Images Asia: No Childhood At All (1997)

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RESTRICTED: Original audiovisual materials are closed to use. Use of these materials may require production of listening or viewing copies.

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Containers:

Box 287, Video-cassette BU047

Physical description:

NTSC VHS [TRT 00:25:00] (2 copies)

Scope and content:

1. Produced by: Images Asia
2. Report on children and how they have suffered physically, mentally and emotionally under Burma's military regime. They are denied basic services and education, and are forced to work for the military regime and/or join the army.
3. Footage of children breaking rocks, building tourist sites, carrying huge bags from boats to land, working at construction sites, irrigation schemes, road building, and mixing toxic chemicals. Footage of children training at various military camps, including the Tiger Camp under drug war lord Kun Sa. Testimonies of former child soldiers. Also includes footage of student demonstrations: December 6, 1996, at Hledan Intersection, Rangoon.
4. Segment on how students risk their lives to demonstrate against the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). The SLORC responds with military retaliation. Footage of student demonstrations: "I believe that, starting from this day, this night, this place, at this time all of us must fight in unity for the dignity of past student leaders, in memory of those who fought in the colonial revolution, for future generations, for the people of Burma, and for our lives."
5. From a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) report: "Many children in Burma are orphaned, abandoned, trafficked, exploited in the labor force, institutionalized or jailed. Across the country many children enjoy no childhood at all. They are simply put to work."
6. Aung San Suu Kyi: "Children have become involved in forced labor lately, because their parents can't afford to take time off from whatever they are doing to make a living, so if you don't provide one person per family for forced labor then you are fined parents send their children to take their place."
7. According to this report, classrooms are crowded, there is a shortage of textbooks, the dropout rate is high, and 40% of the children have never been to school. Ethnic children are worse off, dislocated by civil war, abandoned, or lost. Girls are likely to end up in the brothels and sweat shops across Thailand. Boys are forced to join the army.
8. From a UNICEF report: "Children have become victims or participants in Burma's armed conflicts, used as porters, human shields or human minesweepers.Children are killed, forcibly conscripted, unwillingly separated from their families, kidnapped and tortured."
9. The report states that conscription of children to the army is common, the army rounds up children at movie halls, tea shops, and even schools. Stories are told by runaway child soldiers:
10. Shwe Hla, 7th grader: "After school the SLORC soldiers came and surrounded the school and arrested us if rich people paid a bribe, they would be freed of course, but we had no money."
11. Naing Oo, age 16: "The commanders mixed large tablets with army rum and the soldiers would become aggressive."
12. The SLORC says Burma is experiencing an economic boom, and shows off foreign imports.This report claims that only a small echelon of the society is prospering.

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