Maungdaw: 143 families brought in from Burma proper were settled last week in model villages that are being established in Maungdaw Township in western Burma's Arakan State by the Burmese military regime.
An official told Narinjara that the families were brought from Rangoon Division and they are the 19th round of settlers since the villages were set up in Arakan State.
"All the families are brought from Rangoon Division. Among them, 61 families are of retired prison department officials, 14 are of police, and the rest are of the general population from four districts in Rangoon. They include 422 people in total and this was the 19th settlement since the model villages were established in Arakan State," said the official on condition of anonymity.
The official said that the families were brought from Rangoon to Sittwe by sea on 28 March and arrived in Maungdaw on 1 April. They were temporarily accommodated in Maungdaw's Ka Nyin Tan Ward and later sent to different model villages in Maungdaw.
40 of them were sent to Taungbro and the rest were sent to Nyaung Chaung and Kharee Myaing model villages in Maungdaw, added the official.
The Burmese regime started to establish the model villages in the border townships of Rathidaung, Buthidaung, and Maungdaw in Arakan State since 1999.
According to the official record, 50 model villages had already been set up in those townships and 1,952 families, with 6,655 people, were settled in the villages.
The settlers are being brought mainly from Burma proper and they are mostly ethnic Burmese. They are provided by the regime with free houses, free arable land, and equipment to earn livelihoods.
According to local residents, there is dissatisfaction with the settlers because most of them are criminals, homeless, or transient people from Burma proper and they often engage in anti-social activities in Arakan.
