Myanmar activists release report

Myanmar activists release report

BANGKOK (AFP): The Myanmar military is responsible for massive human rights abuses in southern Myanmar in the pursuit of major economic ventures, a report by dissident students released yesterday said.

The All Burma Students' Democratic Front allege that tens of thousands of villagers have been relocated or used as forced labor on state infrastructure projects in the drive to develop the region.

"Terror in the South: Militarization, Economics and Human Rights in Southern Burma" documents how locals have suffered as roads, railways, gas pipelines and even ecotourism ventures have been built.

"Human rights abuses against the local population have increased as a result of the military's heightened presence in the region to secure large scale infrastructure projects," the student group said.