Shan Women’s Action Network

SWAN was founded by Shan women active in Thailand, inside Shan State and along the Thai- Burma border in Chiang Mai on 28 March1999.

Background of SWAN

Due to the mass forced relocation of approximately 300,000 Shan ethnic people from over 1,400 villages in central Shan State by Burma’s military regime and its massacres and systematic rape used to subjugate and terrorize the Shan communities, hundreds of thousands of Shan people have been fleeing into Thailand. Many stayed in the Shan State Army controlled territory close to the Thai- Burma border.  Unlike the Karen and Karenni refugees, the Thai government did not recognize the Shan people as refugees nor allow them to set up refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border.