Millions Endure Forced Labour

From Radio Australia, 21 May 2001

While visiting Japan in mid-May, Maung Maung, secretary general of the Federation of Trade Unions-Burma, said Tokyo should stop giving development assistance to Burma as it only strengthens the military dictatorship.

Mr Maung added that the government has been making farmers build roads, dams and military installations for years without pay. He told an audience that Burma’s economy had deteriorated since the military junta seized political control over the country in the late 1980s.

He said that more than three million people had been forced into labour by government agents.