Footage appearing to show the brutal public flogging of drug addicts in Myanmar’s Kachin State has been met with outcry online.
While corporal punishment is not unusual in the remote area, where armed separatists once executed addicts on the spot, the five-minute clip has been viewed thousands of times.
It shows men, of varying ages, whipped up to five times each on the back of their legs. When one buckles, the crowd jeers and onlookers push him back up.
The people carrying out the punishment could not be identified but several community-based organizations carry out drug rehabilitation in Kachin State and corporal punishment has been used when addicts failed to follow orders.
Sharing the clip, one student wrote: “The gang’s action is not prevention of drug abuse but brutal, inhumane torture. Their action is not protection of society but humiliation and dehumanization of people.”
The video, which was undated, could not be immediately verified by Coconuts Yangon but a tipster said it was uploaded to Facebook on August 11 by someone who quickly took it down and deleted their own profile.
Heroin and methamphetamine use is rampant among young people in Kachin State.
The area has been ravaged by war since summer 2011, when clashes brought a 17-year ceasefire between the Myanmar Army and the separatist Kachin Independence Army to an end.
