Chin Towns Rocked by Night Robberies

10 November 2012: Local communities in the towns of Thantlang and Hakha, Chin State are worried as a number of shops have continuously been broken into by ‘unknown’ burglars at night in recent weeks.

Within the last ten days, four different shops owned by Pu Ram Cung, Pu Run Cer, Pu Pa Awm and Pu Kawng Luai were robbed in Hakha on 3 and 5 November 2012 respectively.

“Items worth of thousands of kyats are stolen but the robbers cannot be identified until today. It is very worrying,” a Chin local from Hakha told Chinland Guardian.

Thantlang town, about 20 miles away from Hakha, has also seen at least six shops being burgled and goods taken away by mysterious robbers in the last three months.

One of a Chin shop owners from Thantlang told Chinland Guardian: “They [robbers] seem to know where valuable items and money are kept. Many shops that had been robbed lost items worth thousands of kyats. Something has got to be done.”

Sources said that local shop owners got confused whether the cases would be reported to the police or authorities as the robbers could mostly escape unnoticed despite many incidents being made known in the past.

Meanwhile, TABC (Thantlang Association of Baptist Church) is claimed to have filed a lawsuit against members of the Thantlang court including its head U Thet Aung for releasing from jail a burglar, who stole 300,000 kyats from TABC and 200,000 kyats from a local church, according to Faiceu news.

A community leader from Hakha said: “These people [robbers] who committed such crimes can only be a small group. Proper actions must be taken as we tend to feel unsecure and unsafe in our community.”

“In the past, a series of robberies took place in Hakha and a group of youth volunteers was secretly formed to tackle the problems. Eventually, they found out that the robbers were family members of Burma Army soldiers based on the mountain of Rungtlang,” a Chin government employee told Chinland Guardian.

Reporting by Thawng Zel Thang
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