Kawthoolei: The Karens long wait

For the past thirty years, millions of Karen villagers in Burma have been living a precarious existence, regularly being displaced from their huts into the surrounding forests and state-controlled relocation sites. All the while, the Karen have continued to struggle against a military-run state that exerts absolute control over their movement, land, farming, produce and every other aspect of their lives.

The Karen are an ethnic minority living in the forestlands along the Thai-Burmese frontier, who trace their lineage back to Tibet. Since 1948, when Burma broke free from British rule, the Karen have been fighting for independence through an armed group, the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), overseen by the Karen National Union (KNU). This makes the Karen struggle one of the longest wars for independence in the world today. As can be seen in the accompanying photographs, of the current estimated population of around seven million, 1.5 million have been displaced from their villages by the Burmese junta, under the threat of forced labour, rape and landmines. A number of refugee camps have sprung up on the Thai side of the border, the largest of them housing more than 50,000 inhabitants. There, the Karen might be safe, but they again enjoy next to no freedom, since the Thai government is reluctant to acknowledge them as refugees. Today, their survival depends on international aid and volunteers.