"As foreign investors flee, prices rise, and foreign reserves dwindle, many wonder how much longer Burma?s military regime can hold off the rising tide of unrest...The announcement that U.S. oil giant ARCO and telecommunications powerhouse Ericsson are pulling out of Burma is one more sign that the country?s economy is both closing and collapsing. ARCO?s announcement that it was abandoning its rights to develop offshore blocks of natural gas in Burma?s Andaman Sea and Ericsson?s hasty withdrawal are only two of a number of major projects that have fallen victim to Burma?s economic collapse and political impasse. The $800 million ?three-in-one” project which was to have been built by Total, Unocal and Mitsui was quietly shelved late last month. The project would have built a $300 million gas pipeline up from the Yadana pipeline to fuel a $200 million fertilizer plant and a $300 million electrical generating plant. The gas was to have come from the regime?s share of the Yadana field gas with the government and its three partners sharing construction costs..."