Khthon documents mass graves, atrocity crimes, and forensic evidence from conflict zones worldwide. Our work is strictly humanitarian and apolitical.
This site may contain imagery and descriptions of deceased individuals, violent injuries, and human remains gathered in the course of active investigations. Content is presented for accountability and documentation purposes only.
Khthon documents mass graves, atrocity crimes, and forensic evidence from conflict zones worldwide. Our work is strictly humanitarian and apolitical.
This site may contain imagery and descriptions of deceased individuals, violent injuries, and human remains gathered in the course of active investigations.
Khthon · Active Investigation
Decades of military rule and ethnic conflict, reaching global attention with the 2017 "clearance operations" in Rakhine State. With direct access blocked, Khthon's casework here leans on survivor testimony, leaked imagery, and investigative journalism more than any other country in our coverage.
Related Coverage
Situation Overview
Myanmar has endured decades of military rule and violent conflict with its many ethnic minorities, reaching global attention during the 2017 crackdown in Rakhine State. The army, the Tatmadaw, has long deployed scorched-earth tactics — burning villages, committing sexual violence, and forcibly displacing communities. Security forces targeted the Rohingya Muslim minority in what the UN later described as possible genocide. Hundreds of thousands fled across the border into Bangladesh, while those who remained faced systematic violence: killings, torture, and disappearances carried out by soldiers and local militias under state command.
"Systematic forensic investigation has been blocked by military authorities, leaving evidence hidden, contested, and politically dangerous to uncover."
— Khthon Field Assessment
Mass graves are an integral part of this campaign. The most widely confirmed case is the Inn Din massacre, where ten Rohingya men were executed and buried in a single grave, acknowledged by the military after Reuters exposed it in 2018. Survivor testimonies, satellite imagery of burned villages, and clandestine photographs suggest many more burial sites throughout northern Rakhine. These graves are typically shallow, located on village edges or in fields quickly abandoned during mass flight, making them nearly impossible to detect through satellite imagery alone once vegetation regrows.
GEOINT Methodology
Myanmar underscores the importance of HUMINT and SOCMINT: eyewitness accounts, leaked imagery, and investigative journalism have proven more revealing here than remote sensing.
Methods Applied Across This Casework
01 · HUMINT
Refugee Camp Testimony
With direct access to Rakhine State blocked, survivor accounts gathered from Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh camps are Khthon's primary source of location, timing, and circumstantial detail for suspected burial sites.
02 · SOCMINT
Leaked Imagery & Journalism
Soldier-phone photographs, when they surface, and investigative reporting — including the Reuters exposé that forced military acknowledgment of Inn Din — are cross-referenced against other evidence rather than treated as standalone proof.
03 · SATINT
Constrained Remote Sensing
Satellite imagery of burned villages helps anchor incident locations and timing, but shallow graves on field edges are quickly reclaimed by vegetation — Myanmar is where Khthon relies least on imagery alone and most on human sources.
1948
Independence and the beginning of ethnic conflict
Burma gains independence from Britain. Almost immediately, ethnic insurgencies — from Karen, Kachin, Shan, and other groups — begin against the central government. These conflicts, some of the world's longest-running, establish the foundational pattern of Tatmadaw operations: scorched earth, mass displacement, and summary executions in contested areas.
1978 & 1991
Early Rohingya expulsions
Operation Nagamin (1978) and Operation Pyi Thaya (1991) drive hundreds of thousands of Rohingya into Bangladesh. Both operations involve killings, rape, and village destruction. The systematic denial of Rohingya citizenship under the 1982 Citizenship Law establishes the legal architecture for subsequent persecution.
2016
ARSA attacks and military response — Rakhine State
The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) attacks police posts in Rakhine State, triggering a disproportionate military response. Villages are burned, women are raped, and hundreds are killed. Human rights organisations document widespread abuses, foreshadowing the larger campaign of 2017.
2017
"Clearance operations" — the Inn Din massacre
Following further ARSA attacks, the Tatmadaw launches systematic "clearance operations" across northern Rakhine. Over 700,000 Rohingya flee to Bangladesh. At Inn Din village, ten Rohingya men are arrested, executed, and buried in a mass grave — the only massacre the military has formally acknowledged. Reuters journalists who exposed it are imprisoned.
2018
UN Fact-Finding Mission — possible genocide finding
The UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar concludes that military commanders should be investigated and prosecuted for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. The report documents mass graves, burned villages, and systematic sexual violence. Myanmar rejects all findings.
2020
ICJ orders provisional measures
Following Gambia's genocide case filed at the International Court of Justice, the court orders Myanmar to take provisional measures to protect the Rohingya. It is the first time the ICJ has issued such an order in a genocide case against a state. Myanmar's compliance remains contested.
2021
Military coup — new wave of atrocities nationwide
The Tatmadaw seizes power on February 1, 2021, ending a decade of partial democracy. Mass protests are met with lethal force. A civil war between the military and the People's Defence Force (PDF) escalates across Sagaing, Magway, Chin, and Kayah states. Massacres, including Kani (2021) and Let Yet Kone (2022), produce new mass graves.
Ongoing
Khthon's Myanmar casework
With direct access blocked, Khthon monitors Myanmar through survivor testimony from Bangladesh camps, leaked soldier phone footage, and cross-referencing satellite imagery of burned village sites with SOCMINT from conflict-monitoring networks. Mass grave detection is complicated by rapid vegetation regrowth over shallow pits — making human intelligence the primary detection tool.
Browse Khthon's full catalogue of country and case reports across seven global regions, or get involved with our ongoing investigations.
