Soe Win Tan

Donate a temple or a pagoda. So the whole central plain is littered with thousands of pagodas and temples. So it became a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It's also a major attraction for tourists, foreign and locals alike. But since the military coup in 2021, visit to Myanmar by foreign tourists has dried up. So the locals rely on domestic visitors.

So these domestic visitors are now targeted. They're being kidnapped. So tell me, who is doing these kidnappings?

So it's really difficult because since the military coup, there are many different groups sprung up opposing the military rule. You know, they hold arms. So there are pockets of those resistant groups across the country. In that Bagan area also, there is a main road, which is occupied by the resistant groups. We call PDF, People's Defence Forces. Their main aim is to fight against the military rule.

Mutta edelleen, pdf-yhtiöt ovat yrittäneet pyrittää turistit tulokseen Berganiin. He pidättävät heidät, he pyytävät loppua, he tekevät hyvää tuotetta. Tämä vaikuttaa paikalliseen ekonomiin, koska paikalliset huoltajat ovat melko huoltajia Berganiin. Paikalliset ihmiset, jotka olisivat huoltajilta, kuten paikalliset tehtäviä, ruotsalaiset tekevät asioita, ovat nykyään todella vaikeita.

So are these kidnappings only for money and ransom or is there some political motivation behind them as well? Both. This one local BDF group admitted to that they do stop people who they suspect are supporting the military regime and they would interrogate them. There were also allegations that regime soldiers were also involved in kidnapping. We don't know. We can't confirm.

So recent case, just last week, famous actress and her entourage were traveling that route. The actress kind of stayed behind, so she wasn't kidnapped. An actress from Myanmar? From Myanmar, yes. They were traveling along this route and they were stopped and taken away by an armed group. So we spoke to that armed group and they represented denying that they kidnapped for money. They said they stopped those people.

He asked the actresses not to be part of the regime propaganda. So they said that they occasionally stopped and searched their trouble last, but they denied that they kidnapped people for ransom. But the ransoming is taking place along that route, where these groups operate. What happened to the actress and her entourage at the end? They were released eventually, but we don't know whether they had to pay ransom to that group or not. They would not say that openly.

Ja miksi Oulbaigan on erityisesti tarkoitettu paikalle? Yksi syy on yksilöllisyys. Rauta on jäätynyt. Siellä on joitain pieniä kaupungit, mutta ne ovat melko yksilöllisiä. Kun rauta on yksilöllinen, se on tullut helppoa tavoitteeseen.

And do the authorities acknowledge that there is a problem in that region and what are they doing about it? They don't really acknowledge. For the regime, I think two reasons is that they are too busy fighting. They are facing resistance by so many armed groups across the country. Because there are many places which are lawless, you know. And the other thing is they themselves cannot go after the kidnappers.

Because they are likely to be ambushed or waylaid on the way. Because they're armed anyway. Yeah, the groups are. Because the local groups know the kind of terrain. So when the soldiers would turn up, then they would disperse. They would mingle with the other kind of as a villagers. It's really difficult for them to tackle that as of now. Thank you very much. Sowin Tan from BBC Burmese. You've been listening to the documentary from the BBC World Service.