight of Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims, Christians caught up in another conflict, in northern Kachin, are largely forgotten, writes Geoffrey P. Johnston for Canadian newspaper The Whig. Thousands have been killed and least 120,000 displaced in majority-Christian Kachin state, where the army and the . . . Read More

Myanmar: ‘400 villages destroyed, 150,000 people displaced’ in Kachin

June 13, 2018 Myanmar Churches, Genocide, IDPs, Kachin, Minorities, Myanmar, Rakhine, Rohingya, Shan, UN

An elderly Kachin woman looks for shelter after fleeing fighting between Myanmar's army and Kachin rebels in December 2011. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

More than 400 villages have been damaged or destroyed and 150,000 people displaced since the collapse of a ceasefire in 2011 between Myanmar’s army and rebels in northern Kachin state, reports Catholic website AsiaNews. In 2018 alone, 50 villages were abandoned and more than 7,000 people fled their homes, seeking . . . Read More

Myanmar: new peace talks announced during Pope’s visit

November 29, 2017 Myanmar Cardinal Bo, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Myanmar, Panglong, Pope Francis, Rohingya, Shan

Pope Francis meeting Aung San Suu Kyi during his visit to Myanmar, Nov 2017 (Getty)

The third ‘Panglong Conference’ has been announced by Myanmar’s government during an official visit by Pope Francis, reports Catholic news agency Fides. Tabled for the last week in January, it will be the latest in a series of peace negotiations between armed ethnic groups and government forces. The original Panglong . . . Read More

Myanmar: Kachin Baptists jailed for helping photograph bombed church

October 27, 2017 Myanmar Baptists, Chin, Dumdaw Nawng Lat, Kachin, Langjaw Gam Seng, Myanmar, Shan

Two Kachin Baptist pastors who helped a journalist to photograph a Catholic church, apparently bombed by Myanmar’s army in 2016, have been sentenced to two years in prison, for their alleged support of the Kachin Independence Army. According to advocacy group Christian Solidarity Worldwide, which called the verdict a “serious . . . Read More

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