Exiles Report Burma Uses Forced Laborers To Build Tourist Facilities

Burma’s military government is using forced labor to build tourist facilities at a national park, a student group in exile said Monday.

Burma’s government, meanwhile, accused U.S. diplomats of interfering in the country’s internal affairs and warned it may consider downgrading diplomatic ties to the United States and other Western nations, Burma’s state-run press reported.

A villager who escaped from Burma said he was among 150 villagers rounded up each week by the Burmese military to work without food or pay at a marine national park on Lampi Island, off Burma’s southern coast.

About 400 Burmese prisoners also are used as forced labor in the project, the villager told the All Burma Students Democratic Front in Thailand.

A 1996 report by the U.S. Embassy in Rangoon estimated that forced labor accounts for about 3 percent of Burma’s gross domestic product.

Burma’s military government admits it uses forced labor to build infrastructure, but says its citizens are happy to contribute.

The marine park is one of two environmental projects the Burmese government is developing.